phoenix/hints/solutions/spysnatcher_solve.tex

% \nodate
\raggedbottom \widowpenalty 2000
\def\Spy{{\it SpySnatcher\ }}
\centerline{\bf SpySnatcher -- information for reviewers} \vskip 0.25in

 As the introductory instructions tell the player, the object of
\Spy is to identify and catch the ``Mole'' in MI7 (whose premises are known
as ``The Zoo''). This person, last night sometime, removed the plans of the
``Sonic Macrothrodule'' from the chief's safe and is preparing to leak them
to a hostile power (Ruritania). The chief, Sir Arthur Cayley, in co-operation
with Superintendent Hardy of Special Branch, leaves us to explore the Zoo to
see what evidence we can find. Because everyone else is under suspicion,
nobody knows that the player is about, and there will be trouble if we run
into the security guard, or any personnel who happen to be working late.

The first task is to visit an office (owned by one Bertrand Newton) in which
a tape recorder has been set to erase a tape. If we get there too late, we
miss hearing a message recorded by Newton explaining that he is being framed
(by the Mole, as it happens). We also stumble across Newton's passport, and
some Ruritanian money. Since Newton is supposed to be abroad, this should
cast some suspicion on him! {\bf N, N, W, ON, STOP TAPE, GET ALL}.

Now to do what Cayley told us to do -- investigate his secretary's office.
The secretary, Miss Pell, is in the building, and will be coming upstairs
shortly, so we take the opportunity to read her appointments book and a
cryptic memo which in fact contains the combination to Cayley's safe.
Meanwhile the tape is playing. {\bf PLAY TAPE, E, S, S, W, ON, READ BOOK,
READ MEMO and solve for the four digits.} (The first digit puzzle refers to a
well-known song; the second to a series consisting of the number of letters
in JANUARY, FEBRUARY, MARCH, ... or SUNDAY, MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, ...
or even ONE, TWO, THREE, ...; the single-digit perfect number is six; for the
last puzzle, a circle is zero, a line is one and a lemniscate is a figure
eight.)

Into Cayley's office, to open the safe and read some files. The ones that
contain useful information are on BURNSIDE (giving us his description so that
we can impersonate him later), CONWAY (whose home address we need),
MURCHISTON (whose file is inconsistent with another file on him downstairs),
RUSSELL (whose initials we need in order to log on to the {\it MULTIPOCS}
computer as him), ARCHIVE (to obtain the combination to the archive safe in
the basement, and DRUGS (to show that the information on drugs being fed by
Hilbert to a contact is actually false). {\bf E, S, ON, OPEN SAFE using
combination, READ BURNSIDE, READ CONWAY, READ MURCHISTON, READ RUSSELL, READ
ARCHIVE, READ DRUGS.}

There is just about time to log on to Russell's computer next, but instead we
go into Hardy's office and wait for Miss Pell and Mr Gibbs to come upstairs.
Miss Pell's room is bugged and we hear some useful gossip which explains some
of yesterday's actions. We also need to know Miss Pell's Christian name,
which emerges in the conversation. {\bf N, N, W, ON, GET NEWSPAPER, DROP
TAPE, WAIT until conversation starts next door, and LISTEN (to save typing).}

Once the conversation has ended we go to Russell's office -- en route we may
attempt to enter Burnside's office, but fail and notice that his door has a
special lock, labelled with a name. This we note for later use. Once in
Russell's office we find a poem written down: the initial letters of its
lines spell out a password. Logging in to the computer we obtain information
about what Russell did and saw last night -- this seems to incriminate
Burnside! {\bf E, E,  note number, S, E, ON, READ POEM, LOGON (or similar
phrase) with username being Russell's initials (BOR / IGOR / USSR) , password
as in the poem (WALRUS / WEASEL / WOMBAT), XFILE.}

We are now due to explore downstairs, so we wait in Newton's office until the
guard is out of the way -- he comes upstairs and goes into Dr Ramanujan's
office for coffee with the scientist. {\bf W, N, N, W, WAIT until guard has
gone for coffee.}

Downstairs there is a cleaning lady, whom it {\it is} safe to meet but who
will ignore most things the player does. We first go into Conway's office --
the stub of a theatre ticket there suggests that he was elsewhere last night
but searching the rubbish bin before the cleaner gets to it reveals the rest
of the ticket -- so much for that alibi! {\bf E, N, D, S, S, E, ON, EMPTY
BIN, GET ALL.}

Next into Gibbs' office where there is another computer terminal to log on
at. The user name / password problem is harder here: the user name is in the
{\it MULTIPOCS} manual, written in invisible ink on a page marked ``This page
intentionally left blank'' (heating the page at an electric fire exposes the
writing) and the password is Miss Pell's {\it full} Christian name (reading
the newspaper gives a clue to this, and both Miss Pell's file and the
conversation overheard earlier indicate the abbreviated form of her name --
Betty for Elizabeth, Freda for Winifred, Peggy for Margaret.) We again obtain
useful information from the computer, namely the system log of accesses. {\bf
W, N, W, ON, FIRE ON, HEAT MANUAL, READ MANUAL, LOGON with user name from
manual and Miss Pell's full Christian name as password, XFILE.}

Into Hilbert's office, where there are some holiday snaps and a viewer.
Viewing the snaps reveals that one is a microfilm, though we cannot interpret
it as yet. {\bf E, S, W, ON, VIEW SNAPS, GET FILM.}

The guard will be back soon to lock up various offices, so we go into the
basement to avoid him. En route we turn on the light in Murchiston's office
(for future use) and steal the log (this will distract the guard and he will
forget to lock up Brauer's office, which we must visit later.) {\bf E, S, E,
ON, W, S, GET LOG, CALL LIFT, S, D.}

The pressure is now off us, and we can do various useful things in the
basement without being disturbed: first we read the log, to find out just who
was supposed to be around last night. We then go into the equipment room and
use a lens there to examine the passport more carefully -- it turns out to be
a forgery, so Newton {\it could be} abroad after all. We can also enlarge the
microfilm and read the the print produced -- this shows us that the
information being fed by Hilbert to his contact is false since it is a
totally inaccurate recipe for the {\it Veriton} truth drug whose true recipe
we saw earlier. Meanwhile, upstairs, the guard is bemoaning the loss of his
log and will be showing out the cleaning lady, who has finished work. {\bf
READ LOG, N, N, E, ON, GET LENS, READ PASSPORT, ENLARGE FILM, READ PRINT,
DROP ALL.}

Once the guard is downstairs and back at his post we need to go back upstairs
with various useful equipment, including the key to Burnside's office: the
keys are labelled according to the lengths of the key bits and reading off
the lengths gives us either 2304, 3011, or 103. These correspond to national
saints' days, George being April 23rd, Andrew November 30th, and David March
1st. To get in, it is necessary to identify the correct key and use it. (Do
not save the game at this point; doing so causes bad luck and the key jams in
the lock -- this avoids an easy trial and error solution!) To get past the
guard, we need to disguise ourselves as Burnside, by wearing a wig, false nose
and beard to match his description in the personnel files. The guard will
only see us at a distance and we should keep moving! When unlocking
Burnside's door we encounter Ramanujan, who is on his way home; luckily he is
so short-sighted that we can get away with the impersonation provided that we
act naturally! {\bf GET MONEY, GET PAPER, GET KEYS, GET correct BEARD, NOSE
and WIG; WEAR BEARD, NOSE and WIG, W, N, N, U, U, S, S, UNLOCK DOOR with
correct key (Copper for Andrew, Iron for George, Aluminium for David) E, ON.}

This puts us in Burnside's office, but there is still his tripwire to
negotiate (mentioned in the Gibbs-Pell conversation). We then find a love
letter -- clearly this is what he removed from Cayley's office last night --
and his golfing umbrella, which will provide an additional disguise. We have
also seen Ramanujan setting a burglar alarm on his laboratory as he left. We
unset this and go in. {\bf JUMP E, READ LETTER, GET UMBRELLA, JUMP W, W, N,
PUSH SWITCH, E, ON.}

There are several things to be done in Ramanujan's laboratory: first we read
the chronicles of his experiments, and so convince ourselves that the
scientist was otherwise engaged last night; then we collect various useful
items (some butter, some white powder and an aerosol spray called {\it
Chloropooch}!) On leaving the laboratory and going downstairs we meet the
Security Guard again. He will mistake us for Burnside even at close quarters
if we are carrying the large golfing umbrella, but unfortunately he shows us
out of the building and into the street (we dare not argue, or he will become
suspicious!) {\bf READ CHRONICLES, GET BUTTER AND POWDER AND CHLOROPOOCH, W,
N, D.}

There are several things that can be done outside, but our most pressing duty
is to get in again; exploring carefully (and taking the hint about ``the spy
who came in from the cold'') reveals that Murchiston's room has a loose bar
in the window, and we can get in again that way. This information changes the
alibi situation completely -- the Mole need not have been signed in at the
relevant time. The white powder from Ramanujan's laboratory can be used (like
fingerprint powder) to show up some footprints -- someone with large feet has
been using this room as a way in and out! Clearly walking across the floor
obliterates the prints, so we took care not to do this before sprinkling the
powder. The guard has now gone upstairs to lock up, and it is safe to wander
about downstairs. {\bf NE, W, THROW POWDER, W.}

Now into Brauer's office, where there are two things to be done. Firstly we
leave the newspaper behind, for reasons which will become clear. Secondly we
open Brauer's sea-chest, whose lock has a combination based on telephone
dials (which is strongly hinted at in the telephone book the player can find
in the basement.) The various combinations possible are: 20786 = BOSUN, 24278
= CHART, 35338 = FLEET, 42824 = HATCH, 53824 = KETCH, 74073 = SHORE, 74508 =
PILOT, and 78076 = STORM. The chest contains incriminating negatives labelled
``Burnside'' -- clearly Brauer is blackmailing him. {\bf W, W, ON, DROP
PAPER, OPEN CHEST with correct keyword.}

For reasons of timing it is best to pay a visit to the basement next. We need
to go into the archive room, where there is a duplicate set of personnel
files (in a safe whose combination we have already discovered). All we need
to do here is to read Murchiston's file, which is totally inconsistent with
the copy upstairs -- clearly it has been made up, and this provides more
evidence for supposing that Murchiston does not even exist! Another unusual
agent, Emmie Noether (who is a Mata Hari like spy, complete with industrial
strength perfume) comes into play at this stage -- she has also been sent by
Cayley and Hardy to investigate the crime (as their remarks hint), and does
not have an office in the Zoo. Noether will attempt to lock the player into
the archive room, but dropping Ramanujan's butter outside causes her to slip
on it, which avoids that problem. {\bf E, N, N, N, D, S, S, DROP BUTTER, W,
ON, OPEN SAFE, READ MURCHISTON, E, N, N, U, S.}

We are now ready to go into Mrs Hamilton's office and deal with her dog using
the {\it Chloropooch} spray. However the act of stunning Fido causes a
certain amount of noise, bringing the guard down to investigate. When the
guard thumps on the door, it is necessary for the player to bark back in
order to reassure him. (We have thus impersonated both Burnside and Fido!) We
collect a compact disc from Hamilton's office. Meanwhile the newspaper that
we left in Brauer's office (with {\it The Sexy Secrets of Securiplod})
distracts the guard long enough for us to go to the {\it ELGAR} Enigma
machine in the cipher room downstairs and decipher the disc. It contains a
recent transmission from Ruritania -- in fact it is from Brauer who is not on
holiday, but on business. He warns us of an agent called `Purple Yeti' and
signs off enigmatically with ``Move left on your keyboard!'' and a codename.
This in fact identifies Brauer by his Christian name: for example {\it Perm}
translates as {\it Owen} if you move each typewriter key one place to the
left, since {\it O} is immediately to the left of {\it P}, and so on;
similarly {\it Sty} becomes {\it Art} and {\it Hid} turns into {\it Gus}.
{\bf E, SPRAY DOG, WOOF (or similar), GET DISC, W, N, D, S, S, S, E, ON,
INSERT DISC.}

This concludes all that needs to be done in the Zoo, so we leave via
Murchiston's office while the guard is still reading the newspaper. Now
consider the evidence: we have accounted for everyone's movements last night
except Conway, who is doubly suspect because of his big feet (and footprints
in Murchiston's office) and his phoney alibi (the theatre ticket). Cayley and
Hardy are in the {\it Cloak and Dagger} pub but we don't yet know where the
plans are to be handed over, so we take a taxi to Conway's home. Luckily for
us the taxi-driver can be persuaded to accept some of our Ruritanian currency
to pay the fare! {\bf W, S, U, N, N, E, E, E, SW, S, TAXI to MILL LANE.}

We now wait awhile. Someone leaves Conway's house and goes off into the park,
so we follow. The someone conveniently drops a {\it Yummy Choccy Dentorots}
sweet-wrapper in the park, which we intercept: it contains a coded message
explaining where the rendez-vous will be. (As a slight twist, it is the case
that if we were to go to the {\it wrong} address, then we would find an
innocent person also wandering in a nearby park!) {\bf WAIT until someone
appears, S, follow directions until we find the wrapper, GET WRAPPER, READ
WRAPPER.}

The message is not difficult to decode, especially since we know that someone
called the `Purple Yeti' is involved. It is a simple letter-substitution
cipher, and what it actually says is: ``{\it Grazing Goldfish to Purple Yeti.
The wild goose will land at Midnight on the corner of Kerslake Street in
order to make the transfer of its eggs. Please bring the parsnips as
promised. We shall overcome.}'' We therefore take a taxi back to Philby Lane
(using the rest of our Ruritanian money) and enter the {\it Cloak and Dagger}
pub. When played efficiently, the adventure should be completed before 11
p.m., so that we are still able to find Cayley and Hardy and give them the
information. This completes our part of the mole-catching, and we have won --
our {\it `Licence to Maim'} is upgraded to a {\it `Licence to Kill'!}\ {\bf
N, W, TAXI to PHILBY LANE, S, and answer catechism (Conway will be handing
over the plans at Midnight in Kerslake Street).}

\bye