harry,

maryam suggested i get in touch as we need a courier and she thought you might be interested in joining us. her sources have confirmed that the book is being hunted by an illegal fundraising group named midas which has been associated with several terror networks in the last few years. maryam has travelled to istanbul following a lead on the buyer in the hope we can scare them off, but if that doesn’t work then we will need to find the rest of the book chapters before midas do. we are both hoping your diary is clear, because if i am right we will have another three places to visit after this one, and i am not sure how long it will take.

i finished my work on the third chapter of tacitus’s monograph which i found on rhodes. it was concealed in a large stone lintel bearing an image of a rose, the symbol of the consort of the sun god helios. intriguingly rhodes is also known as the island of the knights, named after the knights of saint john of jerusalem, and the clue at the end of chapter three pointed to another home of the knights at bodrum, so i travelled there and was not too surprised to find chapter four concealed in the remains of their fort. i was however astonished by the text! it took me a while to crack it as i didn't recognise the encryption as anything classical. when i finally broke it i discovered that tacitus had used a cipher that we thought had been invented in sixteenth century france. it seems that the imperial cipher school were much more advanced than we had any reason to expect. if courier duty isn't exciting enough for you perhaps the chance to discover more imperial ciphers will be?

the clue at the end of this chapter is very suggestive, and i have bought a ticket to selcuk to investigate. i am pretty sure i was followed to the ticket office.

if you can come then we need you to drop by the british museum before you come out. i think there is something there that we need and will send a message to my contact in room twenty two telling them to expect you and briefing them on what to look out for. it would be good if you could be very discreet about that, but make as much fuss as you like about meeting me in selcuk. i will explain later!

all the best,

jodie