and this he pursued most deviously , aided by the inheritance of the widow , whose passing he had hastened with arduous lovemaking combined with goose-like fattening ; first he found an elderly scribe drowning in debt from a life of dissolution , and paid him to forge a document by which the king appointed him successor to the high servant ; then , after king fazen had unknowingly placed him in this eminent post , provoking the low-ranking servants justified wrath , veig unleashed a pest of discord , suspicion and outright hatred in the spirit home , by slandering , bribing and threatening various servants , all the while making himself the high servants pet with shows of gratitude and servility such as personally preparing the old mans elaborate meals and mulling his wine with strong spices , whose flavour covered the acrid taste of the powdered mushrooms with which he was slowly but steadily poisoning him ( at least his humble past on his fathers side had taught him a thing or two ) .