Merriweather and I in unison.
“Moreover, in a manner specifically designed for you to interpret, Dr Merriweather.”
“I am at a loss to see how.”
Holmes’s grey eyes danced with delight. “Allow me to illuminate.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A S IGNATURE IN A D EAD T ONGUE
“The misspellings,” Holmes said, “give the superficial impression that the sender of the letters is not a cultured, erudite man. Yet that impression is patently erroneous. Would an illiterate employ words such as ‘pernicious’ and ‘plagiarism’? Regardless of how inaccurately he has spelled them, they are long and complex words. Similarly, the syntax of the sentences is anything but straightforward.
“Further to that, the misspellings themselves are inconsistent. Our poison pen friend gets ‘your’ right every time except once in the second letter when he uses two
o
’s in place of
o-u
. A simple monosyllable is normally no problem for him but defeats him on one occasion? I find that hard to swallow.
“And who would write ‘earned’ as ‘eanned’? It is not as though the latter sounds like the former when said aloud. The same goes for ‘fowced’. Misspellings tend to be phonetic. He would far more likely write ‘forced’ with an
s
instead of the
c
or perhaps with a
u
inserted between the
o
and the
r
.
“In all, it seems rather contrived, does it not? As if the misspellings are there to serve some specific, deliberate function. That was the view I took, at any rate, as I read through the letters, and the closing sentence of the third confirmed it for me. The word ‘characters’, after all, does not simply mean people or personalities. It also, in a more literal sense, refers to a letter of the alphabet or symbol, written or printed. Many such
exceptional
characters stand before us on these pages. If, as instructed, we single them out correctly – by which I mean extract the letter which should appear in each misspelled word were that word spelled as it ought to be – we derive a series of characters.”
“You’re saying the letters have some sort of cryptic cipher embedded in them?” I said.
“That is exactly what I am saying.” Holmes produced a fountain pen and a small notebook and began to write. “It should be an
f
rather than an
l
to make ‘piffling’. ‘Pernicious’ has an
i
as its second vowel, not an
a
. ‘Balm’ is spelled with an
l
.”
He continued in this fashion until he had written down a line of letters:
FILIUSCAROLUSNAVISPRATUM
This he divided up into four separate words using diagonal strokes:
FILIUS/CAROLUS/NAVIS/PRATUM
“Now then, Dr Merriweather,” he said. “That looks like Latin to me, but my schoolboy knowledge of the language is a tad rusty. Would you be so good as to translate?”
“
Filius
means son,” said Merriweather. “
Carolus
– that’s medieval Latin for Charles.
Navis
is ship,
partum
meadow. My God!”
“Yes. The letters’ author has named himself. The son of Charles, Earl of Shiplea. Lea and meadow are synonymous, of course.”
“Bancroft,” I said. “He is the guilty party after all.”
“The impertinent whelp!” Merriweather exclaimed.
“It is quite a clever trick,” said Holmes. “The first word is concealed within the first letter, the second within the second, and the last two words, which effectively make up a single word, within the third. Together they form a signature in a dead tongue with which you, Dr Merriweather, are intimately familiar.”
“As though he is further mocking me.”
“The use of capitals is an authentic touch, since that is how the Romans themselves wrote their texts.”
“And yet the grammar is deficient.
Carolus
,
navis
and
partum
are all in the nominative case but ought to be in the genitive: ‘the son
of
…’ That is typical of Bancroft. He is hopeless on his declensions. I am forever marking him down in his Latin compositions, and his Greek, on that front. To be honest, Bancroft is one of the worst students
“Moreover, in a manner specifically designed for you to interpret, Dr Merriweather.”
“I am at a loss to see how.”
Holmes’s grey eyes danced with delight. “Allow me to illuminate.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A S IGNATURE IN A D EAD T ONGUE
“The misspellings,” Holmes said, “give the superficial impression that the sender of the letters is not a cultured, erudite man. Yet that impression is patently erroneous. Would an illiterate employ words such as ‘pernicious’ and ‘plagiarism’? Regardless of how inaccurately he has spelled them, they are long and complex words. Similarly, the syntax of the sentences is anything but straightforward.
“Further to that, the misspellings themselves are inconsistent. Our poison pen friend gets ‘your’ right every time except once in the second letter when he uses two
o
’s in place of
o-u
. A simple monosyllable is normally no problem for him but defeats him on one occasion? I find that hard to swallow.
“And who would write ‘earned’ as ‘eanned’? It is not as though the latter sounds like the former when said aloud. The same goes for ‘fowced’. Misspellings tend to be phonetic. He would far more likely write ‘forced’ with an
s
instead of the
c
or perhaps with a
u
inserted between the
o
and the
r
.
“In all, it seems rather contrived, does it not? As if the misspellings are there to serve some specific, deliberate function. That was the view I took, at any rate, as I read through the letters, and the closing sentence of the third confirmed it for me. The word ‘characters’, after all, does not simply mean people or personalities. It also, in a more literal sense, refers to a letter of the alphabet or symbol, written or printed. Many such
exceptional
characters stand before us on these pages. If, as instructed, we single them out correctly – by which I mean extract the letter which should appear in each misspelled word were that word spelled as it ought to be – we derive a series of characters.”
“You’re saying the letters have some sort of cryptic cipher embedded in them?” I said.
“That is exactly what I am saying.” Holmes produced a fountain pen and a small notebook and began to write. “It should be an
f
rather than an
l
to make ‘piffling’. ‘Pernicious’ has an
i
as its second vowel, not an
a
. ‘Balm’ is spelled with an
l
.”
He continued in this fashion until he had written down a line of letters:
FILIUSCAROLUSNAVISPRATUM
This he divided up into four separate words using diagonal strokes:
FILIUS/CAROLUS/NAVIS/PRATUM
“Now then, Dr Merriweather,” he said. “That looks like Latin to me, but my schoolboy knowledge of the language is a tad rusty. Would you be so good as to translate?”
“
Filius
means son,” said Merriweather. “
Carolus
– that’s medieval Latin for Charles.
Navis
is ship,
partum
meadow. My God!”
“Yes. The letters’ author has named himself. The son of Charles, Earl of Shiplea. Lea and meadow are synonymous, of course.”
“Bancroft,” I said. “He is the guilty party after all.”
“The impertinent whelp!” Merriweather exclaimed.
“It is quite a clever trick,” said Holmes. “The first word is concealed within the first letter, the second within the second, and the last two words, which effectively make up a single word, within the third. Together they form a signature in a dead tongue with which you, Dr Merriweather, are intimately familiar.”
“As though he is further mocking me.”
“The use of capitals is an authentic touch, since that is how the Romans themselves wrote their texts.”
“And yet the grammar is deficient.
Carolus
,
navis
and
partum
are all in the nominative case but ought to be in the genitive: ‘the son
of
…’ That is typical of Bancroft. He is hopeless on his declensions. I am forever marking him down in his Latin compositions, and his Greek, on that front. To be honest, Bancroft is one of the worst students
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