I took from my pocket the paper I had found. It proved to be of heavy parchment, whitened by time; and I felt at once I was running on a true scent. There could be little doubt as to the age of the document. The ink was fading, the handwriting itself was in the style of long ago. The fact that the script was scratchy and uncertain, indicated that a man of meager education had written it. It was, however, perfectly legible. I judged that the date of the missive was at least ten or twenty years prior to the civil war. [Pg 79] [Pg 79] Across the top of the page were written the words, referring evidently to the script beneath, “Sworn by the Book.” At the very bottom was the cryptic phrase “int F. T.” And the following, mysterious column lay between: aned dqbo aqcd trkm fipj dqbo scno ohuy wvyn dljn dtht Of course no kind of an explanation presented itself at first. I took it to a mirror, tried to read it backward, then sat down to give it a careful analysis. I copied the column carefully, then tried to rearrange the letters to make sense. But no such simple treatment was availing. The fourth, ninth, tenth, and last words, for instance, were made up entirely of consonants, and no word of any language, known to me, entirely omits vowels. Four of the remaining seven words contained but one vowel. But I was in no mood to go further to-night. [Pg 80]The events of the past few hours had been a mighty strain on the entire nervous system, and my mind could not cope with the problem. I spread the original parchment on the little table in the center of the room, then quickly undressed, turned out my lights, and went to bed. [Pg 80] Sleep came at once, heavy and dreamless. I barely remember the welcome chill that the pre-dawn hours brought to the room. But it wasn’t written that there should be many hours of refreshing sleep for me that night. In hardly a moment, it seemed to me, I came to myself with a start. Wakefulness shot through me as if by an electric shock. It was that fast-flying hour just before dawn: the cool caress of the wind against my face and the pale-blue quality of the darkness on the window-pane told that fact with entire plainness. It had been wakened by a hushed sound from across the room. It was useless
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