"Everything is poisonous, and there is nothing without poison; the difference in dosage is the difference between poisons."
—— Paracelsus, "Third Lecture on Toxicology"
"The most skilled poisoner never touches the cup."
——Pliny the Elder, Natural History
The spice merchant Sextus walked into his shop early on the fifth day.
He stopped the moment he opened the door - all the spice jars on the entire wall were open. Cinnamon, saffron, myrrh, spikenard, each remained intact, no powder was spilled, no scent leaked. The jar lids are neatly stacked on the left side of the counter, arranged by diameter and spaced uniformly.
He turned around and reported to the officer.
The municipal guards checked for three days: the doors and windows were intact, the locks were not damaged, there were no footprints on the ground, and there were no holes in the roof. The only change is that the jars, which were originally arranged by origin from left to right, are now rearranged by melting point, from lowest to highest. The basis for sorting is the "Natural History" open and covered with a thin layer of dust on the right side of the counter.
The guards looked at each other.
They had no leads, no suspects, no motive. Zero theft, zero damage. The whole thing was like a gust of wind that blew through without taking anything away.
On the fourth day, they delivered the file to a woman's desk.
She opened the file, glanced at it, and then pointed to a paragraph circled in red pen in the report: "He said there was no odor leakage?"
"Yes."
She put down the file and turned to the window. There is a row of mint planted on the windowsill, which is shining green.
"He can't smell it," she said, "because he can't smell it anymore."
She raised her hand, picked a mint leaf, put it in her palm, crushed it, and handed it to the guard.
"What do you smell?"
"Mint."
"Yes. But he can't smell. His sense of smell was turned off five days ago, the night the jars were reordered. Someone came into his store, didn't steal anything, and did two things: open the jars so he could smell something, and then rearrange the order by melting point."
She paused, brushing the broken leaves from her fingers.
"This is not a theft. This is an experiment."
The guard looked at her: "So what we are looking for is an... Experimenter?"
"No." She picked up her coat, "What we are looking for is a pharmacist. Someone who doesn't need to steal anything, just needs to know the melting point arrangement of spices."
She walked to the door and looked back at the mint on the windowsill.
"He will come again. Because the experiment is not finished yet."
The sunlight outside the window was leaking from the edge of the clouds, like a layer of diluted venom, slowly seeping into the gray stone crevices of Rome.
She pulled a small dry bay leaf from her sleeve and held it between her fingers.
Not crushed.
Just looked at it.
Then put it away.
Conception:-