Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
Alex
Alex shifted in his seat, watching the fan make circles on the ceiling above the wide oak desk. A glance out of the corner of his eye revealed Ivy trying to hide the nervous bounce in her knee. He fought the urge to reach over and set his hand on her knee, help her feel more settled.
She’d smiled when they’d seen the Union Jack in the front of the consulate. The first time she’d truly smiled since Penmore. Seeing her relieved like that had settled some of his misgivings about coming here.
After what Alex had discovered in the newspaper, though, Ivy had convinced him they needed to go to the British consulate once they arrived in Cairo.
Not to turn themselves over—in fact, Alex had given his name to the consular official as Alexander Darby and told them his father was Jack—but to take the evidence he’d found in the newspaper that the foreign correspondent, Gretchen Herbert, was in trouble and needed aid.
Trouble was, Alex only had the one newspaper clipping to back up his claims. And the word of a fifteen-year-old didn’t hold much weight.
Also problematic was the fact that Alex had no idea when the paper had even been published.
For all he knew, whatever help Gretchen Herbert had needed was no longer relevant.
The consular official had taken notes while Alex had explained the situation, saying little and betraying even less with his expression. Whether or not he believed Alex—he couldn’t quite say.
But the official had left Ivy and Alex sitting here for over forty-five minutes now, and he hadn’t reappeared.
“I think we should go,” Alex said, shifting in his seat. “Something doesn’t feel right.”
“I’ve never taken you for such a nervous ninny,” Ivy said with a teasing smile. “What do you think is going to happen here at the consulate of all places—I’ll be kidnapped again?”
“No, that’s not it.” Alex bristled, then loosened his collar. “I can’t really even explain it, but being here just doesn’t feel right. I would feel a whole lot better if we’d been able to talk to Uncle Alastair first.”
They’d attempted that—gone straight to Aunt Lucy and Uncle Alastair’s house in Anglo Cairo after arriving at the train station.
Neither of them had been there, and the servants hadn’t shared any information on when they might return.
Bahiti, Aunt Lucy’s long-time servant and the only one Alex knew, hadn’t been there either, so they’d left a note and gone again.
Now Alex felt more certain than ever that they should have stayed, even if the servants hadn’t gone out of their way to make them feel welcome.
They were both disheveled and dirty—the servants probably hadn’t believed they were family.
Right now they looked more like beggars from the streets—stained clothes, grime mucking their skin.
Covered in cinders and ash from the trainyard.
Maybe that’s why the consular official had left them here too. Though he couldn’t have denied their perfect English, he probably doubted their story.
“I don’t think he believed us,” Alex said, giving voice to that worrying thought. “Maybe he’s even trying to contact Uncle Jack—tell him we’ve turned up here.”
Ivy frowned, her dark gaze scanning his. She bit her lip, hesitating, clearly uncertain if she should speak at all, then managed, “Alex … is there any way that those letters could just be a coincidence? I don’t claim to know anything about ciphers, but are you absolutely certain—”
“I’m certain. It’s a cipher. The mathematical probability of it being anything else is astronomical.
Besides,” he added with a calculated shrug that he hoped made him look easy and confident—he didn’t like the fact that she didn’t seem to have complete faith in what he’d discovered— “Besides, this isn’t the first time I’ve spotted a cipher in a newspaper.
They do it in plain sight like this all the time.
I first started checking after I read a story—maybe with Sexton Blake, I can’t remember—years ago. ”
“But why on earth would someone leave that message? Especially with a cipher? It seems like it could have been easily missed. And if this journalist really needed help, why put it in the paper at all? Why not go to someone who could help her, like the police?”
He restrained an annoyed look. “You really put too much faith in the police, Ivy. There’s a reason even novels like the Sherlock Holmes stories don’t paint them in the best light.”
“And there’s a reason those are novels, Alex.” She rolled her eyes. “You have the soul of a cynical old man sometimes, you know that?”
He flattened his palms on his knees, feeling strangely unnerved by her criticism. “And you’re too na?ve.” Maybe even too good for them all. She spent her day like some sort of penitential saint, following Mum around and tending to the sick—what did she know anyway?
No wonder Mum loves her better than me.
That thought came out of nowhere, unbidden and sinister in the sick curl of jealousy that spread through him. Or maybe he was just hungry, irritable, and tired.
She didn’t answer, her eyelashes lowering as she stared at her lap.
Guilt followed. “I didn’t—”
“It’s fine,” she answered. She offered a sweet smile, full of forgiveness and warmth. “We’ve both had a long couple of weeks. And how could I be mad at you, anyway? You saved my life.”
And there it is—that saintly piety.
Just once, he’d like to see her get angry and stay angry. In fact, that moment in the abandoned coach when she’d told him about Roedean might have been the most frustrated she’d been with him for ages, which seemed a silly thing for her to get upset about.
The distant clack of typewriter keys filled the silence that settled between them.
Occasionally, Dad spoke of his days in the war, working for the Arab Bureau, and Alex imagined him sitting in an office like this, filing paperwork in the dusty heat of Cairo while soldiers lost their lives and suffered in the trenches of France.
That reality didn’t give Alex a lot to be proud of—but he didn’t dare ever say that to his parents.
Both of his parents, actually, had missed all the action and important battles of the war and served instead in the obscurity of the Middle East and Egypt.
Some of his friends from the village had real heroes for fathers.
Ones with medals and injuries that proved the hardships they’d faced.
A thud of approaching footsteps jerked Alex from the unpleasant thoughts, and he lifted his head as the consular official—a Mr. Jones—opened the door. He gave Alex a nod, then opened the door more widely for another man, an older, well-dressed gentleman with white hair and piercing blue eyes.
“Here they are,” Mr. Jones said to the gentleman, relief in his expression. A mottled, red flush had risen from his neck onto his jawline. “Just where I told you they were.”
“Excellent.” The gentleman entered, his movements brisk as he went around to the opposite side of the desk. He unbuttoned his jacket, revealing a matching suit vest below it, then flicked his gaze at Mr. Jones. “You can leave us. Thank you.”
Mr. Jones seemed only too happy to comply. He backed out quietly, closing the door behind him with a click.
Ivy shifted beside him, her gaze remaining on the door, then leaned toward Alex.
“Did you see that?” she whispered, her voice barely audible to him. “He looked afraid.”
Alex glanced over, frowning. He hadn’t noticed. “Afraid of what?”
“I don’t know. But Mr. Jones looked pale.”
As though he could hear her, the gentleman’s eyes moved to Ivy, the scrutiny of his gaze seeming to unnerve her. She sat straighter, smoothing her hands over her dirty skirt. No doubt she hated her appearance right now. If she had any flaw, it would be a smidge of vanity.
Then the man looked at Alex. His lips twitched, the corners of his eyes narrowing as his stare hardened.
He looked back at Ivy for just a moment, as though comparing them side by side.
If Ivy was dirty, Alex was filthy. He’d spent days crawling around in shafts in the ship. The man’s white brow raised.
“Alexander Darby, yes?”
Alex nodded.
“And you are?” he asked Ivy.
“Ivy … Darby.”
Come on, Ivy. She didn’t sound comfortable enough with the lie.
“Then you’re siblings?” the man asked.
“Twins, actually,” Alex said, clearing his throat. “Listen, Mr.—?”
“Either way, you’re quite young for having found such an interesting cipher.”
The man reached for the scrap of newspaper that Mr. Jones had left on his desk and took out a pair of spectacles. He set the spectacles on the bridge of his nose and lifted the newspaper. “What type of cipher?”
“A null cipher,” Alex said, sitting straighter.
For the briefest moment, a flicker of insecurity went through him, as though he wanted—needed—to prove himself to this man.
He saw intelligence in the gentleman’s gaze.
A perceptiveness that gave Alex the impression that he was staring at someone intellectually equal to himself.
The gentleman didn’t respond right away. He lifted the scrap again, angling it toward the light. “And the key?”
“Fourth letter of every fourth word in the fourth paragraph,” Alex said. “I recognized the structure. It’s subtle but familiar.”
“Familiar to whom?”
“To someone who enjoys patterns. Cryptography. Numbers.” He shrugged. “It’s the kind of thing you’d use if you wanted to warn someone without drawing attention.”
The man gave a quiet hum of approval. Beside Alex, Ivy shifted.
Not the restless kind of movement—more like the wary sort, the kind she made when her mum was about to ask a question she didn’t want to answer.
Her spine was straighter now, her hands perfectly still in her lap. That usually meant she was on alert.
Interesting. Maybe she was more cautious since her kidnapping.
“And your sister?” The gentleman glanced at her, watching her closely. “Did she notice it too?”
“No,” Alex said quickly. “I saw it.” He hesitated. He didn’t want to make Ivy seem useless—or have the man question why she’d come. “First, anyway. But she’s just as good as I am at this.”
She flinched.
The man gave a slow nod, still watching Ivy for a second too long, and her jaw tightened further. She didn’t like this. Of course she didn’t. She probably wants to throttle me for lying.
“You understand,” the gentleman said finally, returning his gaze to Alex, “that spotting such a cipher isn’t something most adults could do—let alone a fifteen-year-old.”
Alex felt heat crawl up his neck. “It wasn’t that hard.”
“You remind me of someone I once knew. Sharp mind. Eager to prove himself. Good with numbers.” The gentleman’s smile was small, assessing. “But he made the mistake of underestimating the weight of the work.”
“What work?” Alex asked.
“Let’s not get ahead of ourselves.” He folded the paper with quiet precision. “Tell me—do you speak any other languages?”
“French and Arabic. I’m pretty good at German too.”
“Ah.” He tapped the edge of the folded paper. “And your father taught you?”
“Mostly. He’s strict about languages.” About school, really. It was the one area where his father always demanded excellence.
“And you enjoy this? Breaking things apart, finding patterns?”
“I do.”
Another pause. Ivy’s fingers had curled slightly into the fabric of her skirt. She barely seemed to be breathing—still and focused like she got when she sensed something wasn’t quite right but didn’t yet know what.
“Then I’d like to make you an offer,” the gentleman said at last, and his tone shifted to something cautious. “But …”
An offer? Alex tried to restrain himself from leaning forward eagerly. If he didn’t know better, it sounded as though the man wanted to employ him. He exchanged a glance with Ivy. “But what?”
“But, on the other hand, you’re runaways, aren’t you? It would be highly irresponsible for me not to turn you over to the police.”
“We’re not runaways,” Ivy cut in quickly. Her eyes were wide, her face white.
The gentleman frowned. “Am I to assume that you don’t want me to turn you in to the police for a different reason? Nothing nefarious, I hope.”
“No—nothing like that,” Alex said. He reached over and set his hand on Ivy’s, hoping to keep her from speaking.
She wouldn’t do a good job concealing the truth.
“I know our appearance isn’t the best, but it’s just that our father is an archeologist. We were at a dig when I came across this cipher.
Thought it would be important to turn it in immediately. ”
“Ah, that makes sense.” The gentleman’s face brightened. “Excellent. That was quite sensible of you.” He sat back in his chair. “If that’s the case, then I’d love to make a proposal to you, though I may need to speak to your father about it.”
Alex hesitated. This lie was quickly spinning out of his control. If the man insisted on talking to Uncle Jack, this could all get out of hand. “What’s the offer? Our father won’t mind. He’s not in Cairo right now—went to Luxor for a few days. He was needed to … consult at a dig.”
“Of course. A famed archeologist like your father is likely to be in demand.” The gentleman cleared his throat.
“It’s a modest offer, of course. But, you see, I have several other newspaper articles written by this ‘Gretchen Herbert’ I’d like you to review.
” He gave Ivy a taut smile. “Both of you, of course. I’ll need you to search for hidden messages, perhaps even a pattern.
Come stay with me for a few days. Room, board, and something in your pocket for your time. ”
Ivy’s hand closed tightly around his. Alex felt it before he saw the expression on her face—a barely veiled alarm in her eyes, the tension creeping into her posture. She didn’t trust this man. Not even a little.
“Why?” Alex asked, ignoring the way Ivy’s fingers were practically drilling into his skin.
“Because sometimes the world needs people like you.” The gentleman’s gaze was steady. “Quiet minds with sharp edges.”
Ivy’s thumb tapped once against his wrist—a signal. A warning.
“And I always make a point to invest in potential before someone else does.”
An offer to work as a cryptographer? For money? And from a British government official, no less. A shiver of excitement went through Alex. No one had ever offered to pay him for something like this before.
Ivy cleared her throat, drawing Alex’s attention to her for a moment. She shook her head in warning, more forcefully this time, then leaned toward him and hissed in his ear, “We don’t even know who he is.”
The man smiled. “How silly of me. Did I forget to introduce myself? My name is Prescott Federline. It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”