at Perez was acting like the
Mures of Auchendrane, who despatched a series of witnesses and
accomplices in their murder of Kennedy. As they always needed a new
accomplice to kill the previous accomplice, then another to slay the
slayer, and so on, the Mures if unchecked would have depopulated
Scotland. Enriquez surmised that _his_ turn to die would soon come; so
he confessed, and was corroborated by Diego Martinez. Thus the facts
came out, and this ought to be a lesson to murderers.

As the muleteer hung fire, Perez determined to poison Escovedo. But he
did not in the least know how to set about it. Science was hardly in
her infancy. If you wanted to poison a man in Scotland, you had to
rely on a vulgar witch, or send a man to France, at great expense, to
buy the stuff, and the messenger was detected and tortured. The Court
of Spain was not more scientific.

Martinez sent Enriquez to Murcia, to gather certain poisonous herbs,
and these were distilled by a venal apothecary. The poison was then
tried on a barndoor fowl, which was not one penny the worse. But
Martinez somehow procured 'a certain water that was good to be given
as a drink.' Perez asked Escovedo to dinner, Enriquez waited at table,
and in each cup of wine that Escovedo drank, he, rather
homoeopathically, put 'a nutshellful of the water.' Escovedo was no
more poisoned than the cock of the earlier experiment. 'It was
ascertained that the beverage produced no effect whatever.'

A few days later, Escovedo again dined with the hospitable Perez. On
this occasion they gave him some white powder in a dish of cream, and
also gave him the poisoned water in his wine, thinking it a pity to
waste that beverage. This time Escovedo was unwell, and again, when
Enriquez induced a scullion in the royal kitchen to put more of the
powder in a basin of broth in Escovedo's own house. For this the poor
kitchenmaid who cooked the broth was hanged in the public square of
Madrid, _sin culpa_.

Pious Philip was demoralising his subjects at a terrible rate! But you
cannot make an omelet without breaking eggs. Philip slew that girl of
his kitchen as surely as if he had taken a gun and shot her, but
probably the royal confessor said that all was as it should be.

In spite of the resources of Spanish science, Escovedo persisted in
living, and Perez determined that he must be shot or stabbed. Enriquez
went off to his own country to find a friend who was an assassin, and
to get 'a sti