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By Root 760 0

If the message is encoded according to the method of Trithemius, it means that Trithemius copied from the Templars, and since it quotes a sentence that was current in Rosicrucian circles, it means that the plan attributed to the Rosicrucians was none other than the plan of the Templars. Try reversing the argument, as any sensible person would: Since the message is written in Tri-themius’s code, it was written after Trithemius, and since it quotes an expression that circulated among the seventeenth-century Rosicrucians, it was written after the seventeenth century. So, at this point, what is the simplest hypothesis? Ingolf finds the Provins message. Since, like the colonel, he’s an enthusiast of hermetic messages, he sees thirty-six and one hundred and twenty and thinks immediately of the Rosicrucians. I And since he’s also an enthusiast of cryptography, he amuses ! himself by putting the Provins message into code, as an exercise, i So he translates his fine Rosicrucian sentence using a Trithemius cryptosystem.”

“An ingenious explanation. But it’s no more valid than the colonel’s.”

“So far, no. But suppose you make one conjecture, then a second and a third, and they all support one another. Already you’re more confident that you’re on the right track, aren’t you? I began with the suspicion that the words used by Ingolf were not the ones taken from Trithemius. They’re in the same cabalistic Assyro-Babylonian style, but they’re not the same. Yet, if Ingolf had wanted words beginning with the letters that interested him, in Trithemius he could have found as many as he liked. Why didn’t he use those words?” “Well, why didn’t he?”

“Maybe he needed specific letters also in the second, third, and fourth positions. Maybe our ingenious Ingolf wanted a multicoded message; maybe he wanted to be smarter than Trithemius. Trithemius suggests forty major cryptosystems: in one, only the initial letters count; in another, the first and third letters; in another, every other initial letter, and so on, until, with a little I effort, you can invent a hundred more systems on your own. As I for the ten minor cry ptosy stems, the colonel considered only the first wheel, which is the easiest. But the following ones work on the principle of the second wheel. Here’s a copy of it for you. Imagine that the inner circle is mobile and you can turn it so that the letter A coincides with any letter of the outer circle. You will have one system where A is written as X, another where A is U, and so on... With twenty-two letters on each circle, you can produce not ten but twenty-one cryptosystems. The twenty-second is no good, because there A is A...”

“Don’t tell me that for each letter of each word you tried all twenty-one systems....”

“I had brains on my side, and luck. Since the shortest words have six letters, it’s obvious that only the first six are important and the rest are just for looks. Why six letters? Suppose Ingolf coded the first letter, then skipped one, then coded the third, then skipped two and coded the sixth. For the first letter I used wheel number 1, for the third letter I used wheel number 2, and got a sentence. Then I tried wheel number 3 for the sixth letter, and got a sentence again. I’m not saying Ingolf didn’t use other letters, too, but three positive results are enough for me. If you want to, you can take it further.”

“Don’t keep me in suspense. What came out?”

“Look at the message again. I’ve underlined the letters that count.

K uabris Defrabax Rexulon Ukkazaal Ukzaab Urpaefel Taculbain Habrak Hacoruin Maquafel Tebrain Hmcatuin Rokcasor Himesor Argaabil Kaquaan Docrabax Reisaz Reisabrax Decaquan Oiquaqun Zaitabor Qaxaop Dugraq Xaelobran Disaeda Magisuan Raitak Huidal Uscolda Arabaom Zipreus Mecrim Cosmae Duquifas Rocarbis.

“Now, we know what the first message is: it’s the one about the thirty-six invisibles. Now listen to what comes out if you substitute the third letters, using the second wheel: chambre des demoiselles, 1’aiguille creuse.”

“But I know that, it’s—”

“ ‘En aval d’Etretat—La Chambre des Demoiselles