The Decipherment by Tehreem Ali
* * *
With Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata still echoing, Isabelle felt far more relaxed to put her mind at the task of deciphering a code. The soft and melancholic melody kept her at bay with her confused state of mind.
As she started to take in the details of what she had created from her thoughts, the code image, the whole place around her turned into black with loads of ciphers, symbols, numbers, formulae, graphs and everything else that existed in the world of codes and cryptology. It looked like the inside of a working computer system, with all the greens jumping and colliding over one another in a black space.
Guess my mind does want me to help figure this out.
The writing, as she had noticed before, was Hebrew. She liked Hebrew – she found it beautiful. It was a tough language to learn. If the code was translated into English, the following sentence was obtained:-
XWPERLEZHGIITSIJVQWIMQWSWCISHPCVEM
[XIX III I]
At first sight it looked like jumbled up words, but Isabelle had tried all the words her brain could muster. It all seemed so . . . naïve. The thing that struck her most was the use of two different languages in the cipher. The letters were in Hebrew, but the counting at the bottom was Roman numerals. Using two languages to create a code was somewhat of a pointless idea to her. Sure, codes can be created in any way possible – as long as they were confusing. But using separate grids in a single code was redundant. She had to look at the problem from a new direction and think.
She mentally made a list of all the simple and basic codes she could think of, in the hope that some might match with this code. She could then figure out how to break it.
She first concentrated on the Roman numerals at the bottom. They seemed easy to decipher. The first set of numerals was 19, second was 3 and the third was 1.
19.3.1.
The numbers could represent anything, considering the fact that they were real numbers, a universal set of all the numbers including integers, fractions, decimals, and so on. The spaces among the numbers seemed odd. It showed how weak the creators had been in forming such a code that contained spaces among its numbers. Codes always have joined numerical values in them. It makes it all the more confusing for the person to think that the joined numbers are not one but different parts in the code. Only if the numbers had no spaces between them, they might form something else.
What if there were no spaces after all?
Isabelle could easily eliminate them herself. In her mind, she joined all the Roman numerals. In the enlarged portal before her, the image changed as she had thought. The numerals joined themselves. It now appeared as:
[XIXIIII]
Now if they were translated into English, they formed 1931.
1931.
A year.
But a year of what?
What was so important in that year that it was worth mentioning in the code? Of course, many events might have occurred in that space of time, but Isabelle couldn’t possibly know all of them. She wasn’t even born then. She only knew what she learned from books – and she didn’t think any of that would help her crack open a code. But the possibilities are always endless. She had to think outside the box, which meant she had to recall all she knew to be a part of that specific era.
She didn’t know much, but she had to give it a try.
Ernest Lawrence invented the cyclotron in 1931 used to accelerate particles in study of nuclear physics
Harold Urey discovered heavy water, water that contains deuterium, a rare hydrogen isotope.
Kurt Gödel published his incompleteness theorem in 1931.
The first International Neurological Congress, attended by individuals from 42 countries was formed in Berne, Switzerland.
The first electric guitar was also invented in 1931 by George Beauchamp
László Bíró first exhibited his ballpoint pen, in Budapest.
Thomas Edison died 1931.
Australia gained independence from Great Britain.
Empire State Building was completed in 1931 and stayed the world’s tallest building till 1974.
Yellow River flood (Huang He flood) generally thought to be the deadliest natural disaster of historic times, occurred in 1931 which killed between 900,000-2,000,000 people in China
First Dracula movie was released in 1931.
Why had the thieves chosen this specific date? They had to steal some precious piece of art from the museum. Then why do all the history talking in secret language? Maybe it had something to do with what they were to steal. It could be the year of death or birth of the artist whose painting they were going to steal . . . or better yet, it could be the year the painting itself was created in – it was as simple as that.
Isabelle wondered why she hadn’t thought of such a simple thing before. Whatever it was the robbers had planned on stealing belonged to the year 1931, or was created in that specific era. In that case, the sentence about the numerals in the code might be the name of the artist or his painting – the supposedly stolen piece of art.
It was the only thing that made sense. What else would be said through a code language than something to be stolen? No one would know of it if it was in some other language. It was a farfetched scheme, but wasn’t that what everyone did these days? Isabelle wondered.
She looked at the letters in the code again. It seemed as if they were encoded using a simple technique.
XWPERLEZHGIITSIJVQWIMQWSWCISHPCVEM
AZRHUOHCKJLLXVLMYTZLPTZVZFLVKRFZHP
All the types of ciphers and codes are classified into two main head categories: transition cipher and substitution cipher. In the former one, the letters of the message are simply rearranged following a straightforward system, effectively generating an anagram; whereas in the latter one, the alternative to transposition cipher consists of simply replacing each letter or groups of letter in the plaintext by another letter, symbol or number. Once it is determined which type of cipher it is, it becomes easier for the encoder to decipher the code.
From her experience, Isabelle knew this to be a substitution cipher. The continuous repetition of some letters, along with their disordered arrangement convinced her it was not a transition cipher. Mostly the strange and confusing impression that codes have is due their transposed or substituted nature. It makes it all the more hard to think of a way to decipher the code.
From what Isabelle had learned and experienced over the years she worked in the cryptology field, she had never come across such a code in which two different languages were used simultaneously. Although some would see it as a sign that showed how naïve its creators had been, Isabelle thought it made the code more difficult to encipher since one would have to use multiple languages and hence multiple techniques to break the ciphertext, making it all the more complicated.
But no matter how complex this code was, she had to break it. It was her ticket to freedom – from her own mind!
Starting simple was always best. Sometimes, it’s the simple things that are the hardest of all. Isabelle had learned it the hard way. Since her parents passed away and her aunt not shortly after, she had no relation left in the family to support her. Being a successful and independent woman as she was is not an easy goal to achieve, especially with no family support and in a world where looks and money did the job.
Of course, when she had no family left, she had to provide for herself. And hence she had learned that instead of going into too many complications over what is to be and what is not to be, is it always better to ride with the chances life presents us with – even the risky ones.