The doctor was much struck by the symptoms of the illness
and the first thing he did was to make the patient swallow a lot of milk
and oil. Then he drove the servants headlong to the chemist's, and
descending into the kitchen closely examined every copper vessel there
by candle light, scolded the cook and the scullery maids till they were
in tears, and terrified Clementina by telling her she was the cause of
it all to the speechless confusion of the innocent creature. Not content
with this, he made his way at once to Mr. Demetrius's room and there
cross-examined everyone with the acerbity of an Old Bailey judge. What
had the young lady been in the habit of eating and drinking? They must
fetch what had been left over from her meals, he must see and examine
everything. What had she eaten yesterday evening? Preserves? Then what
sort of sugar was used, and where was the spoon? He insisted on seeing
everything.
"But doctor," whined old Lapussa, "you surely don't mean to say that the
child has been poisoned?"
"I do indeed, and with copper oxide too."
"How is that possible?"
"Why, simply because some of her food, preserve, for instance, has been
allowed to stand too long in a copper or silver vessel and copperas has
been developed."
The old man did not know enough of chemistry to understand how copperas
could be developed from silver, but he was seriously alarmed.
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