"Ay, you were a monk, and snuffled Latin there for many a year—well."
"I begin to breathe again—so—" muttered Shaw.
"I had heard with certainty that the three sisters were to receive the Blessed Sacrament there to-morrow from the hands of the bishop, with all solemnity—"
"Well, well, what then?" asked Gray, impatiently.
"Yes, what then?" repeated the Laird of Sauchie, whose eyes were always closing.
"I stole the vestments of the sacrist who hath charge of the altar vessels, flowers, and ornaments, and whose duty it is to provide candles, bread, and wine for the communion. Well I knew where old Father Duncan's cassock hung when the good man was a-bed; and I knew the pocket too wherein he kept the key of the iron-doored niche containing the cruets of wine, beside the great altar. I donned the gown, I found the key—with eyes half blind, with ears that tingled, and a heart that trembled at every fancied sound, I glided through the long aisle of yonder silent church, and sought the niche, unchanged as when I saw it last, some sixteen years ago! I opened it—softly—slowly—fearfully, and the cruets of wine were before me—to-night, sirs—only to-night—yea only an hour ago were they before me, in my hands—and—and—"
"My God! thou didst not poison the wine—the wine about to become—"
"Hush, oh hush, in pity now; I poisoned one of them at least."
"Horror!" exclaimed Gray of Kyneff; "I foresaw not this. I would have cared little about the poisoning of some vulgar wine-pot, suppose that all Dunblane had died o' the dose; but the Communion—the Holy Eucharist—"
"I poisoned it!" groaned Borthwick, while his teeth chattered; "and to-morrow will solve a grand and awful mystery."