“The honest truth,” replied Mrs. Petz. “I can make you rich in honey, and all I have to say is to give you this warning: Never, if you love your own life, do you tell a living soul how a miserable little Hare made a fool of a strong She-bear.”
The Man promised her, trust and true, and lifting his axe he struck a blow at the cloven tree. The tree fell apart, Petz was again free, and she at once led the Man to the honey-tree. The Man returned home, yoked up his oxen, put a cask in the cart, and went to the wood for the honey. When he had filled the cask he returned home.
Meantime it had grown dark, and Petz crept noiselessly behind the cart and crouched down under the peasant’s window, saying to herself, “Just wait, you fellow, till I listen a little!”
The Man brought the cask of honey into the house, and the children, seeing the prize, crowded around the father with questions. “O little father, where did you get that honey?”
“I found it in the forest, dear children.”
Then the wife put in her word. “Tell me, father, how did you come by so much honey?”
And the Man replied, “Oh, don’t bother me! It was an old trotter of a Bear that was chasing a little Hare and got stuck fast in the cleft of a tree. Then I came along and helped her out of the scrape, and for thanks she showed me the hollow tree where the honey was. So I brought it home. But it served her right, the lazy old fat tramper; what business had she chasing a Hare?”
Mrs. Petz did not lose a word of all this, and she growled to herself, “Just wait once, wait! I’ll be even with you with a vengeance for jeering at me.”
She went away home, and presently the Man, wife, and children all went to bed. Early next morning the Man got up and went out to till his field. He yoked his oxen, filled a sack with grain, put it and a plough into the cart, and with a “Gee-up, you oxen!” set out for his field, which lay on the edge of the forest. He was just about to begin ploughing when Mrs. Petz came along.
“Oho, cousin, so there you are! Didn’t you promise me, trust and true, not to say a word to mortal soul of what had happened to me, and didn’t you go home and tell the whole story to your wife and children? Hey?”