The truth was that, having obtained that most valuable information, the trio wanted to get rid of her as soon as possible. Therefore, with excuses that the household at Pembridge Gardens would be suspicious if she returned too late, they bundled her almost unceremoniously outside, Jim hailing a hansom for her, paying the man, and telling him to drive to Notting Hill Gate Station.
Then, when he re-entered, he exclaimed with a laugh to the Baronet, "That was a cheap `quid's' worth of information, wasn't it--eh?"
"Cheap, my dear boy? Why, it's placed us absolutely on top. The treasure, if it still remains there, is ours!"
"Ah! not too hasty! Not too hasty!" exclaimed the old German in his deep guttural voice, and raising his head from the table. "Up to a certain point, it is all right, but--"
"But what?" the others gasped, in the same breath.
"Well, there's something wanting, alas! Or else the girl has made a great mistake. After the addition of the numbers to 666, all goes entirely wrong!"
"Goes wrong!" they echoed breathlessly, with one accord.
"Yes. The further reading is quite unintelligible," he declared, speaking with his strong Teutonic accent.
"The girl seemed quite certain about it!" exclaimed Jim, exchanging glances with Challas.
"Quite," the other remarked, blandly.
"Well, my dear sirs!" exclaimed Haupt, pointing to his lines of hastily-written Hebrew. "The commencement of the record is here, plain enough. It commences, `Remember and forget not, O Israel. Not for thy righteousness---' But after taking the two-hundredth letter I can discover nothing. Commencing again at six only results in nothing, while a repetition of the fiftieth and the consequent addition is equally futile. No! The confounded girl has made some mistake--and we are once more at a standstill. You see that one false number throws out the whole. The cipher is one of the most ingenious ever conceived."
"But, my dear Haupt, you know the basis, and where it commences! You will surely succeed!" Challas cried, frantically.
The old man shook his head very dubiously.
"As I have already told you," he responded in his deep voice, "a single misplaced number throws it all out. We are again at an absolute deadlock--and must remain as ignorant as we were before."
"But have you made every possible effort?" asked Jim Jannaway, with eager face, as he bent over the old man's shoulders.
"I have tried all the combinations of the Apocalyptic Number, but they are futile!" replied the old German, laying down his pen, and blinking through his glasses.
"Then the girl has failed us after all," remarked Challas in a low, hard voice. "Griffin has deciphered the record and we're absolutely `in the cart.'"
"I won't give up!" declared Jannaway. "I'm hanged if I will! This may be one of Charlie's tricks, remember! He may have learnt the truth and got hold of Laura to put us on the wrong scent."
"He may--curse him!" muttered Sir Felix. "Why didn't he take my warning and get away abroad?"
"Because he's quite as cute as we are. He knows full well that while he remains in England circumstances will continue to be propitious. So he lives quietly down in Kent, with both eyes very much open."
Already Jim Jannaway's ingenious mind was active; already he was devising a way out of the awkward _cul-de-sac_ in which they now found themselves.
"What are we to do?" inquired Sir Felix, with his dark brows knitted at this sudden failure of all his elaborate plans.
"Leave it to me," replied the good-looking scoundrel, with the utmost confidence. "Let Erich remain quietly within reach--not, however, at the Waldorf--and allow me to carry out the scheme in my own way."
"I cannot think why the girl made such a mistake," Challas remarked very disappointedly. "I admit the solution was complicated, but you saw that she was clever enough to write it down."
"She listened behind a closed door. She may have misunderstood," Jim remarked.
"Or, what is much more likely," remarked the German, "Griffin, who has the reputation of being a very shrewd man, does not trust his daughter, and purposely misled her in explaining his secret."
"No, I don't think that," said Jannaway. "Griffin trusts the girl, even though she's quite young, absolutely and implicitly."
And thus the three desperate schemers agreed to leave matters in the hands of the most daring and unscrupulous of men, Jim Jannaway, unconscious that the exterior of the mansion was being watched independently by two persons, Doctor Diamond, and a thin-faced, ill-clad woman, who, noticing the Doctor's keen interest in the place, glanced at him full of surprise and wonder.
CHAPTER THIRTY TWO.
REVEALS THE CIPHER RECORD.
In the study at Pembridge Gardens, the silence only broken by the solemn ticking of the little Sheraton clock, Professor Griffin's calm, even voice was slowly dictating to Gwen the translation from the Hebrew of the cipher record into English.
The girl, as her father's amanuensis, had long ago become quite an expert with the typewriter, and in order to make a clear copy she had seated herself at the machine, her slim, white fingers deftly touching the keys.
"If you are ready dear, we'll begin," said the old man, drawing his folios of scribbled Hebrew towards him.
"I'm quite ready, dad," she assured him, pulling her skirt around her at the little table by his side upon which the typewriter was fixed.
"Very well, then. I'll translate slowly. Forgive me if I hesitate, child, for some of it may perhaps be difficult to put into intelligible or Biblical English. It is really a most astounding statement by a scribe of the Temple."
Then, after a brief pause, he began to dictate to her the hidden record, which was as follows:
"_Remember and forget not, O Israel. Not_ for thy righteousness, or for the uprightness of thine heart, dost thou go to possess thy land, but for the wickedness of these nations the Lord thy God shall drive them out before thee.
"_Thou shalt love_ the Lord thy God and keep His charge, His statutes and His commandments.
"_And_ know ye this day why this secret record is written, that it may be preserved unto the just... _The_ lapse of years are nearing its filling. _The_ relief of the Doom will come, in spite of all. _The_ people's right is nearing. _The_ period of the Blood-debts, and that of the Suppression will lose its power, and Israel shall be restored (here follow seven words undecipherable).
"..._As_ the Lord God was against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, Gomer and all his bands, the house of Togarmah, of the north quarters, so shall He be against all the enemies of Israel that spread over the land. _For_ He will make His Holy name known in the midst of His people Israel, and will not let them pollute His Holy name any more; and the heathen shall know that He is the Lord, the Holy One in Israel...
"_And the desolate_ places of the Land shall become populated, Jerusalem the city shall be restored, the sanctuary shall be set up, and the children of Israel shall be gathered there from the four corners of the earth where they will be found scattered.
"_Be thou prepared_, and prepare thyself, for the Lord God will make a covenant of peace with His chosen people; it shall be a peace everlasting and His tabernacle shall be set in the midst of them for evermore, even upon Mount Moriah.
"_Stay_ yourselves, and wonder, for unto thee, O children of Israel, are the greater treasures of Solomon's Temple still preserved. _And_ thus it is therein written in a book that is sealed, so that the wicked of Babylon and the enemies of Israel shall not know. _Verily_ I say unto you the Ark of the Covenant, and the tablets, and the rod of Aaron, and the other sacred objects which Solomon placed in the house of the Lord are still with thee, O Israel, until the wastes be builded, the cities inhabited and the Lord God cometh again unto the mountains of Jerusalem... for your own ways--and the Lord will build up the ruined places--
"_Know ye the truth_ concerning the sacred treasures of Israel, the vessels out of the house of the Lord. _In_ the third year of Jehoiakim, King of Judah, cameth one night into Jerusalem one Hashbbiah, a secret messenger from Antioch, who seeking Zeruiah, the high priest, told him in private that Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon, had advanced upon the hosts of Pharaoh-Necho at Carchemish and defeated him, and that the King of Babylon had taken from the river of Egypt unto the river Euphrates all that pertained unto the King of Egypt.
"_Now_ Zeruiah, a man full of learning, remembered the prayer of Solomon, and saw that the prophecy of the fall of Jerusalem was to be fulfilled, and that Judah was to be led into captivity by the Babylonians... _And_ he went out upon the mountain alone and prayed unto the Lord. _And_ the Lord directed him to take counsel of six priests, of whom one was the prophet Ezekiel, to decide how the sacred things of the house of the Lord should be held from the hands of the despoiler.
"_And to one of the priests_, Uzziah, son of Haziah who came from Gaza, was revealed a hiding-place outside the gates of Jerusalem, beyond the valley of Jehoshaphat, where the treasures could be concealed beneath the earth in a dry-room, in connection with a series of water-tunnels, which could be emptied only by those who knew the secret gate of the waters.
"_And the ears of Zeruiah_ the high priest, heard a voice behind him saying: `This is the way, walk ye in it. Place the treasures of the house of Jehovah therein, and seal them with the waters, so that no man shall know.'
"_So_ at night he went with Uzziah onto the place that was revealed, which is on the side of the mount.
"_And_ he saw that it had been used by thieves in the days when Rehoboam was king, and that its entrance had since been unknown to any man.
"_And returning to_ the inner court of the Temple in darkness of night he went into the Holy Place and called unto him Baruch, the son of Neriah, Sherebbiah, the scribe, Ezekiel the priest, and the five other priests. _And_ together both that night and the next and through many nights did they carry forth the most treasured objects of the Temple down into the valley, letting no man know that they were being taken from the house of the Lord.