“No,” Jupiter said slowly. “We couldn’t have stolen it. But just the same, we have it. Show it to them, Bob.”
Bob put his hand in his jacket pocket. Then he tried the other pocket. Becoming alarmed, he tried all his pockets. At last he swallowed hard and said, “I’m sorry, Jupe, I don’t have it. In the excitement I must have lost it.”
“YOU HAD the silver spider and you lost it?” Rudy stared at Bob in dismay.
“That’s terrible,” Elena said. “But how could such a thing happen?”
Jupiter explained how Prince Djaro had told them the silver spider was missing, and asked their help in finding it. He told of Djaro’s taking them to the vault and showing them the imitation spider, and of his suspicion that Duke Stefan had removed the real one for purposes of his own — to prevent Prince Djaro’s coronation. Then Bob told how he had found the real spider hidden among his handkerchiefs.
“I begin to understand the plot,” Rudy muttered. “Duke Stefan had the spider hidden in your room. Then he sent men to arrest you. You were supposed to be found with the spider in your possession. Duke Stefan would claim you stole it, that Djaro by his carelessness gave you the chance. Djaro would be disgraced. You three would be expelled from the country and all ties with the United States would be broken off. Duke Stefan would continue to rule as Regent. Then, with Djaro still in disgrace, he would find some pretext for assuming the rule of Varania for himself.
“Now, though the spider is gone, he can still proceed. He will charge you with stealing it and hiding it, even if we manage to get you safely to the American Embassy.”
Pete shook his head. “I still don’t understand,” he said, “why the silver spider is so important. I mean, suppose it had been lost in a fire or something, then what?”
“Then the whole country would go into mourning,” Elena put in. “But Prince Djaro would not be blamed. Really, it’s hard to explain what that silver spider of Prince Paul means to us. It’s not just a jewel. It’s a symbol. It represents all we treasure — our freedom, our independence, our good fortune.”
“Probably we’re superstitious,” Rudy added. “But a legend goes with it. Prince Paul is supposed to have said, when he was crowned, that just as a spider had saved him and let him bring freedom to his people, so would freedom and fortune reign as long as the silver spider remained safe. Maybe he didn’t actually say that, but every Varanian firmly believes he did. The loss of the spider would be a national calamity. To make Prince Djaro responsible for the loss, even indirectly, would make the citizens of our country, who now love him, feel he is unworthy.
“No,” he finished, after a long pause, “unless we can restore the silver spider to Prince Djaro, Duke Stefan will win.”
“Golly,” Bob said, gulping, “that’s bad. Here, help me look again. Maybe I missed it.”
This time Pete and Jupiter searched Bob’s pockets, turning each one inside out. They even looked in the cuffs of his trousers. But they knew as they did so it was hopeless. Bob didn’t have the spider.
“Think, Bob!” Jupiter urged. “You had it in your hand. Now what did you do with it?”
Bob frowned, trying to think.
“I don’t know,” he said. “The very last thing I can remember is the pounding on the door and Rudy coming in the window. Then everything is a blank until he was bending over me on that balcony.”
“Partial amnesia,” Jupiter said, pinching his lip. “When someone gets a blow on the head, it isn’t at all unusual for him to forget what’s just happened. Sometimes he forgets everything for the last few days or even weeks. Sometimes just for the last few minutes. Usually his memory for the missing time gradually comes back, but not always. That’s apparently what happened to Bob. When he bumped his head on the balcony, he forgot the last three or four minutes.”
“I guess that’s what happened, all right,” Bob sighed, feeling the bump on his head. “I have a kind of recollection of running around the room, trying to find a good hiding place for the spider. I was pretty excited, of course, but I do remember thinking it wasn’t any good to hide it under the mattress or under the rug, or back of the wardrobe, because it would be found at once.”
“The natural thing to do,” Rudy ventured, “would be to jam the spider into your pocket when you saw me. Then maybe it fell out when you tumbled off the rope on that balcony.”
“Or maybe I still had it in my hand when I hurried out onto the balcony,” Bob said unhappily. “Then when I started feeling my way along the ledge, I might have just opened my hand and dropped it. It could have fallen on the ledge or maybe down into the courtyard.”
“If it fell into the courtyard, it will be found,” Rudy said, after a long silence. “If so, we’ll know about it. If it isn’t found — ”
He looked at Elena. She nodded.
“Duke Stefan’s men probably won’t search your room for it,” she said. “They’ll think you three still have it. So if it isn’t found in the courtyard, tomorrow night we must go back and look for it.”
DURING THE long night, The Three Investigators remained hidden in the sentry hut on the palace roof. No one searched that part of the castle — it was too obvious they had gone down, not up. The cleverly placed dangling rope, and Jupiter’s handkerchief, which had been found at the entrance to the cellars, led the search away from the boys.
After Rudy and Elena left them, Pete, Bob and Jupiter had stretched out on the wooden benches to try to sleep. Despite the uncomfortable beds and the adventures of the evening, they slept soundly.
As the sun rose the next morning, Pete woke, yawned and stretched his muscles. Jupiter was already awake, doing some exercises to take a slight stiffness out of his muscles. Pete found his shoes, put them on and stood up. Bob was still sound asleep.
“Looks like a nice day,” Pete commented, peering out the narrow slits which constituted windows in the little stone hut. “Except that it doesn’t look like we’re going to get any breakfast. Or lunch. Or dinner. I’d feel a lot better if I knew when we were going to eat.”
“I’d feel a lot better if I knew how we were going to get out of this palace,” Jupiter replied. “I wonder what Rudy’s plans are.”
“And I wonder whether Bob will remember what he did with the silver spider when he wakes up.”
Just then Bob sat up, blinking.
“Where are we?” he asked. Then he put his hand to the back of his head. “Ouch, my head hurts. I remember now.”
“You remember what you did with the silver spider?” Pete burst out.
But Bob shook his head. “I remember where we are,” he said. “And I remember how my head got bumped — that is, I remember what you told me. That’s all.”
“No use worrying about it, Bob,” Jupiter said. “We just have to wait and see if your memory comes back by itself. It may or it may not.”
“Uh-oh!” Pete said, at the window. “Someone’s coming out on the roof. He’s looking this way!”
All three crowded to the window. A somewhat stooped man in baggy gray clothing and wearing a large apron had stepped through the doorway from the stairs. He held a broom, dustpan and cloth. He looked around stealthily, then put down his cleaning implements and came scuttling toward the sentry hut.
“Let him in, Pete,” Jupiter said. “He’s not a guard and he obviously knows we’re here.”
Pete eased the door open and the man slipped inside. Once within, he breathed a sigh of relief.
“Wait!” he said in heavily accented English. “Make sure I was not followed.”
They watched at the window for another couple of minutes. No one else appeared, and they all relaxed.
“Good,” the man said. “I am a cleaner. I slipped away up the stairs. I have message from Rudy. He says does one named Bob remember?”
“Tell him no,” Jupiter answered. “Bob doesn’t remember.”
“I will tell. Rudy says also, be patient. When it is very dark again he will come. Meanwhile, here is food.”
The man reached into the pockets of his ample apron and brought out wrapped sandwiches, some fruit, and a plastic bag of water, all of which had been hidden in the capacious garment.
The boys took the food with great satisfaction. The man did not linger.
“I must hurry back,” he said. “All is excitement below. Be patient and may Prince Paul extend his protection to you and to our prince.”
With that he was gone. Pete gratefully bit into a sandwich.
“We’ll have to ration the food to make it last all day,” Jupiter remarked, passing a sandwich to Bob. “And especially the water. But it’s lucky Rudy and Elena have friends in the castle.”
“Lucky for us,” Bob said. “What was it he was telling us last night about the organization of minstrels to assist Prince Djaro? My head hurt too much for me to listen carefully.”