Next morning, Wednesday, the 7th, Betty Binfield brought down from the bedroom the remains of Mr. Blandy’s supper.  Old Ann Emmet, the charwoman, chanced, unhappily for herself, to be in the kitchen.  Susan told her she might eat what had been left, which she did, with the result that she too became violently ill, with symptoms similar to those of Mr. Blandy, and even by the following spring had not sufficiently recovered to be able to attend the trial of her benefactress.  When Susan, at nine o’clock, went up to dress her mistress and informed her of her protegee’s seizure, Miss Blandy feelingly remarked that she was glad she had not been downstairs, as it would have shocked her to see “her poor dame” so ill.  The doctor called in the forenoon and found his patient easier.  Later in the day Mary said to Susan that as her master had taken physic, he would require more gruel, but as there was still some left, she need not make it fresh “as she was ironing.”  Susan replied that the gruel was stale, being then four days old, and, further, that having herself tasted it, she felt very ill, upon which facts Mary made no comment.  She thoughtfully warned the cook, however, that if Susan ate more of the gruel “she might do for herself—­a person of her age,” from which we must infer that Susan was much her master’s senior; how, otherwise, was the old man to take it daily with impunity?

The strange circumstances attending this gruel aroused the maids’ suspicions.  They examined the remanent contents of the pan—­the aged but adventurous Susan again tasting the fatal mixture was sick for many days—­and found a white, gritty “settlement” at the bottom.  They prudently put the pan in a locked closet overnight.  Next day, Thursday, the 8th, Susan carried it to their neighbour, Mrs. Mounteney, who sent for Mr. Norton, the apothecary, by whom the contents were removed for subsequent examination, the result of which will in due course appear.

Meanwhile, Mary’s uncle, the Rev. Mr. Stevens, of Fawley, having heard of his brother-in-law’s illness, arrived on Friday, the 9th.  To him Susan communicated the suspicious circumstances already mentioned, and he advised her to tell her master what she knew.  Accordingly, at seven o’clock the following morning (Saturday, the 10th), Susan entered her master’s bedroom, and broke to him the fearful news that his illness was suspected to be due to poison, administered to him by his own daughter.  So soon as he had recovered from the first shock of this terrible intelligence, the old attorney asked her where Mary could have obtained the poison—­he does not seem to have questioned the fact of its administration—­and Susan could suggest no other source than Cranstoun.  “Oh, that villain!” cried the sick man, realising in a flash the horrid plot of which he was the victim, “that ever he came to my house!  I remember he mentioned a particular poison that they had in their country.”  Susan told him that Mr. Norton advised that Miss Blandy’s papers be seized forthwith, but to this Mr. Blandy would not agree.  “I never in all my life read a letter that came to my daughter,” said the scrupulous old man; but he asked Susan to secure any of the powder she could find.