Renzi was by no means ignorant of secret codes after his experiences in Jersey: could he find a method from first principles to encrypt the message? The gravest difficulty of all was that in virtually every case the key had to be known beforehand at the receiving end or it must be sent in clear by other means—with catastrophic consequences if compromised.
Despite everything, Renzi found himself drawn into the logical challenges of the dilemma. After the intense boredom of the prisoner-of-war negotiations, the danger and frustration of dealing with Fulton, this bracing intellectual exercise was congenial, and he bent his mind to the task.
Any cipher whose key could be discovered was by definition unusable. Classical ciphers, such as the famous Caesar Shift, with no key but letter substitution, were unsafe—code-breaking had moved on in modern times. The same applied to the transposition types and, without prior arrangements, more complex techniques would require a key or method-type to be sent on before in clear.
A book cipher? This had the advantage that the key was already in the possession of the receiver—the text of a pre-agreed book held by both. A word in the message was specified as a precise location of that same word in the book. The disadvantage was that not only was it essential for each to have precisely the same edition but it was laborious, and the resulting encipherment could be large in size. The Bible had been used many times, with its exact chapter and verse convenience, but of course it would be the first that code-breakers tried.
There was another method: the running-key cipher. This used a source book too, but at individual character level. From a given point the ongoing text was used as a continuous key-stream to yield coded values against the message contents. This was better—and if the book’s title was protected the resulting encipherment was near unbreakable.
So, what volume was to be used, known precisely by both parties? The Admiralty’s own King’s Regulations? Or the Articles of War? But without them to hand he could not swear to accuracy. And if it was to be some other book, its name and edition had to be divulged first. He was back where he had started.
He lay down and closed his eyes. It was the separate transmission in clear of a key or decoding method that was the sticking point. If he could only—
He sat bolt upright. That was it! The method, the key-text—and a cast-iron secure way of transmitting the key!
Galvanised, he set to work. He would not be disturbed—he had uncovered some time ago that Haslip’s concern to be left alone was on account of a certain woman, and the French could not trespass on diplomatic territory.
Snatching up paper and a pencil he began to set up his tabula recta, the encoding matrix. Not needing to consult a book, he was able to work swiftly, and at a little after midnight he had the result. Carefully he burned his workings, folded the papers as small as he could and sealed them tightly together.
He hesitated over the forwarding instructions but eventually settled on “Foreign Office, per Smith, Paris.” It would find the right handler easily enough. Underneath, in smaller lettering, was the more important entry: “Refer Cdr Thomas Kydd, HMS Teazer. ” It was done.
Kydd stalked into his cabin in a foul mood. This was the third man flogged within the month for petty crimes, unavoidably in full view of the shore, and the spirit aboard was stagnating. When would the damned timbers arrive for the repair? He was keenly conscious of the fearful danger under which England lay and it went so much against his grain to lie in useless idleness. And Renzi—heaven knew what he was up to, and would Kydd ever find out?
Restless, he ventured on deck again. A fine sight, so many blue-water ships, particularly the big Indiaman to the south—as massive as a line-of-battle ship with, no doubt, a freighting aboard worth a prince’s ransom, and soon to venture out to the open ocean where dangers lurked in wait every day of her six months’, or more, voyaging.
Ashore, he could pick out the Deal hovellers. On this fine summer’s day there was nothing to occupy them except the taking out of fresh provisions, passengers—
“Telegraph’s in a taking,” Hallum offered, behind him, trying to make conversation. The shutter atop a bluff tower in the King’s Naval Yard was indeed busy, clacking away furiously. The chain of signal stations stretched all the way to London and the Admiralty in a direct line.
Idly, Kydd wondered what it was signalling. Never used for routine messages it was how the first lord of the Admiralty, through his senior staff, was able to reach out and deploy the chess pieces that were his fleets to counter enemy threats. Incredibly, this signal would be here, in the commander-in-chief’s hands, some fifteen minutes or so after it was sent from London.
He resumed pacing. It was no use worrying about his timber, which would come in its own good time. He must contain his impatience and be ready to throw Teazer into the fray the instant she was whole once more.
“Boat approaching, sir.”
Oddly, the vessel had been launched from the King’s Naval Yard instead of the flagship, and with only a single officer in the stern-sheets. Kydd stayed on deck and watched it hook on.
The officer came on board. “Commander Kydd, sir?” he asked respectfully, with more than a hint of curiosity.
“It is.”
“Then, sir, I have a message from the admiral. You are to hold yourself in readiness at his office immediately for a particular service that he will speak to you about—in person.”
“Er—”
“I know nothing further.” “Very well.”
Admiral Keith was short, almost to the point of rudeness. “Kydd, I have just received a signal from the Admiralty concerning you that greatly disturbs me.”
“Sir?” The Admiralty?
“It asks—no, damn it, demands that you be taken out of your ship and made ready to receive a parcel o’ rogues from the Aliens Office under circumstances of the utmost secrecy. Now, sir—this is intolerable! I will not be kept in ignorance. You will tell me what is afoot this instant, sir.”
Kydd swallowed. “Sir, I—I cannot. The Aliens Office?”
“Are you asking me to accept that a—a junior commander is to be made privy to matters considered too sensitive for a senior admiral? Have you been politicking, sir? I won’t stand for it in a serving captain of mine, Mr. Kydd, no, not for one minute.”
“N-no, sir.”
“And I intend to be present when those jackanapes arrive!”
“Of course, sir.”
“Most irregular!”
“Yes, sir, it is.”
“You’ll wait here until sent for,” Keith rumbled irritably. “You may not leave on any account.”
“Aye aye, sir.”
Sitting alone in the little side office, Kydd waited apprehensively.
Late in the afternoon he heard a commotion in the outer office: raised voices, scraped chairs and hurrying footsteps. Moments later, two travel-dusty men strode in, closely followed by a red-faced Keith.
“This is insupportable! I will not have it! This officer is under my command and—”
“Sir. We take our instructions from the foreign secretary directly, this being as grave a matter as any that has faced this kingdom.” The taller individual sniffed. “You have a telegraph, sir. If you have any doubts . . .”
He waited pointedly until the admiral had left them, then addressed Kydd: “From this point on everything that is said shall be at the highest possible level of secrecy. Do you understand me?”
“I know my duty, sir.”
“Very well.” He opened his dispatch case and extracted a small packet, the seal broken. “What do you understand by this?”
Kydd took it and went cold. “Why, this is from my ship’s clerk and good friend. Where is he—”
“That will be of no concern to you. Can you say any more?”
“Er, unless I might read the contents?”
“No, sir, you may not,” he said, taking it back. “Please answer me directly. Was there any arrangement between you touching on the transmission of
privileged information?”
“None. He’s in a—a difficulty of sorts, is he?” Kydd said uneasily.
The two exchanged looks. “He is performing a mission of the utmost importance that is proving unfortunate in its complexity,” the taller man said carefully. “You may know that what you hold is a form of communication that is strongly ciphered. We do not possess the key, however, and believe that his referring to yourself implies it may be found by reference only to you.”
Kydd was dumbfounded. “We’ve never discussed anything in the character of spying—nothing! Renzi wholly detests it, you may believe.”
“Then this leaves us in a difficult position indeed,” the man continued heavily. “If you know of nothing he has said, no paper to keep guarded, no locked cabinet . . . ?”
“I do not.”
“Nothing whatsoever that may lead us to a key?”
“Tell me, this key, how would I know it?”
The other man broke in, his dry voice calm. “Mr. Kydd, the practice of privy communications is a black art but has a number of inviolable axioms, one of which is that the receiver must be in possession of the same key that was used to encode the message, without which he is helpless.
“It is the usual practice to establish a key beforehand, else we shall be obliged to transmit the key by other means, a most unsatisfactory and hazardous proceeding. In this particular case we have no prior arrangement and the key not being onpassed therefore must exist here, and be alluded to. The only clue we have is what you see before you. Your name has been invoked and that is all. A masterly stroke, which is its own guarantee of security but, regrettably, leaves us in a quandary.
“As to its appearance, well, a key can be of many forms—an arithmetical formula, a grid of nonsense, a passage in a book and in fact anything—but without it . . .”
Kydd realised that the men would not have acted as they had unless the matter was vitally important, and Renzi would not have given his name unless he himself was the key.
“Show me the message,” he demanded.
Reluctantly it was handed over. Kydd examined it minutely: it was in his friend’s hand but consisted of lines upon lines of meaningless letters in groups of five and covered several pages. A few mistakes were blotted out and there were one or two crossed-out sequences in the margin, but that was all. It was not signed, and the beginning was only a bare date on one side, with what looked like a doodle on the other. No doubt it had occupied lonely hours of danger for Renzi.
He looked at the little picture. It was a stylised open book and a fat exclamation mark next to it as though in exasperation at the tedium of the task. Was this a sign—or a pointer of some kind? A clue?
Then he had it! “Why, I think I know what it is. A passage from a book, you said. Will a poem do at all?”
“Yes, damn it!”
The sudden tension in the room made Kydd think better of a grand gesture and he contented himself with the plain facts. “By this little picture Renzi is reminding me of a poem he’s got fastened to the bulkhead in his cabin above his desk. Taut hand with words, is Nicholas.”
“What poem?” the taller man ground.
“Oh, it begins—let me see:
Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you’ll grow double
Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble . . . ?
Kydd tried to recall what went next but failed. “I can’t remember the rest.”
“Go out to your ship and get the doggerel! Now!”
“I don’t see any reason why I should,” Kydd replied quietly, but at the man’s reddening face he relented. “We can find it at the bookseller just along by Beach Street here. It’s by his friend Wordsworth, whom he much admires. Should you get an 1800 edition you’ll no doubt find the poem in it.”
The proprietor was taken aback when three men burst into his shop, demanding urgently that precise volume of Wordsworth but hurriedly obliged. There was the poem: “The Tables Turned.”
At the office the table was swiftly cleared and paper produced. The taller yielded to the other, who drew up his chair, sharpened his pencil and opened the book.
“Priceless!” He chuckled and read:
Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife:
Come, hear the woodland linnet,
How sweet his music! on my life,
There’s more of wisdom in it.
“Damn you, sir! Get on with it!”
Patiently, a tabula recta for the tableau was constructed and the cipher-text applied. In a short time the man raised his head and, with a satisfied smile, said quietly, “Gentlemen, we have a solution!”
Renzi returned to his rooms weary and depressed. It had been weeks of waiting and no reply—and the worst of it was that Fulton had disappeared. Renzi had sent him a short message saying that London had been contacted on his behalf but it had been returned unopened with the terse notation “not at this address” and no further clue.
It had been maddeningly frustrating. Was Fulton taken by the authorities? Had he quit the field entirely, returned to America? Or was he in possession of a fine new contract from the French that now saw him in some palatial lodging and for ever out of reach?
As he flopped into his chair he noticed the vase back in the window. Nervously he lifted it—but there was no message. Then he saw a copy of that morning’s Moniteur tossed carelessly to one side. And deep within it he found a substantial packet.
The superscription was in an unknown hand and, unusually, the packet was secured with sailmaker’s twine instead of the usual ribbon. Inside, there were two parts, both ciphered. One was short, no more than a few sentences, Renzi guessed. The other was boldly inscribed even if in coded groups and on stiff, expensive vellum.
There was no key, no little drawing or textual hint. However, he guessed immediately the significance of the unusual fastening, for that would surely be:
Age! twine thy brows with fresh spring flowers,
And call a train of laughing Hours . . .
He took the vellum first, a prominent “1” indicating the key-stream was to start with it and continue to the other. He set out his matrix. Soon finding himself correct in his assumption, the two pages were swiftly deciphered and then he sat back, satisfied.
It had told him two things: the first was that Kydd, knowing his penchant for memorising poetry, had correctly divined his key. The next was that Whitehall had accepted his difficult situation and taken positive steps to help him, for this was in effect a counter-offer from the foreign secretary of Great Britain himself. Renzi could prove it by decoding the vellum in front of Fulton.
The offer was interesting, but would it be sufficient? He turned his attention to the shorter message and applied himself. This was a very different document—and Renzi was shocked to the core. It was terse and to the point: if Fulton did not accept the offer he was to be killed.
Mechanically he burned his workings and stirred the ash carefully. All he had feared was coming to pass. He was now being expected to perform the ultimate act of dishonour in this whole wretched business, that of mercilessly ending the life of an unsuspecting other.
Could he do it? He knew he must. This was the transcendent logical outworking of what he had undertaken to do.
The means? Silent but sure—a blade. He had none, but a quick foray produced a kitchen knife, thin-bladed but effective, the point honed to a wicked sharpness. There was, of course, the chance that he would never use it, for where was Fulton now?
The prisoner-of-war talks dragged on with no sign of an agreement, even though Britain held some four times as many prisoners as the French and was prepared to exchange at the rate of many for one. The unspoken obstacle was the reality that trained seamen were too valuable to return to duty in a navy that was so successful. There was every probability now that there would be no hope left to the wretches in Bitche and Verdun.
Utterly depressed by the futil
ity of the situation, Renzi was un-prepared for what met him when he reached his room after another week of tedium. As he entered, he was confronted by a grinning Fulton rising from a chair. “Hail to you, Smith!” he declaimed dramatically. “How goeth it?”
Recovering himself Renzi said, “What the devil are you doing here? You’re being followed, you fool!” Anger flooded over him at the careless attitude and jocular tone. Then he became alarmed. Was this part of a French trap?
“No, I’m not trailed,” Fulton said lazily, stretching. “I’m only this day back in Paris, and nobody knows I’m here. Er, have you, by chance, heard anything from London?”
“Where have you been all this time, may I ask?”
“Oh, Amsterdam. Thought I’d like to see the canals—very interesting to me.”
Renzi bit off a retort and forced himself to be calm. If the French wanted to catch them together they would probably have made their move by now. “Well, I’m pleased to tell you that I’ve been in contact with England—and at the highest level.” He moved to the other chair and smiled winningly. “It seems that you’ve earned the attention of no less than Lord Hawkesbury, the foreign secretary of Great Britain. In fact I have a communication from him addressed to you.”
“Oh?” Fulton said.
Renzi drew a deep breath. “Indeed so.” He went to a picture on the wall and felt behind it, detached the packet and opened it. “Here.” He handed it over, letting Fulton feel the quality of the paper.
“It’s in code.”
“Naturally. For your protection, should the French discover you are treating with the English.” Renzi took it back and smoothed it. “However, I shall now decipher it before you as your assurance of its authenticity.”
“Don’t trouble yourself. If you’re fooling me we’ll find out soon enough. Just tell me what he’s got to say.”
Renzi’s stomach contracted. It was the last throw of the dice. “Well, in it the foreign secretary welcomes your interest and notes the terms you are asking, including the forming of a plenary committee and, er, your one-hundred-thousand-pound fee. I’m happy to say he sees no insuperable bar to any of your provisions.”
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