CHAPTER FOUR

"Is he gone?" Martha asked, after hearing the front door close loudly.

"Yes," I answered, "completely gone."

"But what about his lunch?"

"He won't have any lunch today."

"And his dinner?"

"No dinner, either."

"What?" cried the old servant.

"No, Martha, he won't eat any more, and neither will anyone else in this house! He won't allow any of us to eat until he's discovered the meaning of the old writings he found that are unreadable."

"My God! You mean we're going to starve?" she said before she ran out of the room.

I feared that with my uncle's stubbornness, Martha could be right, but I did not tell her. I then thought of going to tell Grauben everything, but realized that I could not leave, or my uncle might return while I was gone. What would happen if he came back while I was away? He would be terribly upset. Therefore, I stayed there, waiting for him.

After nervously walking around the room for some time, I sat down in my uncle's old chair in his study to examine the mysterious piece of ancient writing. I soon noticed that the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth letters formed the English word "ice", that the eighty-fourth, eighty-fifth, and eighty-sixth letters formed "sir", that a few Latin words appeared in the second and third lines, and I recognized three French words on the fourth line.

It was crazy—four different languages in that silly sentence! What connection could there be between such words as ice, sir, anger, cruel, wood, changeable, mother, and sea? I could easily connect the words, "ice" and "sea" with Iceland, but not the rest.

I struggled for quite some time with this mysterious message, containing one hundred thirty-two letters. I was warm and needed air. I then fanned myself with the paper, and as a result saw the letters from back to front and made a discovery. I was shocked when I recognized words in Latin when I read the document from back to front. After a short walk around the room to calm myself, I sat down to read the mysterious document.

But then I was filled with amazement and terror. A man had been courageous enough to ... 

"Oh, no!" I cried out. "I mustn't let my uncle know about this! He'd want to try it, too. He would risk everything, and he'd take me with him, and we'd never come back! Never!"

I then decided that I must destroy the document so my uncle would never discover its meaning. I walked to the fireplace, as there was a little fire still burning. Just as I was going to throw the paper into the fire, the door to the study opened, and my uncle quickly walked in.

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