Chapter 18

CHAPTER 18 Amy couldn't believe it. Something had happened between her and Kurt. She couldn't really explain it. Yes, they'd played chess. But there had been more to it than that. Like her senses had all been suddenly plugged in. For the first time in weeks, she had been able to think about something other than the hunt. Then, just like that, she had to go. There was barely time for a good-bye. "Good luck," Kurt had told her. But all she felt was the bad luck of the moment. And then there was Dan's destruction of Churchill's message. "How could you do that?" she asked as Nellie

艾米简直不敢相信。 她和库尔特之间发生了什么。 她真的解释不清楚。 是的，他们下过棋。但事情远不止于此。 就像她的感官突然被接通了一样。 几个星期以来，她第一次能够想些打猎以外的事情。 然后，就这样，她不得不走了。 连告别的时间都没有。 “祝你好运，”库尔特对她说。 但她只觉得当时运气不好。 然后是丹毁了丘吉尔的口信。 “你怎么能这么做？”她像内莉一样问道

sped them away from the Witbank mine… and Kurt. Her brother looked at her in disbelief. "Come on, Amy. You didn't think that just because I ripped it up—" "I know, I know, you memorized it!" Amy said. "It's the Dan Cahill Mental Gymnastics Show. But that's not the point! How could you have taken that incredibly stupid risk in the mine? You could have died! Again!" "I found what no one else has found in a hundred years," Dan said, "so maybe you say, like, thanks?" "He also tricked those two guys into thinking the paper meant nothing," Nellie said. "You're just as bad as he is!" Amy shot back. Dan held up a finger. "Winston Churchill once said, 'In wartime, truth is so precious that she should always be attended by a bodyguard of lies.'" "How do you know that?" Amy asked. "It's right there, on the page your book is open to," Dan said, pointing to the biography on the car

让他们离开了威特班克矿井和库尔特。 她哥哥难以置信地看着她。 “来吧，艾米。你不会因为我把它撕了就这么想吧——”“我知道，我知道，你记住了！”艾米说。 “这是丹·卡希尔精神体操秀。 但这不是重点！你怎么能在矿井里冒这么愚蠢的险？ 你可能会死的！再来一次!”“我发现了一百年来没有人发现的东西，”丹说，“所以也许你会说，谢谢？”“他还欺骗了那两个人，让他们认为那篇论文毫无意义，”内莉说。 “你跟他一样坏！”艾米反驳道。 丹举起一根手指。“温斯顿•丘吉尔（Winston Churchill）曾说过，‘在战争时期，真理是如此珍贵，以至于它总是应该有一个谎言保镖守护。“你怎么知道的？”艾米问。 “就在那儿，在你书打开的那一页上，”丹指着车上的传记说

seat. "Churchill was all about hidden messages. He worked with spies. I locked this baby in my head, dude." On the other blank page Nellie had given him he wrote out what he had found in the mine: AM LOST, TIRED, GONE IN, DRIVEN NOUGHT. WE HIT A SHARK —O CONFUSED LETTERS, FLEE, LOVER, FROM THESE LINES! WLSC "Churchill wasn't crazy," Dan said. "And he wasn't drunk. I'm betting this all means something." Amy stared at the words." 'We hit a shark'?" "I'm buying the nutcase scenario," Nellie said. "Okay, okay, it sounds a little weird, but let's think," Dan said. "Isn't that what you do when you're attacked by a shark— hit it on its snout?" "Churchill just escaped from prison, right?"

座位。“丘吉尔非常注重隐藏的信息。 他和间谍一起工作。我把这孩子锁在脑子里了，伙计。” 在内利给他的另一张空白纸上，他写下了他在矿井里的发现：我迷路了，累了，进去了，一无所有。 我们打了个鲨鱼-o迷茫的字母，逃离吧，爱人，从这一行！“丘吉尔没有疯，”丹说。 “而且他没有喝醉。我敢打赌这一切都意味着什么。” 艾米盯着上面的字。‘我们撞到鲨鱼了’？”“我相信这种疯狂的设想，”内莉说。 “好吧，好吧，这听起来有点奇怪，但让我们想想，”丹说。 “当你被鲨鱼攻击时，你不就是这么做的吗？——打它的鼻子？”“丘吉尔刚从监狱里逃出来，对吧？”

Nellie said. "So maybe it's some English expression for victory. Like, 'Ho-ho, we really hit a shark there, didn't we, old chap?' Very Kabra, don't you think?" "Dan?" Amy said. "Remember that code we had to solve on Uncle Alistair's estate, to open the hatch in his backyard? Where the hint was actually a play on words? What if this thing is actually two parts— the top part is the code, and the bottom part is the instructions for decoding it?" "Hmm…" Dan looked at the last few lines of the message. "So, 'O confused letters' would be part of the instructions." "Yup, and 'confused' could be a code for 'scrambled.' Scrambled letters means an anagram," Amy said. "And 'flee'— that means the same thing as 'leave' in Uncle Alistair's puzzle. You have to take something away, like a letter or word…" "Lover!" Dan said. "That's it. He doesn't mean a real lover. He means the word l-o-v-e-r! And 'from these lines'— five letters, five lines!— wait,

内莉说。所以这可能是英语中对胜利的表达。 就像，“嗬嗬，我们真的撞到鲨鱼了，是不是，老伙计？”很像卡布拉，你不觉得吗？”“丹?”艾米说。 “还记得我们在阿利斯泰尔叔叔家必须破解的密码吗？打开他后院的舱门。” 暗示其实是文字游戏？ 如果这个东西实际上是两部分——上面是代码，下面是解码的说明呢？”“嗯……”丹看了看留言的最后几行。 “所以，‘O混淆字母’将是说明的一部分。” “是的，‘混乱’可能是‘混乱’的暗号。打乱字母的意思是字谜，”艾米说。 “而‘逃离’——在阿利斯泰尔叔叔的谜题中，它的意思和‘离开’是一样的。 你必须拿走一些东西，比如一个字母或一个单词……”丹说。 “就是这样。他指的不是真正的情人。 他指的是单词l-o-v-e-r！还有‘from these lines’——五个字母，五个行！——等等,

I think I know…" Dan slapped his forehead. "Agggh, it's in Dutch." "I don't think so," Amy said. "Churchill was a Brit, not a Boer. So now we unscramble. Okay, that second to last word is easy—with." "Shaka!" Dan blurted out. "That's the last word! So the final words are with Shaka! Okay, I'll get the rest of it in two minutes. Time me. Go ahead." But Amy was staring at the first word already. "Dan, I think we hit the jackpot." Dan's face lit up, the way it did whenever the supermarket stocked Red Sox ice cream. Slowly, he attacked the puzzle and didn't stop until he'd finished:

我想我知道了……”丹拍了拍额头。 “啊，是荷兰语。”“我不这么认为，”艾米说。 “丘吉尔是英国人，不是布尔人。 现在我们来解读一下。好吧，倒数第二个词很容易。” “沙加!”丹脱口而出。“这是最后一句话！”所以最后的话是和Shaka说的！好吧，剩下的我两分钟内搞定。 我的时间。去吧。”但艾米已经盯着第一个词看了。 “丹，我想我们中大奖了。” 丹的脸亮了起来，就像每当超市里有红袜队的冰淇淋时一样。 他慢慢地开始解谜，直到解完才停下来。

"Tomas ingredient in the ground with Shaka!" Dan blurted. "That was three minutes seven seconds," Nellie remarked. "He knew!" Amy said. "Churchill knew the location of the Tomas clue!" "He must have found out while in prison," Dan said. "Or maybe there was a Cahill running the mine." "So… the clue must be buried with Shaka's corpse," Amy said. "Now we're talking!" Dan replied. "Ew," Nellie called from the front seat. "We have to dig up a body?" "Dan?" Amy asked. "Where is Shaka buried?" Dan took out his Shaka book and leafed to the end. "Well, no one is one hundred percent sure. But legend has it he was killed in a place called Durban, which is in the KwaZulu-Natal province." "Which is, uh, where?" Nellie said. "Past the Mpumalanga province," Dan replied. "Thanks a lot."

“汤玛斯的配料和沙卡在一起！”丹脱口而出。 “那是三分七秒，”内莉说。 “他知道!”艾米说。“丘吉尔知道托马斯线索的位置！”“他一定是在监狱里发现的，”丹说。 “也可能是卡希尔家的人在开矿。” “那么……这条线索一定和沙卡的尸体一起被埋葬了，”艾米说。 “现在我们说对了！”丹说。 “哎呀，”内莉在前座叫道。 “我们必须挖出一具尸体？”“丹?”艾米问。 “沙卡埋在哪里？”丹拿出他的沙卡书，翻到最后。 “嗯，没有人百分之百确定。 但传说他是在夸祖鲁-纳塔尔省一个叫德班的地方被杀的。” “在哪里？”内莉说。 “过了普马兰加省，”丹回答。 “非常感谢。”