"So it is," said Duke. "We'll go down again. We haven't seen Mr. Alan's room."
"Where is it?" Noel asked.
"That's what we've got to find out," responded his brother as he ran down the steps.
There was a door very near the foot of the stairs, but it was locked. Peeping through the keyhole, Duke saw enough to convince him that it was Mr. Alan's room.
"Mother did not say it was locked," said Noel.
"She did not say it was not," replied Duke. "Let us see if there is not a key in one of the other doors that will open it."
Just then Noel's eyes spied a key lying under a step in the bend of the stairway. Duke pushed it into the lock and found that it turned it easily.
The room they entered was small and comfortably furnished, but it seemed to be in an amazing state of disorder. A large writing-table was littered with books, papers, diagrams, stones and other things which seemed to the boys mere rubbish. The table had several drawers, and more than one of them stood open, showing the contents thrown together in the utmost confusion.
"He did leave his things in a muddle when he went away," said Noel, wide-eyed with wonder.
"And here's his pipe on the mantelpiece," said Duke. "Now would you have expected that Mr. Alan would smoke a short black stump like this?"