It's really exciting! I have about 150 pages to go and haven't a clue.

Poison by contact: It appears that some of the victims are thought to have been poisoned by contact--through the skin, possibly from handling a certain book. This reminded me of something I read long ago about the Borgias and what masters of poison they were. Not sure if this is fiction or not, but I read of the inside of new gloves being poisoned so that the wearer would die at some point unrelated to their enemy.

Clever isn't it. Theoretically I think poison by contact is possible. If you think about the number of people who used to die because their wig powder, face powder etc. contained arsenic because it whitened the skin it must be possible to poison someone by having them handle something soaked in poison. I don't know how soon the poison would loose potency though. I suppose it would depend on the material it was applied to, rate of absorbency, potency of the poison itself.

I've read the same thing about the Borgias. One of them used to take a daily very small dose of arsenic to protect himself against being poisoned.

Yes, I agree. There was a continual battle between the Church and the secular authorities for domination. Each had its own weapons.

I think that it was more by ingesting the poison. Apparently the stolen poison was smeared onto the pages of the book and then, as the monks licked their fingers to separate the pages,they ingested it, which explained their blackened tongues and fingers.

I think you're right, Bev. As I read on, that seems to be William's thoughts in the final conversation in the library. Previously I had thought the blackened tongue was just a result of the poison in the body and not necessarily that the poison had entered the mouth.

I did not do well at identifying the murderer. My suspects kept getting killed off. I have a few more pages to read but I know the whole plot now.

I'll leave this open for a few days more, but, have opened the Treasure Island thread as well. I loved following the discussion here, and hope to see many more.

I was the same Dagny. I thought the black tongues were due to the fact they had been poisoned, not through actual ingestion of poison. I agree with Ann as well, my suspects kept getting killed off. Mark of a good mystery novel that though, not being able to guess early on.

You and me both! Another death reported and here's me saying, well, it wasn't him. I was totally blindsided.

That's what I love about this novel, you can read it on some many levels and it doesn't disappoint on any of them.