She had already placed two of the bottles on the shelf--when a fatal objection to trusting the empty box out of her own possession suddenly crossed her mind.
Her husband's colleagues at Wurzburg and some of the elder students, were all acquainted (externally, at least) with the appearance of the Professor's ugly old medicine-chest.

It could be easily identified by the initials of his name, inscribed in deeply-burnt letters on the lid.
Suppose one of these men happened to be in Frankfort?
and suppose he saw the stolen chest in the locksmith's shop?
Two such coincidences were in the last degree improbable--but it was enough that they were possible.
Who but a fool, in her critical position, would run the risk of even one chance in a hundred turning against her?
Instead of trusting the chest in a stranger's hands, the wiser course would be to burn it at the first safe opportunity, and be content with the security of the cupboard, while she remained in Mr.Keller's house.

Arriving at this conclusion, she put the chest and its contents back again on the shelf--with the one exception of the label detached from the blue-glass bottle.
In the preternatural distrust that now possessed her, this label assumed the character of a dangerous witness, if, through some unlucky accident, it happened to fall into the hands of any person in the house.

She picked it up--advanced to the fireplace to destroy it--paused--and looked at it again.
Nearly two doses of the antidote were still left.

Who could say, looking at the future of such a life as hers, that she might not have some need of it yet--after it had already served her so well?
Could she be sure, if she destroyed it, of remembering the instructions which specified the intervals at which the doses were to be given, the signs which signified recovery, and the length of time during which the vegetable diet was to be administered?
She read the first sentences again carefully.
"Antidote to Alexander's Wine.