Near the dead animal lay a metal helmet ornamented with the gilded
imperial eagle, and a little farther on lay a mud-stained form in a
uniform of coarse gray cloth, with a gaping wound in his head; his left
hand clutched the rushes among which he had fallen. As Katharina, in her
peasant gown, moved timidly across the open space, she heard a voice say
faintly in Hungarian:
"For God's sake, good woman, give me a drink of water."
Without stopping to question whether he was friend or foe, Katharina
caught up the metal helmet to fetch the water.
There was water everywhere about her, but it was the filthy water of
the morass.
Katharina remembered having heard that the shepherds of the Hansag, when
they were thirsty, cut a reed and thrust it deep into the swampy earth,
when clear, drinkable water would rise from the lower soil. She
therefore thrust a long cane into the moist earth, then put her lips to
it, and sucked up the water. On removing her lips a clear stream shot
upward from the cane. She held the helmet under this improvised fountain
until it was full, then returned with it to the rose-bush.
The wounded man was lying on his back, his bloodstained face upturned
toward the sky.
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