He put the phial and the document in his father's writing into his breast pocket, and tucking the gray-haired notary under his arm, he left the room.
Frau Schimmel followed his example.

Having reached the ground-floor she stopped and, shaking her gray head, murmured: "Doctor Melchior was such a wise man, I wonder he did not order that each of his successors should make the girl of his choice inhale the elixir before he proposed to her.
The life I led with Vorkel, and with my second husband Schimmel, who lies beside the first in the churchyard, was hardly perfect, but Zeno's existence will be hell upon earth." But this time Frau Schimmel was a little wide of the mark in her prophesy.

The two young people, for a time, treated each other distantly and coldly, but Fran Rosalie learned to regard her husband with a timid respect that sat well upon her.

As for him he was transformed into a stern man since he had inhaled the elixir, and his severe dress seemed but an outward sign of his earnestness.

Before the year was out a boy was given to them, and when Rosalie saw him take the little one in his arms and kiss it, she called him to her bedside and whispered: "Forgive me." He made a sign of pardon, and stooping, kissed her white face, that was still the dearest in the world to him.