When the King got home he asked guests and made a feast, but the meat was to be boiled in the new pot, and so he took it up and set it in the middle of the floor. The guests thought the King had lost his wits, and went about elbowing one another, and laughing at him. But he walked round and round the pot and cackled and chattered, saying all in a breath—
"Well, well! bide a bit, bide a bit! 'Twill boil in a minute."
But there was no boiling. So he saw that Peik had been out with his fooling rods and had cheated him again, and now he would set off at once and slay him.
When the King came, Peik stood out by the barn door. "Wouldn't it boil?" he asked.
"No, it would not, and you shall smart for it," said the King, about to unsheath his knife.
"I can well believe that," said Peik, "for you did not take the block, too."
"I wish I thought," said the King, "you weren't telling me a pack of lies."
"I tell you it's because of the block it stands on; it won't boil without it," said Peik.
"Well, what do you want for it?"
It was well worth three hundred dollars; but for the King's sake it should go for two. So the King got the block and traveled home with it. He bade guests again, made a feast, and set the pot on the chopping-block in the middle of the room. The guests thought he was both daft and mad, and they went about making game of him, while he cackled and chattered around the pot, calling out, "Bide a bit! Now it boils, now it boils in a trice."