The Ludwig Conspiracy(41)

Steven grinned. “Maybe because you don’t know enough about the subject?”

“Very funny, Herr Lukas. Let’s see if we’re on the right track with VENUS as the keyword, and never mind the wisecracks. If you’re right, I’ll prove you wrong with a kiss.”

“I think you need something called a Vigenère square for decoding words.” Steven tried to remember. “With a bit of thought, and a good sharp pencil, I guess we—”

“Are you nuts?” The art detective giggled so loudly that several tourists turned to look at them. “What are computer programs for? I’m sure we’ll find a website to do it for us.” With a last glance at the Temple of Venus, she turned toward the park’s exit. “I suggest we get a room over in the hotel and make ourselves comfortable in the lobby.”

“Suppose they don’t have a computer there?”

Sara Lengfeld looked at the bookseller with a mixture of pity and horror. “Oh, Herr Lukas, Herr Lukas,” she murmured. “Sometimes I really think you’re living in the wrong century.”





The hotel was slightly run-down and old-fashioned, as if its best days were long behind it. An elderly waiter moved through the first-floor restaurant, where there were not many guests. Yellowed photographs of Bavarian landscapes hung in the stairwell. Somewhere someone was playing a zither. However, the hotel did have a computer in the lobby, if not the latest model. At the hotel bar, Sara ordered a martini, which was too warm, and then she began tapping away at the keyboard, while Steven watched her curiously.

“It says here that Blaise de Vigenère was a sixteenth-century French diplomat who wrote several books on cryptography,” she said as she stared with concentration at the scratched screen. “The cipher named after him was regarded as impossible to decode for a long time, until it was finally cracked, first by a British mathematician and then by a Prussian officer in 1863. Today of course it’s simpler. Voilà!” Sara leaned back with satisfaction, pointing to a table on the monitor. “Here’s a program we can use to crack Monsieur Vigenère’s cipher.”

“Let’s try it with LOVED first,” Steven suggested. “Just to be on the safe side. It says there you need five letters in the keyword.”

Sara nodded, then typed the first coded word from Marot’s diary, QRCSOQNZO, into the computer. In the “Key” field she typed LOVED. After only a few seconds they had the solution.





Input QRCSOQNZO

Key LOVED

Output BFXWRBBUS





“Well, that obviously didn’t work,” Sara said, disappointed. “It would have been too simple, I suppose. Now let’s try VENUS.”

She carefully typed in the five characters, but all she got back was another tangle of nonsensical letters.

“Shit. Maybe I typed something in wrong.” Sara tried again, but with the same result.

“Try APHRODITE,” Steven said. But again the result was nonsense words, and it was the same with AMOR, EROS, HEART, and a dozen other love-related words.

Sara sipped her martini silently, while Steven racked his brain for more possible keywords. “Damn,” he finally exclaimed. “And I was sure I was on the right track with the Vigenère cipher.”

“You could still be, and it’s just that we don’t have the right word yet,” Sara said. “I don’t think we ought to give up.”

She looked at some leaflets she had picked up in the ticket office, which described the Fairy-tale King’s other castles. “At least this is the smallest of the castles that Ludwig built,” she said. “I guess we can be glad we don’t have to search Herrenchiemsee or Neuschwanstein.”

Sighing, the bookseller got off the hotel sofa. “I guess there’s nothing I can do but decode a few more pages of the diary,” he said wearily. “After all, by the last point I reached, our friend Theodor hadn’t arrived at Linderhof. Maybe Marot’s account will put us on the track of the right word yet.” He nodded, suddenly determined. “I’d better start right away. Did you reserve me a room?”

“Well, as it happens, I have good news and bad news for you.” Sara drained her warm martini and nibbled the olive. “Yes, I did manage to get a room, which wasn’t easy, because Manstein Systems has booked almost the entire hotel. And no, it’s not a room for you; it’s a room for both of us. It’s up in the attic and was really meant for the hotel staff. I’m afraid there was nothing else free. I just hope you don’t snore as much as you did last night.”