“I had warned you, Waylon.” Ranger said.
“Why don’t you want Tafadzwa? You can only oppress weaker people.”
“Leave them alone.” A female voice came, “Or I will kill your horse.”
Gretta had her gun pointed at neck of Ranger’s horse. The ranger trembled. He did not plead for mercy by his mouth, but his eyes were. Ranger uttered nothing and went away without his horse.
She tied the horse to a tree and four of them ran to keep a distance from the ranger.
They stopped only after they got confident they were in a safe place.
“First you guys cause firing in Tafadzwa’s house and now in here?” Gretta said.
“This was his fault.” Waylon showed Roderick.
“Ahh… firing in Tafadzwa’s house was his.” Roderick said.
She rolled her eyes and looked at someone who had nothing to do with both of those firings. Barry.
“Barry. Decipher the code, quick!” she said.
Waylon took the paper out of his pocket, then handed it to Barry.
“This cipher keeps changing. I hope it is the same one I saw last night.” Barry said.
“Can you decode it?” asked Roderick.
Barry’s face lit after folding the parchment open.
“The code hasn’t changed.” Barry smiled, “This is vinigre cipher. I did not crack it for them yesterday because they would have killed me immediately after knowing what is written here.”
He tore a page from his notebook and clicked to sprout the pen tip. Then he started to scribble alphabets in a different sequence, “Keyword is Queen. I should use four letters.”
The code was alien like for everyone. Roderick stood confused, watching the cipher:
KIPGNDCGMFJBIOVDAWAEQNLFNMHQEAJUQIQXCQB
GKHRIYKHHIEJBITNBUGIVIMLIEUEMRTAYTXUCL
IEFJBSYFUZSYATUFSHJCXEATNSSXXCWAVVYB
KBBHLREZJIEUXIEFJGIROKNXLROQERGUXLMFXYEHVDLIXHHHB
Barry wrote by looking at the alphabet sequence:
KIPG NDCG
QUEE NQUE
Barry looked on the table and ticked where K and Q intersected. Doing so, he got V. He found the intersection point of I and U to be O. Barry was confident he was in the right way so he created understandable words from the cipher. He continued till he had written:
VOLCANIC IS THE KING’S WRATH BUT A WOMAN TAMED HIM
TUNNEL UNDER THE PALACE IS WHERE KING KEPT HER
Barry stopped writing altogether after hearing growling of a dog near to them. He stuffed the half decoded cipher and the main paper in his pocket, whereas those who could fight unlocked their rifles. Roderick was in desperate need of a suppressor for their rifles, but he could afford to cause another gunshot since they were close to deciphering the code.
A huge dog ran towards them. It was as big as Roderick had tied in Tafadzwa’s house. Waylon shot before Roderick could tighten his finger muscles. The dog whimpered and fell silent.
Roderick went towards its corpse, watched its brain through the bullet hole. He did not find collar on the dog’s neck.
“This was a wild dog.” Roderick said, “No collar.”
“Hurry. Crack more.” Waylon poked Barry.
Barry took out crunched parchments out of his pocket. He unfolded the main code flat. His heart came to his mouth when he realized the cipher had changed.
“It doesn’t look same.” Gretta said.
“I am afraid.” Waylon said.
“Well, go on.”
“I can’t decipher this code.”
“Let me see.” Roderick snatched it from his hands. This code looked way more complex than the previous one, “Do you know another cryptographer?”
Waylon got silent. Barry also had no idea to offer.
“Hey.” Roderick said, “How about we bring the cryptographer whom we had seen in Tafadzwa’s house? If Tafadzwa has him, then he must be very skilled in what he does.”
Roderick noticed Waylon nodding . Agreement was visible in Barry’s face too.
“Gretta.” Waylon said.
“Don’t worry.” She smiled, “I’ll be always there to take you out of trouble.”
