what fearful, he
demanded loftily if she ever would have dared to announce to him, her old
master, so candidly what she thought of him, as she had done an hour ago,
if she had not inhaled the contents of the phial. And Frau Vorkel had to
admit that she had been forced by some occult power to utter those
disrespectful speeches. She looked with awed wonder, first at her master,
then at the little bottle, and suddenly broke out with: "My! My What will
be left for the judges to do when everyone can be forced to speak out
boldly and disclose his smallest sin. My! My! But then we shall hear
pretty tales! From the Burgomaster down, everyone in Leipsic will have to
get a new pair of ears, for what one hears will be as outrageous and
unseemly as among the savages."

These observations showed the Court apothecary that Frau Vorkel had,
despite her want of intelligence, grasped to a certain extent the
importance of his discovery; while this pleased him in a way, it also
made him uneasy, therefore he made her swear on the crucifix that so long
as she lived she would never impart to any living soul, his son excepted,
what she had that evening experienced.

Then Herr Ueberhell went back to his search for the unknown element which
had given to his son's elixir the power that had been exhibited in such
wonderful fashion. But he did not succeed in finding the right
ingredient, for as often as he called Frau Vorkel to come and inhale the
new mixture, she gave such plausible and politic answers to his dangerous
questions that he could be by no means sure of her absolute truthfulness.
Then too the operations progressed slowly because that day at noon his
finger had been badly cut by the bursting of a glass retort. So presently
he ceased work for a while and insisted that Frau Vorkel should take the
phial in her own hand and inhale its contents once more, because it
pleased him to try the power of the elixir.

With an amused smile he asked her if she used the great quantities of
wool, which she so constantly demanded, for no other purpose than to knit
socks for him.

The phial trembled in the hand of the housekeeper, and before she could
help it her response had passed her lips:

"You have all the socks that you need and it is surely no great crime for
me to knit a few pairs to warm the feet of your assistant, that poor,
silent worm who stands downstairs the livelong day in the cold shop."

Despite this reply Herr Ueberhell only laughe