He nodded toward the table—on which were the remains of a half-consumed meal—and then at a coffeepot on the stove.
After visiting the servants’ bedchambers, in which they saw other indications of a hasty packing and departure, Claudia showed them the door of the large bedroom in which Prince Marcos usually slept.
Adjoining it was his mother’s chamber. It was large, like her son’s, and more luxuriously appointed.
The latter apartment was in an orderly condition, with the bed neatly made and decorated with pillow shams. But the bedroom belonging to Marcos showed that it had been disturbed by some rather turbulent proceedings.
“Seems to have been a fuss of some kind in here,” observed Chick. “A regular rough-house, from the look of things.”
It did look like a “rough-house,” as that term is used in its slang sense.
The window curtains were hanging in disorder from a broken pole, and the mirror of the dresser was cracked in a star, as if something had been hurled into the middle of it. The drawers were open, and their contents strewn about the floor.
Nick Carter carefully studied the room, and his brain worked rapidly in piecing together the evidence before him. It did not take him long to arrive at a definite conclusion.
“The bed has not been slept in,” he remarked. “But you can see where a person has been thrown down on it. The condition of the window shows that somebody—perhaps the man who had been thrown down on the bed, tried to escape by the window, but was overcome before he could raise the shade.”
“They attacked Marcos in his own home,” murmured Claudia. “It was Marcos who was thrown on the bed, no doubt. The question is, where is he now?”