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THE READING ROOM

How to Read the Signals

Every signal hides a single word; your work is to recover it and carry it to the keyhole. Nothing here says which signal hides which way — only the ways a word can hide. The rest is yours to notice.

The keyhole check

Every recovered word carries a two-letter check, stamped on its signal. It never gives a word away — it only confirms one, so you may guess freely and stay honest. To read a check yourself, number the letters A = 0 through Z = 25:

  • the first letter is the sum of your word's letters, wrapped at 26;
  • the second is the sum of each letter times its place (1st, 2nd, 3rd…), wrapped at 26.

If your word's two letters match the signal's stamp, you have it.

The ways a word can hide

Marks, and the hands beside them

Some signals strike certain letters and set a small hand by each. A hand may lean you to a neighbour — kept within the word, or ranging through the alphabet. Read only what is struck.

Coordinates

Number the words of a page. A coordinate names one word and one letter of it — taken from an end, or counted from its head. Read the letters they choose, in order.

The edges of a text

A word can stand in the first letters of the lines, or the last, or step corner to corner down them. When the middle says nothing, read the edges.

Beneath the surface

A page shows you one thing; its source, its notes left for machines, and the addresses it keeps out of sight hold another. Read the page beneath the page.

Inside the picture, inside the sound

An image can carry a message in its smallest bits; a sound can carry a picture in its frequencies. Look — do not only listen.

Hands, stacked

The hardest marks are two at once: one hand finds a letter, the other turns it. Learn each hand alone, and the pair comes clear.

Two of these hands — the marks and the coordinates — are the Society's own inventions. The Pocket Primers teach them properly, with graduated practice and hidden puzzles of their own.