She stooped again and picked up the package of rat-poison which Matilda had hidden under the chest of drawers on the previous night.

She looked at it closely.

It had evidently not lain long where she had found it, for there was no dust on it, and the coarse paper had an unmistakably fresh look.

The indication of the contents was written upon it in ink, in illiterate characters.
"It is rat-poison!" exclaimed Veronica.

"The cat must have eaten some of it! How did it come here ?" She looked at her maid curiously.
"The cat could not have wrapped it up and folded in the ends of the paper," observed Elettra.
"That is true." They looked at each other, in considerable astonishment.