Nancy opens the envelope and inside is a letter and a rusty iron key. The letter reads:
“Dear Agents of DUCK,
Please allow me to introduce my self, I am Director Evet S. Johnson of the Secret Agents of DUCK. I ran the Agents of DUCK in the 1990s and we nearly caught Kevin, but he managed to elude us at every turn. As you know, the Mount Diablo Golf Club has been our secret headquarters since our founding in 1881. One summer lightning struck the old oak tree in the Club House yard and split it right down the middle. I thought we would have great firewood for years to come from the old oak, but what we found in the middle of the tree was better than firewood and far more mysterious. It was a small copper cylinder that had grown into the middle of the tree. We knew it had to be very old because the copper had turned such a dark green that it was almost black. Unfortunately, in 2002 the cylinder disappeared from it’s display case during a bizarre cleaning incident that involved way too much bleach, an agent named Sally and some marshmallow goo. But, that is not important as I do have a copy of what was inside the cylinder. It looks like it was a coded message and someone had started to build a key, but must have gotten interrupted and hid the message and part of the key in the cylinder and placed it in a crack in the tree trunk where over the years the tree simply grew over it. While I do not think this will get us any closer to catching Kevin, someone must have hid this cylinder in the trunk of the tree and I surmise that whatever is at the end of the search may be quite valuable. And, as you know these years and years of chasing Kevin are quite costly.
Sincerely,
Evet S. Johnson"
The Message:
E TFEZC E MA LIEZG HYBBYQIJ, UY E MA QVETEZG TFEU AIUUMGI EZ KYJI. E FMRI HYSZJ TFI TVIMUSVI YH LBMKC LMVT MZJ FEJJIZ ET EZ TFI FEBBU YH AYSZT JEMLBY. HEZJ TFI JIJEKMTEYZ XBMWSI MZJ QETF TFI CIO, SZBYKC TFI JYYV TY TFI KVOXT.
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“Dad, can’t we just have one clue where it has a map and it shows us with a big X, dig here for glorious riches.”
“I can’t believe I was right about the whole Agents of DUCK and how long have they been chasing Kevin? And, yes it would be nice to have an X marks the spot.”
“Dad, I think I figured it out, these people either need to make better ciphers or we are just way too good at it. It looks like a reverse alphabet with a split in the middle, so A-M are reversed and N-Z are reversed as well.”
“Nancy, I think you are just a natural, so what is the key, I am still thinking mostly about DUCKs.”
Nancy wrights out the Key:
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She then quickly writes out the deciphered message. She really is good at this.
I THINK I AM BEING FOLLOWED, SO I AM WRITING THIS MESSAGE IN CODE. I HAVE FOUND THE TREASURE OF BLACK BART AND HIDDEN IT IN THE HILLS OF MOUNT DIABLO. FIND THE DEDICATION PLAQUE AND WITH THE KEY, UNLOCK THE DOOR TO THE CRYPT.
“Dad, this is it, we just need to find the dedication plaque for Mount Diablo State Park and use this rusty old key to find the treasure.”
“So, I wonder how this all relates back to you and I ending up in that building where I had amnesia and you were knocked on the head.”
“I’ve been thinking about that too. I remember a couple of weeks ago, we had a special guest in Mrs Pidwinkle’s Math class that talked about ciphers, encryption and puzzles. At the end we all took sort of a test that had us solve a bunch of word puzzles, riddles and decode ciphers. I finished in half the time of the other kids and am pretty sure I figured them all out correctly.”
“Do you think the Agents of DUCK could have set that up to find someone to solve the riddles leading to Black Bart’s treasure?”
“It is as good an explanation as any and I am really good at this stuff and you aren’t too bad either. How about you dad, anything weird at work lately?”
“Well, they did switch the free coffee in the break room from Starbuck’s to Seattle’s Best.”
“Uhm Dad, not the kind of weird I mean, you know like testing you or encouraging you to solve puzzles or anything.”
“Well, they are testing a new medication for ADHD that is suppose to help a person with attention and focus. It enables someone to solve complex problems and to work issues to completion, but it had a side effect of temporary amnesia.”
“Uh Dad, temporary amnesia, focus to complete something, like say finding clues and solving them until the last clue is found.”
“You are right, we were both targeted. I bet they drugged me to provide us focus and you for your unique ciphering gift.”
“Well, that explains everything and it may even be right, so all that is left is finding the treasure. Well that and why have the Agents of Duck been chasing Kevin since 1881?”
“Wouldn’t Kevin be dead by now?”
“Unless Kevin isn’t a person, or it is a descendant of Kevin? As far as I know we don’t have any Kevin’s in our family tree.”
“Well, let’s get some rest and in the morning we can hike to the ranger station, I think I remember it is about three miles Northeast of the golf course and we went about a mile last night, so with the hills, maybe an hours hike.”