Chapter 20

Her Grace said, “Scroll down.”  The software program converted her voice to digital data and compared this to its files and found it similar in many respects to another file.  The program responded electronically and then converted a series of electronic pulses to sound.  This sound asked, in its monotone voice, “Do you wish to scroll down?”

“Yes,” she responded.

The cursor moved down to the next email.

“Open email,” she said.

Again the computer generated the same words in query and again she agreed.

Her failing vision forced her to use thirty-point type so she could only see a few lines of type on each page.  She strained to read.  Her blood pressure rose.

“Scroll down!”

Again the computer checked and she said, “Yes” and the screen scrolled.  She felt anger and frustration.  The blood pressure monitor sent its signals to her physician.  She knew her physician would read the numbers and come to check.  She could not allow a momentary weakness to cause an interruption.  She had no time for it.

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She willed herself to let the anger go and read dispassionately.  She forced herself to be patient with the computer, herself, and the new danger.

“Call my aide!”

The Church used email sparingly.  The Church chose this route not because they were uncomfortable with technology.  The Church had many masters of the web and superb programmers.  It was because of this very expertise that they used these resources sparingly.  The Church understood that no matter how good their experts in technology were, someone else’s experts would be better.

The Church defended against high tech with low tech.  Couriers memorized coded instructions and delivered their messages to others who decoded them.  These decoded messages were then scanned as images and stored in folders on portable drives.  These drives were physically destroyed after each use. And, the computer hard drives that this information flowed through were reformatted and filled completely with ones and zeros and then they were also destroyed.

When the information was even more important, the Church used more primitive methods.  Information was written on rice paper in a multiple source substitution code.  Their cryptographers used archaic religious treatises as source books.  They knew that even the PRCs cryptographers could not break the code.  Fanatical couriers carried these messages. They were instructed to eat the rice paper if there was any chance the information would be compromised.  When the message was especially important, the rice paper was impregnated with very powerful, fast-acting poison.  The courier would swallow the paper and the contents would reach their stomachs. Even after the poison that killed the courier stopped any chance of information compromise, the combination of saliva and stomach acids would make data recovery impossible.

“Acolyte Mary and guards are now entering the room,” the computer said.

Mary was new and trembled in her eagerness.  The young girl flipped the switch that physically disconnected Her Grace’s screen from the computer.  Mary then placed the first piece of rice paper on the image reader that made the computer screen a large screen picture viewer.  The acolyte curtseyed and left.  Her Grace made a mental note to move the acolyte to a different section.

She saw the guard’s attention focus for a moment on the lovely young acolyte.  For this brief second, the guard did not see Mary as a potential threat, but instead as an object of his desires. She could not afford to have any of the guards tempted by this young woman’s beauty.  The fact that Her Grace had never received any attention from men, never been pretty, had nothing to do with her decision to have the girl removed from her service.

Her Grace waited until the computerized voice told her the room was again empty.  She then directed her computer to scroll through the images on the screen, magnifying some for closer inspection.  Her servants reported that the brother was suspicious and starting to check.  She knew something like this would happen.  She and her minions already had plans in place.

“Call for my secretary,” she told the computer in an angelic voice so at odds with what she had planned.

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