Preface to Murder, M Morris [best selling autobiographies TXT] 📗

is that I’ve been trying to land a publishing contract for a while now. It shouldn’t be so hard. I’m a well-known journalist with a solid track record. But my agent just can’t seem to find an opening with any of the big publishing houses. She’s been trying for almost a year with no success. Frankly, it’s been galling to watch Diane bringing her book to publication while I twiddle my thumbs on the sidelines. So I decided to have a quiet word with Grant before Diane’s talk, and he suggested that I meet Jennifer. In fact, it was a very productive meeting. We’re already moving forward with some ideas.’

‘And where and when did this meeting take place?’

‘At the White Horse, just after Diane’s talk.’ He looked abashed. ‘I had to tell Diane that I was driving straight back to London. I feel bad about that now. It was the very last thing I said to her, and it was an untruth.’

‘And what time did the meeting finish?’

‘We left the pub at about five to eleven. I remember checking the time, because I wanted to estimate when I could expect to get home. I called my wife just as I was setting off to let her know that I wouldn’t be back until about one o’clock in the morning, and for her not to wait up for me.’

‘I see. It seems like a long drive to make, especially since you were returning to Oxford the next day for the literary festival.’

‘Yes. Normally when I’m in Oxford I stay with…’ He stopped abruptly. ‘I mean, sometimes I stay with a friend.’

‘A friend? Who?’

Dearlove threw the end of his cigarette to the ground and crushed it angrily against the cobbles with his shoe. He reached into his jacket pocket for a replacement but found the pack empty. ‘God, dammit! Where can I buy more of these?’

‘There’s a shop this way,’ said Bridget, steering him in the direction of the High Street. ‘Now, you were saying that you usually stay with a friend in Oxford. Do you want to tell me who that is, or shall I make a guess?’

He bowed his head. ‘All right, I may as well admit it. I usually stay with Diane.’

Bridget recalled that during her previous conversation with Dearlove he had referred to Diane being “all alone in that big empty house of hers.” Now it was clear that he had seen the inside of that house first-hand. And he had made no secret of the fact that he had slept with Diane when they were students.

‘You were having an affair with her?’

‘Yes,’ he admitted.

‘And did your wife know about it?’

‘Of course not! That’s why I didn’t mention anything about it to you before. So you see, Inspector, Diane meant a lot to me. She was far more than just a colleague. She was more than a friend. That’s the reason I’m so keen to help you find out who killed her.’

‘That may be so,’ said Bridget. ‘But you must understand that this also makes you a prime suspect for her murder.’ They had arrived on the High Street now, close to a small independent newsagent that sold tobacco. Bridget indicated the shop. ‘I think you’ll find what you need in there.’

28

Ffion had her head in a book. Several books in fact. A pile of Diane Gilbert’s reference texts on code-breaking stood on one side of her desk. A book on steganography was propped open in front of her. And in her hands was a hardback edition of A Deadly Race - signed by the author herself.

Ffion was on the hunt for a secret message – Diane’s password – and perhaps it was hidden right here, within the very book she held. After all, if Diane Gilbert wanted to use the art of cryptography to hide her password, where better to conceal it than within her greatest work, her first published book?

Steganography. Concealed writing. One message hidden within another.

Even better than protecting a message by use of a secret code, steganography went one step further and disguised the fact that a message even existed. Ffion imagined the pleasure that the academic might have had, knowing that her biggest secret was out in the open, on full public display. It fitted the profile Ffion had built up of Diane.

Arrogant. Contemptuous. Presumptuous.

But these were qualities that could easily backfire.

It was late and most people had already left the office. But Ffion was going nowhere, not now that she had picked up the scent of her quarry. It was just a hunch, but she knew that her instincts were good. She had trusted hunches before, and they had led her to success. She was sure that this time would be no different. If only she could find the key.

She flipped through the pages of Diane’s book. Nearly five hundred in total. Three hundred words to a page. And Diane Gilbert had never used a short word if she could find a longer one that meant the same. Ffion did the maths. Close to a million letters in total. It was like searching for a needle in a haystack. Or a grain of sand on the seashore. Or a drop of water in…

Come on, focus.

The principle of steganography was simple. Whereas in most codes – or ciphers, to use the correct term – a substitution method was used to replace each letter in a word or sentence with another, in steganography the letters that made up the hidden message didn’t change, they were simply picked out of a larger text. The book that lay open on Ffion’s desk explained it through examples.

One common technique had been invented by Francis Bacon, the English philosopher and adviser to Queen Elizabeth I. The principle of Bacon’s cipher was to conceal a message using different formatting