I stayed silent and was flabbergasted. I was related to Loretta! I was her grand-cousin! For 3 minutes I just stood there until I recovered from my shock.
"So did your husband ever tell you specifically what truth would the necklace bring?" Eric inquired.
"No." Mrs. Leponez replied. "I never knew what the significance of the necklace was."
"It could have something to do with the Misterio, couldn't it?" Waylen suggested.
"its possible," Mrs. Leponez responded. "But how?"
"We don't know yet, but the chance is high."
"Has the police discovered who the other 2 gangsters were?" I asked.
"Yes. There is one of them who was caught 4 days after Frederick's trial, but the 3rd one escaped."
"What was his name?"
"Dhruv Barmbado."
Now, Loretta was on the couch the whole time thinking for a while. Then she spoke.
"Is it possible, that the necklace is the thing?"
"What thing?" Mrs. Leponez inquired.
"The disc! Could the necklace contain the disc? Remember in my trial, Aziel, that my grandfather had stolen the Misterio's disc for the information of that formidable weapon? Could it be possible that he hid the disc inside the necklace?"
It seemed reasonable to me at least, so I took of the necklace.
"You handed the necklace to Aziel?" Mrs. Leponez exclaimed.
"yes." Loretta replied.
"Why though?"
"Cause I love him with all my heart."
I smiled as I examined the necklace. It was intricately fashioned, made of marble on one side and jade on the other. It was impossible to form the 2 of them together. There had to be an opening! I tried with all my might to pry the necklace open. It was stuck. The contents in the necklace had to contain the disc, or else there is no plausible reason for making it so hard to open.
"Oh Aziel." Waylen laughed. "What the heck are you trying to do?"
"Trying to open the necklace!" I murmured with all my power gone.
"The necklace opens by code. Stop trying to pry it open with your hands."
Everyone laughed as I was chagrined.
"Then why don't we just hand it to the police and finish off the Misterio?" I sighed, trying to get the others' minds off my humiliating actions.
"The police won't be convinced with just a necklace, Aziel." Eric replied, trying to control his laughter. We need the disc itself."
"Then how are we going to get the code?"
"Is there a brand name on the lock?"
I examined the necklace. The words were extremely small. When I asked for a magnifier, Mrs. Leponez handed me one. I looked it over again. It was in code. It wrote:
Elt Wagzdwppyi
I showed it to Eric.
"Does the necklace say anything else?"
I looked it over the third time. Sure enough, I saw another code. It said;
obzgxkx, Rot 19
"That is in Caesar shift encryption." Eric stated. "ROT 19 symbolizes the number of letters you go back."
"Ah." Mrs. Leponez exclaimed. "Daniel loved codes. Very typical of him."
"Can you decrypt it?" Waylen asked.
Eric asked for a piece of paper and pen. After Mrs. Leponez handed it to him, Eric began to write the alphabet. Afterwards, he wrote out the alphabet again on the bottom but this time starting from u. After some writing, he came up with the word. Vignere.
"What is vignere?" I inquired
"By vignere I think the code means vignere square. It is another encryption method. But this one isn't as easy to decrypt as the caesar shift. You need a password. By that it means only one word."
I looked over the necklace again. This time, I could not find new words or encryption on it.
"Why do we need to solve the codes anyways?" Loretta inquired.
"We can figure out what kind of lock this is." Eric replied. "All locks have weaknesses. If we can find the weakness in this one, we can open the lock without finding out the code."
We thought for a moment. Then something came to my mind.
"Loretta, back in the trial, you said there is a storage shed in Liberty, didn't you?"
She nodded.
"Mr. Leponez definitely made up the codes. No company would put their brand on their products in code. Mr. Leponez could have put in the shed the password!"
Everyone agreed that there was such a possibility.
"But where is the shed?" Eric inquired.
"It's in the Catskill mountains." Mrs. Leponez replied.
"Then lets-" I ejaculated until Waylen covered my mouth. He told us to come together and whispered.
"Someone's at the window!"
We looked through the window. Sure enough, there was a shadow over the curtains.
"What are we going to do?" I inquired with a soft voice.
"I've got an idea." Mrs. Leponez said. "Here's the plan."
