She was calm as she lit the letter on fire, and dropped it in the brass trashbin next to her secretary, then doused it with water. After that, she pulled out her nib and personal letterhead. Her hand dipped the nib into the dark ink, but she paused as she pulled it out, hovering over the glass bottle, thinking about something Edward had said, twice, she remembered, and she was confused about that.

She breathe out slowly, teasing out the implications of what Edward wrote, about doing the right thing. About trusting. We’ll do right by you Edward.

“Dear John,
I hope you are recovering well from the heat wave that has overcome New York. We have had our own problems here in the Continent, however, the weather has not been as severe here. I write now to tell you that we are settling in well in Vienna. Robert has invested in a number of areas, mostly with Prussians, including in a couple of savings banks. He is considering purchasing a string of salt mines, some in the border of Austria and Prussia.
Earlier today I heard a most amusing story about two boys and a small leatherbook that one of them owned. Perhaps I will tell you more about it in my next letter….”

xxxxxx

A month later, John accepted the parcel from his manservant, and walked quickly to the drawing room of his townhouse, pulling the door shut behind him, and sat on his favorite chair, his heart hammering in his chest so thunderously, he thought it could be heard outside the room, even though he knew what to expect in the parcel.

He tore it open, and extracted his sister’s letter. This was her first attempt at using the codex he and Edward had developed, but using the new skip code sequence.

For some reason, he wasn’t surprised that her letter flowed well. Nor that she had thought of the perfect solution to their dilemma.

Firstly, Lady Beatrice proposed that he arrange to have the gold moved, in several shipments, back to England, to their parents’ country estate southeast of London, since John was planning to head back to London over the next six months, given growing unrest in America. The gold could be hidden amongst his things, and then Beatrice could help John secure the gold in their parents’ country estate once they were all delivered there. A back-up plan would be to send the gold to one of Robert’s (her husband’s) offices, the one closest to salt mines he’d purchased in the border between Austria and Prussia.