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Cardano Grille is a steganography cipher developed by  Girolamo Cardano in 1550. It consists of a Grille with holes in it that can be placed over a letter to reveal a concealed message. Wikipedia has a write up of the Cardano Grille‘s history and method.

What you will need:

• A printer to print a grid
• A craft knife to cut out some squares
• A table of things to look up
• A book to do the looking up in
• A message template

Making a Grille

To make a Grille I printed a simple grid on a sheet of paper – card would probably be better for use at the table but for a prototype it was fine.

I used a 7 by 15 grid.

I cut a number of the cells out.

Using at the table

As a plot generator for a tabletop RPG:

• Take a Grille and place it over a page in the book – any orientation can be used
• Read the first full letter in each of the holes
• Look up what each of those letters mean and slot them into a message template

Example for a Modern Spy Game

Message Template:

There will be an [Letter 1: Incident] in [Letter 2: Place] involving [Letter 3: Person] which you should prevent. Secondary Mission: If possible retrieve [Letter 4: Thing] from [Letter 5: Agency] who are [Letter 6: Incident] [Letter 3: Person].

Look up Table:

Opening “The Complete Plays of Christopher Marlowe” at page 441 and placing the Grille over the page I got the following letters:

A, O, D, O, S, H

This gives the message:

There will be an Blackmail in Washington involving Criminal which you should prevent. Secondary Mission: If possible retrieve Cipher from DGSI who are Agent Provocateur Criminal

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Built on land exchanged by the Pifl family to the Auk, Pickling and Pifl Railway for the construction of railway lines to the town in 1839 The Éclat has over one hundred rooms. In a cost cutting measure all the cliff top hotels and grand houses on Fyrenordan Road were built in a similar style and from a largely consistent plan. Despite this The Éclat which often simply goes by “Number 1” sees itself as the best hotel in Pifl and considers The Babylon Spa its only true competition in the town.

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The next spa was the first to incorporate accommodation for guests to stay in as well as the neo-classical style popular with the senior members of the family. It was quite successful. For reasons that remain unclear it was bombarded from the sea by vessels in 1812. To this day it is unclear if the attackers were Pirates, Privateers, French, American, Dano-Norwegian or British Royal navy. What is known is that they caused a section of the cliffs and the buildings above to collapse into the sea.

Construction of a replacement began almost immediately. The opening was delayed after a visit by members of the Pifl family to Brighton who decided to remodel it in the Indo-Saracenic style of the Royal Pavilion. Described by Ruskin in most unflattering terms it collapsed into the sea during a storm since its lower parts had not been designed to carry the weight of the many domes that had been put on top of them.

Not to be deterred a far more conservative spa was created. This time it was built set back from the cliff and the major works inland from the tip of the point. This magnificent Italianate complex lasted almost a century. During the Great War a battery of guns was stationed on the point. The spa was requisitioned by the army and munitions for the battery stored in some of its buildings. One night an accident caused the magazine to explode in a freak accident that completely disintegrated the building but left no crater. Local rumours persist that experimental weapons research had been underway at the spa and that a “ray gun” of some sort had caused the destruction.

After the war the Pifl family built the last of the spa hotels on the site. This one, which stands to this day, is a fine example of 1920s art deco. While the government paid for much of the scheme as compensation for the loss of the previous spa the Pifl family invested a considerable sum too. By the 1960s the families decline forced them to sell the complex to its current owners.

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One unique feature is a water aided paternoster running from the clifftop spa to the private beach and lido. The paternoster which uses water to ensure the downward force on the lift is greater than the weight to be lifted but which brings water back up when the weight on the downward side exceeds that on the upward side. Given the risk involved in their use its a miracle that no one has been killed or injured using the paternoster. This may be because they are little used due to the long section between the hotel and the beach where the rider is travelling in a barely lit vertical shaft cut into the solid rock of the cliff with no means of escape in the event of the paternoster failing.

Most visitors and staff prefer to use the more conventional pair of electric powered lifts that operate from the hotel to the beach level. Although originally intended purely for staff and freight use they are still oak panelled and operated by a uniformed member of staff. The current operators are a pair of identical twins who were employed as lift girls in the 1940s.

The hotel hosts an annual literary week focused on Crime Fiction during the off season.

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Licensed Hotel & Restaurant

Fyrenordan Road, Pifl, Aukshire Tel. Pifl 4111

Resident Proprietors Mr and Mrs CA Rice

OPEN ALL THE YEAR

• All Main Bedrooms with Sea Views
• Central Heating Throughout
• Hot & Cold in all Bedrooms
• Television Lounge
• Residents Bar Lounge “A Free House”
• Parties (up to 100) arranged and catered for on Ground Floor
• Boat arranged for Fishing Parties
• Parking

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• Smugglers caves
• Coterel Bay
• Caravan Park
• Camp grounds

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• The Ivy Café
• Mining Museum
• Pifl Hospital
• St Pauls
• Pifl Hospital

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