CHAPTER IX
CONFIDENCES AND SECRET WRITING
The shore was a miracle of wild water and white foam. When the windblows into Cruden Bay there is no end or limit to the violence of waves,which seem to gather strength as they rush over the flat expanse ofshore. The tide was now only half in, and ordinarily there would havebeen a great stretch of bare sand between the dunes and the sea.To-night, however, the piling up of the waters sent in an unnatural tidewhich swept across the flat shore with exceeding violence. The roaringwas interminable, and as we stood down on the beach we were envelopedin sheets of flying foam. The fierce blasts came at moments with suchstrength that it was physically impossible for us to face them. After alittle we took shelter behind one of the wooden bathing-boxes fasteneddown under the sandhills. Here, protected from the direct violenceof the storm, the shelter seemed like a calm from which we heard theroaring of wind and wave as from far off. There was a sense of cosinessin the shelter which made us instinctively draw close together. I couldhave remained happy in such proximity forever, but I feared that itwould end at any moment. It was therefore, with delight that I heard thevoice of Miss Anita, raised to suit the requirements of the occasion:
"Now that we are alone, won't you tell me about Gormala and the strangeoccurrences?" I tried to speak, but the storm was too great for thepurposes of narrative. So I suggested that we should come behind thesandhill. We went accordingly, and made a nest in a deep hollow behindthe outer range of hillocks. Here crouched among the tall bent, whichflew like whip lashes when the wilder bursts of the storm came, and amida never-ending scourge of fine sand swept from the top of the sandhills,I told her of all my experiences of Gormala and Second Sight.
She listened with a rapt attention. At times I could not see her face,for the evening was closing in and the driving clouds overhead, whichkept piling up in great masses along the western horizon, shut out theremnants of the day. When, however, in the pauses of drifting sand andflying foam I could see her properly, I found her face positively alightwith eager intelligence. Throughout, she was moved at times, and now andagain crept a little closer to me; as for instance when I told her ofthe dead child and of Lauchlane Macleod's terrible struggle for lifein the race of the tide amongst the Skares. Her questions were quiteilluminating to me at moments, for her quick woman's intuition graspedpossibilities at which my mere logical faculties had shied. Beyond allelse, she was interested in the procession of ghosts on Lammas Eve. Onlyonce during my narrative of this episode she interrupted me; not anintentional interruption but a passing comment of her own, candidlyexpressed. This was where the body of armed men came along; at which shesaid with a deep hissing intake of her breath through her teeth:
"Spaniards! I knew it! They were from some lost ship of the Armada!"When I spoke of the one who turned and looked at me with eyes thatseemed of the quick, she straightened her back and squared hershoulders, and looking all round her alertly as though for some hiddenenemy, clenched her hands and shut her lips tightly. Her great dark eyesseemed to blaze; then she grew calm again in a moment.
When I had finished she sat silent for a while, her eyes fixed in frontof her as with one whose mind is occupied with introspection. Suddenlyshe said:
"That man had some secret, and he feared you would discover it. I cansee it all! He, coming from his grave, could see with his dead eyes whatyou could see with your living ones. Nay, more; he could, perhaps, seenot only that you saw, and what you saw, but where the knowledge wouldlead you. That certainly is a grand idea of Gormala's, that of winningthe Secret of the Sea!" After a pause of a few moments she went on,standing up as she did so and walking restlessly to and fro withclenched hands and flashing eyes:
"And if there be any Secrets of the Sea why not win them? If they be ofSpain and the Spaniard, why not, a thousand times more, win them. If theSpaniard had a secret, be sure it was of no good to our Race. Why--" shemoved excitedly as she went on: "Why this is growing interesting beyondbelief. If his dead eyes could for an instant become quick, why shouldnot the change last longer? He might materialise altogether." Shestopped suddenly and said: "There! I am getting flighty as usual. Imust think it all over. It is all too wonderful and too exciting foranything. You will let me ask you more about it, won't you, when we meetagain?"
When we meet again! Then we would meet again: The thought was a delightto me; and it was only after several rapturous seconds that I answeredher:
"I shall tell you all I know; everything. You will be able to help me indiscovering the Mystery; perhaps working together we can win the Secretof the Sea."
"That would be too enchanting!" she said impulsively, and then stoppedsuddenly as if remembering herself. After a pause she said sedately:
"I'm afraid we must be going back now. We have a long way to drive; andit will be quite late enough anyhow."
As we moved off I asked her if I might not see her and Mrs. Jack safelyhome. I could get a horse at the hotel and drive with them. She laughedlightly as she answered:
"You are very kind indeed. But surely we shall not need any one! Iam a good driver; the horse is perfect and the lamps are bright. Youhaven't any 'hold-ups' here as we have Out West; and as I am not withinGormala's sphere of influence, I don't think there is anything todread!" Then after a pause she added:
"By the way have you ever seen Gormala since?" It was with a queerfeeling which I could not then analyse, but which I found afterwardscontained a certain proportion of exultation I answered:
"Oh yes! I saw her only two days ago--" Here I stopped for I was struckwith a new sense of the connection of things. Miss Anita saw the wonderin my face and drawing close to me said:
"Tell me all about it!" So I told her of the auction at Peterhead and ofthe chest and the papers with the mysterious marks, and of how I thoughtit might be some sort of account--"or," I added as a new idea struckme--"secret writing." When I had got thus far she said with decision:
"I am quite sure it is. You must try to find it out. Oh, you must, youmust!"
"I shall," said I, "if you desire it." She said nothing, but a blushspread over her face. Then she resumed her movement towards the hotel.
We walked in silence; or rather we ran and stumbled, for the fiercewind behind us drove us along. The ups and downs of the surface wereveiled with the mist of flying sand swept from amongst the bent-grasson the tops of the sandhills. I would have liked to help her, but ajudicious dread of seeming officious--and so losing a step in her goodgraces--held me back. I felt that I was paying a price of abstinence forthat kiss. As we went, the silence between us seemed to be ridiculous;so to get over it I said, after searching in my mind for a topic whichwould not close up her sympathies with me:
"You don't seem to like Spaniards?"
"No," she answered quickly, "I hate them! Nasty, cruel, treacherouswretches! Look at the way they are treating Cuba! Look at the _Maine_!"Then she added suddenly:
"But how on earth did you know I dislike them." I answered:
"Your voice told me when you spoke to yourself whilst I was telling youabout the ghosts and the man with the eyes."
"True," she said reflectively. "So I did. I must keep more guard onmyself and not let my feelings run away with me. I give myself away soawfully." I could have made a reply to this, but I was afraid. That kissseemed like an embodied spirit of warning, holding a sword over my headby a hair.
It was not long before I found the value of my silence. The lady'sconfidence in my discretion was restored, and she began, of her owninitiative, to talk. She spoke of the procession of ghosts; suddenlystopping, however, as if she had remembered something, she said to me:
"But why were you so anxious that Gormala should not have seen yousaving us from the rock?"
"Because," I answered, "I did not want her to have anything to do withthis."
"What do you mean by 'this'?" There was something in the tone of herquery which set me on guard. It was not sincere; it had not that naturalintonation, even, all through, which marks a
question put in simplefaith. Rather was it in the tone of one who asks, knowing well theanswer which will or may be given. As I have said, I did not know muchabout women, but the tone of coquetry, no matter how sweet, no matterhow ingenuous, no matter how lovable, cannot be mistaken by any man withred blood in his veins! Secretly I exulted, for I felt instinctivelythat there rested some advantage with me in the struggle of sex. Theknowledge gave me coolness, and brought my brain to the aid of my heart.Nothing would have delighted me more at the moment than to fling myself,actually as well as metaphorically, at the girl's feet. My mind was madeup to try to win her; my only thought now was the best means to thatend. I felt that I was a little sententious as I replied to herquestion:
"By 'this' I mean the whole episode of my meeting with you."
"And Mrs. Jack," she added, interrupting me.
"And Mrs. Jack, of course," I went on, feeling rejoiced that she hadgiven me an opportunity of saying something which I would not otherwisehave dared to say. "Or rather I should perhaps say, my meeting with Mrs.Jack and her friend. It was to me a most delightful thing to meet withMrs. Jack; and I can honestly say this day has been the happiest of mylife."
"Don't you think we had better be getting on? Mrs. Jack will be waitingfor us!" she said, but without any kind of reproach in her manner.
"All right," I answered, as I ran up a steep sandhill and held out myhand to help her. I did not let her hand go till we had run down theother side, and up and down another hillock and came out upon the flatwaste of sand which lay between us and the road, and over which a sortof ghostly cloud of sand drifted.
Before we left the sand, I said earnestly:
"Gormala's presence seems always to mean gloom and sorrow, weeping andmourning, fear and death. I would not have any of them come near you oryours. This is why I thanked God then, and thank Him now, that in ourmeeting Gormala had no part!"
She gave me her hand impulsively. As for an instant her soft palm layin my palm and her strong fingers clasped mine, I felt that there was abond between us which might some day enable me to shield her from harm.
When Mrs. Jack, and 'her friend', were leaving the hotel, I came tothe door to see them off. She said to me, in a low voice, as I badefarewell:
"We shall, I daresay, see you before long. I know that Mrs. Jack intendsto drive over here again. Thank you for all your kindness. Good night!"There was a shake of the reins, a clatter of feet on the hard road, asweeping round of the rays of light from the lamp as the cart swayed atthe start under the leap forward of the high-bred horse and swung up thesteep inland roadway. The last thing I saw was a dark, muffled figure,topped by a tam-o'-shanter cap, projected against the mist of movinglight from the lamp.
Next morning I was somewhat _distrait_. Half the night I had lain awakethinking; the other half I had dreamt. Both sleeping and waking dreamswere mixed, ranging from all the brightness of hope to the harrowingpossibilities of vague, undefined fear.
Sleeping dreams have this difference over day dreams, that thepossibilities become for the time actualities, and thus for good andill, pleasure or pain, multiply the joys or sufferings. Through all,however, there remained one fixed hope always verging toward belief, Ishould see Miss Anita--Marjory--again.
Late in the afternoon I got a letter directed in a strange hand, fineand firm, with marked characteristics and well formed letters, and justenough of unevenness to set me at ease. I am never quite happy with thewriter whose hand is exact, letter by letter, and word by word, and lineby line. So much can be told by handwriting, I thought, as I looked atthe letter lying beside my plate. A hand that has no characteristics isthat of a person insipid; a hand that is too marked and too various isdisconcerting and undependable. Here my philosophising came to an end,for I had opened the envelope, and not knowing the writing, had lookedat the signature, "Marjory Anita."
I hoped that no one at the table d'hote breakfast noticed me, for I feltthat I was red and pale by turns. I laid the letter down, taking carethat the blank back page was uppermost; with what nonchalance I could Iwent on with my smoked haddie. Then I put the letter in my pocket andwaited till I was in my own room, secure from interruption, before Iread it.
That one should kiss a letter before reading it, is conceivable,especially when it is the first which one has received from the girl heloves.
It was not dated nor addressed. A swift intuition told me that she hadnot given the date because she did not wish to give the address; theabsence of both was less marked than the presence of the one alone. Itaddressed me as "Dear Mr. Hunter." She knew my name, of course, for Ihad told it to her; it was on the envelope. The body of the letter saidthat she was asked by Mrs. Jack to convey her warm thanks for the greatservice rendered; to which she ventured to add the expression of her owngratitude. That in the hurry and confusion of mind, consequent on theirunexpected position, they had both quite forgotten about the boat whichthey had hired and which had been lost. That the owner of it would nodoubt be uneasy about it, and that they would both be grateful if Iwould see him--he lived in one of the cottages close to the harbour ofPort Erroll--and find out from him the value of the boat so that Mrs.Jack might pay it to him, as well as a reasonable sum for the loss ofits use until he should have been able to procure another. That Mrs.Jack ventured to give him so much trouble, as Mr. Hunter had beenalready so kind that she felt emboldened to trespass upon his goodness.And was "yours faithfully, 'Marjory Anita.'" Of course there was apostscript--it was a woman's letter! It ran as follows:
"Have you deciphered those papers? I have been thinking over them as well as other things, and I am convinced they contain some secret. You must tell me all about them when I see you on Tuesday.
M."
I fear that logic, as understood in books, had little to do with my kisson reading this; the reasoning belonged to that higher plane of thoughton which rests the happiness of men and women in this world and thenext. There was not a thought in the postscript which did not give mejoy--utter and unspeakable joy; and the more I thought of it and theoftener I read it the more it seemed to satisfy some aching void in myheart, "Have you deciphered the papers"--the papers whose existence wasonly known to her and me! It was delightful that we should know so muchof a secret in common. She had been 'thinking over them'--and otherthings! 'Other things!'--I had been thinking of other things; thinkingof them so often that every detail of their being or happening wasphotographed not only on my memory but seemingly on my very soul. Andof all these 'other things' there was one!!...
To see her again; to hear her voice; to look in her eyes; to see herlips move and watch each varying expression which might pass across thatlovely face, evoked by thoughts which we should hold in common; to touchher hand....
I sat for a while like one in a rapturous dream, where one sees all thehopes of the heart fulfilled in completeness and endlessly. And this wasall to be on Tuesday next--Only six days off!...
I started impulsively and went to the oak chest which stood in thecorner of my room and took out the papers.
After looking over them carefully I settled quietly down to a minuteexamination of them. I felt instinctively that my mandate or commissionwas to see if they contained any secret writing. The letters I placedaside, for the present at any rate. They were transparently simpleand written in a flowing hand which made anything like the necessaryelaboration impossible. I knew something of secret writing, for such hadin my boyhood been a favourite amusement with me. At one time I had beenan invalid for a considerable period and had taken from my father'slibrary a book by Bishop Wilkins, the brother-in-law of Oliver Cromwell,called "Mercury: or the Secret and Swift Messenger." Herein were givenaccounts of many of the old methods of secret communication, ciphers,string writing, hidden meanings, and many of the mechanical devicesemployed in an age when the correspondence of ambassadors, spies andsecret agents was mainly conducted by such means. This experience hadset my mind somewhat on secret writing, and ever after when in thecourse of miscellaneous reading I
came across anything relating to thesubject I made a note of it. I now looked over the papers to see if Icould find traces of any of the methods with which I was acquainted;before long I had an idea.
It was only a rudimentary idea, a surmise, a possibility; but still itwas worth going into. It was not any cause of undue pride to me, for itcame as a corollary to an established conclusion, rather than as a finepiece of reasoning from acute observation. The dates of the letters gavethe period as the end of the sixteenth century, when one of the bestciphers of that time had been conceived, the "Biliteral Cipher" ofFrancis Bacon. To this my attention had been directed by the workof John Wilkins and I had followed it out with great care. As I wasfamiliar with the principle and method of this cipher I was able todetect signs of its existence; and this being so, I had at once stronghopes of being able to find the key to it. The Biliteral cipher has asits great advantage, that it can be used in any ordinary writing, andthat its forms and methods are simply endless. All that it requires inthe first instance is that there be some method arranged on between thewriter and the reader of distinguishing between different forms of thesame letter. In my desk I had a typewritten copy of a monograph on thesubject of the Biliteral cipher, in which I half suggested that possiblyBacon's idea might be worked out more fully so that a fewer number ofsymbols than his five would be sufficient. Leaving my present occupationfor a moment I went and got it; for by reading it over I might get someclue to aid me. Some thought which had already come to me, or someconclusion at which I had already arrived might guide me in this newlabyrinth of figures, words and symbols.[1]
[1] See Appendix A.
When I had carefully read the paper, occasionally referring to thedocuments before me, I sat down and wrote a letter to Miss Anitatelling her that I had undertaken the task at once on her suggestion andthat I surmised that the method of secret writing adopted if any, wasprobably a variant of the Biliteral cipher. I therefore sent her my ownmonograph on the subject so that if she chose she might study it and beprepared to go into the matter when we met. I studiously avoided sayinganything which might frighten her or make any barrier between us;matters were shaping themselves too clearly for me to allow myself tofall into the folly of over-precipitation. It was only when I hadplaced the letter with its enclosure in the envelope and writtenMarjory's--Miss Anita's--name that I remembered that I had not got heraddress. I put it in my pocket to keep for her till we should meet onTuesday.
When I resumed my work I began on the two remaining exhibits. The firstwas a sheaf of some thirty pages torn out of some black-letter law-book.The only remarkable thing about it was that every page seemed coveredwith dots--hundreds, perhaps thousands on each page. The second wasquite different: a narrow slip of paper somewhat longer than a halfsheet of modern note paper, covered with an endless array of figures ineven lines, written small and with exquisite care. The paper was justsuch a size as might be put as marker in an ordinary quarto; that it hadbeen so used was manifest by the discolouration of a portion of it thathad evidently stuck out at the top of the volume. Fortunately, in itslong dusty rest in the bookshelf the side written on had been downwardso that the figures, though obscured by dust and faded by light andexposure to the air, were still decipherable. This paper I examined mostcarefully with a microscope; but could see in it no signs of secretwriting beyond what might be contained in the disposition of the numbersthemselves. I got a sheet of foolscap and made an enlarged copy, takingcare to leave fair space between the rows of figures and between thefigures themselves.
Then I placed the copy of figures and the first of the dotted pages sideby side before me and began to study them.
I confined my attention at first chiefly to the paper of figures, for itstruck me that it would of necessity be the simpler of the two systemsto read, inasmuch as the symbols should be self-contained. In the dottedletters it was possible that more than one element existed, for thedisposition of significants appeared to be of endless variety, andthe very novelty of the method--it being one to which the eyes and thesenses were not accustomed--made it a difficult one to follow at first.I had little doubt, however, that I should ultimately find the dotcipher the more simple of the two, when I should have learned its secretand become accustomed to its form. Its mere bulk made the suppositionlikely that it was in reality simple; for it would be indeed an endlesstask, to work out in this laborious form two whole sheets of acomplicated cipher.
Over and over and over again I read the script of numbers. Forward andbackward; vertically; up and down, for the lines both horizontal andvertical were complete and exact, I read it. But nothing struck me ofsufficient importance to commence with as a beginning.
Of course there were here and there repetitions of the same combinationof figures, sometimes two, sometimes three, sometimes four together; butof the larger combinations the instances were rare and did not afford meany suggestion of a clue!
So I became practical, and spent the remainder of my work-time that dayin making by aid of my microscope an exact but enlarged copy, but inRoman letters, of the first of the printed pages.
Then I reproduced the dots as exactly as I could. This was a laborioustask indeed. When the page was finished, half-blinded, I took my hat andwent out along the shore towards Whinnyfold. I wanted to go to the SandCraigs; but even to myself I said 'Whinnyfold' which lay farther on.
"Men are deceivers ever," sang Balthazar in the play: they deceiveeven themselves at times. Or they pretend they do--which is a new andadvanced form of the same deceit.