In this nineteenth-century mystery, a spunky girl strives to decipher a code in order to recover her family’s lost fortune.

No one ever talks about Hattie’s grandfather, who’s been hidden in the Utica Insane Asylum ever since he squandered Grandmother’s fortune and started hearing voices in the walls. When a telegram arrives with news of Grandfather’s death, old wounds are reopened and financial ruin looms once again. But it’s not until Hattie intercepts a threatening notice from the tax collector that she realizes they’re in danger of losing everything — including the family estate. A mysterious book containing a code written by Grandfather leads Hattie to believe that Grandmother’s fortune may not be lost after all, however, and though she works feverishly to crack the code, every step forward leads to another riddle. Are the contents of the book simply the ravings of a madman, or is it possible that there was more to Grandfather than met the eye?