The woman with the worn, dusty boots stood firm on the cracked earth and said that she was going to save the farm. Andreas laughed so loudly and so freely that the golden-brown whiskey in his heavy crystal glass sloshed dangerously from side to side. He said that if she could save this piece of dried-up land, he would give her half of it. At that moment, he had no idea that he had just made a bet with absolutely the wrong person and that his fate was about to take an unexpected turn.
His booming laughter cut through the oppressive heat of the large wooden veranda, rolled down the creaking steps, and spread unhindered across the courtyard, which was crossed by deep cracks and had not seen a single drop of rain in a long time. The exhausted farmworkers, who were carrying empty feed sacks on their aching shoulders near the dilapidated cattle shed, stopped in their tracks and turned around in confusion. Even the few extremely emaciated cows weakly lifted their heavy heads, as if they had to process this unfamiliar sound. However, the strange woman did not join in the laughter.
She remained completely motionless while the stirred-up dust slowly settled on her boots, a frayed and sun-bleached backpack over her shoulder and an old, worn leather-bound notebook pressed tightly against her chest. She waited with an almost eerie patience until the man’s mocking laughter died out on its own in the shimmering air. Half of the farm, Andreas repeated loudly, while theatrically wiping a tear of laughter from the corner of his eye and taking a large sip from his glass. Did you hear that, Clemens?
This lady here comes on foot out of nowhere, asks for a simple sip of water, and in the same breath wants to become my equal partner. Clemens, the experienced and weather-beaten foreman of the farm, only shook his head slowly and uncomfortably without saying a word. He knew his long-time employer better than anyone else on this land. He knew exactly that this booming laughter was the desperate laughter of a man who was sinking inexorably.
And a sinking man, as harsh experience taught, often laughs much louder and shriller than everyone around him, just to drown out his inner panic. Because the unvarnished truth was that the historic estate of Bärenbach was dying a slow, agonizing death, and absolutely everyone in this remote rural region knew it. Three relentless years of extreme drought had mercilessly devoured the once lush pastureland down to the last root. The large main pond, once the pride of the estate, had turned into a huge plate of rock-hard clay crisscrossed by deep cracks, on which only dark scavengers settled to rest in the scorching sun.
Of the original 400 magnificent cattle that Andreas had proudly inherited after the death of his father, fewer than 80 pathetic animals remained today. And these remaining 80 looked as if they consisted only of dry leather stretched over sharp bones that cracked unhealthily with every step. The once-respected name of the estate had long since become a bitter joke in the nearest small town. At the lively weekly market in nearby Pfaffenberg, people said, when they wanted to express that a business was running miserably, that it was running exactly like Andreas’s fate.
And he knew that all too well. That was exactly why he was sitting on his veranda with hard alcohol at 10 o’clock in the morning, and exactly why he laughed in this desperately loud, almost hysterical way. The woman took a deliberate step forward without letting his mockery impress her. My name is Theresa.
I walked all the way from the big city, from the distant highway, because the bus stop no longer turns onto this bumpy and deserted country road. I only asked you for water because I am very thirsty after this endless walk. But I have observed your land very closely while I walked for hours over these dusty paths. I have studied it very thoroughly, and I say to you again with full conviction, I can save this farm from certain ruin.
With what? Andreas spread his arms in a sweeping, sarcastic gesture and pointed at her. With that little worn notebook in your hands? Are you going to pray that it finally rains?
It will not rain, said Theresa with a calm, almost eerily matter-of-fact voice, neither this year nor perhaps next year. The mocking laughter on the veranda broke off instantly. That was definitely not what the exhausted farmworkers, who were still listening, had expected. Every single person who had appeared here in recent years to sell false hope for expensive money had always first promised that the redeeming rain would soon come.
So how in the world do you intend to save anything here, Frau Theresa? asked Andreas, now noticeably sharper. The water that you and your land so urgently need is not up in the empty sky, but deep down under your feet. Andreas descended two creaking steps from the veranda, still clutching the half-empty whiskey glass firmly in his right hand.
Seen from close up, he was still a rather handsome man in his middle years. His graying hair was casually combed back. He wore a heavy leather vest over a completely crumpled white shirt. He looked attractive and completely ruined at the same time.
Just like men look who have never had to hear the word no in their entire lives and are now breaking at reality. Under my feet, he repeated slowly, savoring and mockingly emphasizing every word. My good woman, my grandfather drilled through this land countless times. My father drilled through this land.
I myself have drilled through this land. That’s three whole generations full of dry, useless wells. There is absolutely nothing down here except hard rock and endless disappointment. They all simply drilled in completely the wrong place, replied Theresa without the slightest hesitation.
And you want to tell me that you know the right place? Not yet in detail, but I know exactly how and where I have to search. Andreas looked over at Clemens, looked at the silent workers at the barn, and finally looked at Zelda, the plump cook, who had appeared in the open kitchen door and was nervously drying her wet hands on her white apron. He now had an audience, and a man like Andreas simply could not stop showing off once he knew that people were watching him.
So she knows how to search, he announced loudly, while stepping back onto the veranda as if he were entering a grand theater stage. The lady shows up here completely out of nowhere, only with the dusty clothes on her body, without a vehicle, without a known name, without any possessions, and claims that she knows more than three experienced generations of hard-working farmers did not know. She knows more than the expensive experts I paid a fortune to in the past. More than the smart people from the agricultural cooperative, more than the strict gentlemen from the bank.
Yes, simply more than the whole world. Maybe, said Theresa completely calmly and unimpressed. Maybe, he mimicked her in an artificially high, mocking tone. Some of the younger workers laughed softly.
Well, then let’s make the matter properly and officially, since you apparently have a fondness for crazy bets. He snapped his fingers loudly and imperiously in Zelda’s direction. Bring me a piece of paper immediately. Bring me paper and a pen.
Come on, hurry up. Zelda hesitated for a moment, looking worriedly from the angry master of the house to the calm stranger and back. Then she hurriedly disappeared into the dark kitchen and returned shortly afterward with what she could find quickly. A large piece of brown wrapping paper, the kind used to wrap fresh meat at the market in Pfaffenberg, and an old cheap ballpoint pen that scratched and skipped at the first stroke.
Andreas pressed the rough paper roughly against the wooden railing of the veranda and began to write in large, crooked letters, the typical messy handwriting of someone who laughs arrogantly to himself while writing. Then he cleared his throat loudly and read the text aloud in a thundering voice, as if he were proclaiming an important historical proclamation to the entire dusty farmyard. I, Andreas, rightful owner of Gut Bärenbach, hereby solemnly promise Frau Theresa the exact half of this entire property, in the unlikely event that she finds running water on this land and thus saves this farm from certain ruin. He made a dramatic theatrical pause, looked around triumphantly, and added, Signed and sealed by Andreas, right here in front of the eyes of all these hungry and exhausted witnesses.
The workers laughed again, this time a little louder, to please their boss. Only Clemens, the old foreman, did not change his expression and did not laugh. Andreas put his signature under the scrawled text with an extravagant and completely exaggerated flourish, turned the brown paper around with a sweeping movement, and held out the cheap ballpoint pen to Theresa. Please, sign away, Frau Doctor of Hidden Water Veins.
Let us make this glorious new business partnership highly official. Actually, this moment was precisely designed for her to retreat timidly. That was the whole cruel point of this macabre joke. She was supposed to turn bright red, stammer an apology, quickly turn around, and disappear forever, exactly on the same dusty road she had come from.
And he, Andreas, would then have a wonderful, heroic story for the next six months, which he could tell boastfully in his local pub in Pfaffenberg. But Theresa had no intention of fleeing. She let her heavy backpack slide slowly to the parched ground, tucked the leather notebook firmly under her left arm, took the pen without the slightest hesitation, and signed with her full real name. Her handwriting was round, clear, extremely precise, and did not tremble even once.
I will need a simple place to sleep for the next while, she said calmly, handing him back the scratchy pen. I will eat normally with the other workers and work just as hard. I do not ask for a single cent of wages. If I should fail with my claim, I will leave silently.
And you keep this piece of paper as another funny joke for your evening regulars’ table rounds. But if I am actually right, then this piece of paper is now binding and valid. The arrogant smile on Andreas’s face shrank abruptly by a noticeable centimeter. It was only one small centimeter, but it was noticeable.
It was the very first time in a long time that a person did not do exactly what he expected and demanded of her. Zelda, he said with sudden harshness in his voice, without taking his eyes off Theresa. Make a small bed for the lady doctor in the old day laborers’ quarters, and take this piece of paper and keep it very, very safe in the glass cabinet in the living room, because in a few weeks I will have the great pleasure of reading it aloud again. And that will be exactly on the day we celebrate her sad departure.
With that, he turned around brusquely, grabbed the half-empty whiskey bottle, and went back inside the house, still laughing artificially. But this laugh now had a fine, barely audible crack in it. There was something tiny, extremely uncomfortable hidden in it. An irritating feeling of uncertainty that he absolutely could not name.
What Andreas, in his boundless arrogance, did not yet know was that exactly this dirty piece of brown wrapping paper, signed out of pure mockery on a scorching hot morning, would very soon develop into the most important legal document of his entire life. And he also did not suspect in the slightest that the stoic woman with the dusty boots, standing there in the middle of his decaying farmyard, carried in her worn leather notebook more solid knowledge about deep groundwater than all the highly paid experts of the entire rural region together. Zelda led Theresa wordlessly across the dusty yard to the quarters, a long, narrow building with an extremely hot brick roof, standing right next to the empty cattle shed. On the short walk there, the old cook kept secretly watching the mysterious newcomer out of the corner of her eye.
You should never have signed that paper, Zelda finally whispered so softly that no one else could hear it. He will make your life an absolute hell from now on, every day, until you finally give up. That’s exactly his way. He humiliates people until they leave broken on their own.
And afterwards, he tells the whole town that the person was simply too weak for this hard life. I know, answered Theresa gently and composedly. You know and you still put your name under it. I have been humiliated in my life by people far worse and crueler than him, good Frau Zelda.
The rich people in their expensive tailored suits, those so-called cultivated men, they humiliate you at least directly and openly to your face. The others, the supposedly educated ones, humiliate you in writing and behind your back, while smiling kindly. Zelda stopped in the middle of the path. She looked at this remarkable woman properly and attentively for the first time.
The boots were indeed completely worn, but they were very high-quality boots made of thick, expensive leather, made for someone who had already waded through a lot of wet construction site mud and difficult terrain. The hands showed distinct hard calluses, but the fingernails were clean and neatly cared for. And the entire way she spoke did not match that of a destitute vagrant who has to beg at the edge of the road for a night’s lodging. Who exactly are you?
asked Zelda full of curiosity. Theresa let her gaze slowly sweep across the wide yard, saw in the distance the dried-up dead pond and the completely rusted, motionless windmill that stood uselessly in the middle of the yellow, withered pasture and pointed into nothing. For the moment, I am simply an exhausted woman who is very thirsty, she said softly. I will tell you everything else as soon as the earth allows me.
In that first oppressively hot night, Theresa lay wide awake on the extremely narrow, hard bed in the sparse quarters and heard the loud, irregular snoring of the workers through the thin wooden wall. She lit the small stub of a leftover candle and carefully opened her notebook with the old leather binding. The many pages inside were heavily yellowed, covered with a tiny, very tightly written handwriting that was definitely not her own. There were detailed drawings of gentle hills, countless directional arrows, complicated Latin plant names, lines that looked like old maps, and other markings that almost looked like old forgotten prayers.
At the very front, on the very first page, stood in somewhat larger script a single meaningful sentence, written many decades ago by a hand that was long since no longer alive. The earth constantly speaks to us. It is only the people who have completely forgotten how to listen to it properly. Theresa slowly and lovingly ran her index finger over these familiar words.
Just as she had done every single night for countless years. Then she blew out the small flame of the candle. Outside, a deep absolute silence reigned over the entire dry landscape. But far below this superficial silence, extremely deep in the dark and cold rock, something ancient and powerful was waiting only to be found by her.
The next morning, even before the hot sun had risen in its full dazzling glory above the horizon, the early-rising workers found the new woman already wide awake, in the middle of the yellow withered pasture. She was not at all busy hastily digging anywhere, and she was not praying to the clouds either. Instead, she squatted completely still on the ground and stared with absolute concentration at an ordinary anthill. Have you perhaps lost something, good woman?
asked one of them, the young lad named Tobias, and visibly had to strain to suppress his rising laughter. I have already found it, she answered completely relaxed, without lifting her gaze from the teeming ground for even a second. What have you found? he wanted to know, amused.
Ants, more precisely, ants whose small bodies are covered with extremely moist, dark clay. Theresa rose slowly, brushed the dry dust from the knees of her sturdy trousers, and immediately noted something in her little book. Ants never dig so deep into the hard earth without a very good reason, young man. No one in this whole world ever digs so deep without a very solid reason.
She continued her leisurely walk across the wide dead pasture, stopped here at a bush, paused there at a stone, and Tobias stared after this strange, fascinating figure, who grew smaller and smaller against the slowly rising morning sun. He did not know whether he should tell the other workers about it. Or whether he should better keep this highly peculiar feeling entirely to himself, the feeling that something completely new and unexpected had begun to move on this dying farm. In the first few days, no one on Gut Bärenbach took Theresa even remotely seriously, and for her part, she did not make the slightest effort to be taken seriously.
She woke up every day long before the first rooster crowed. She crossed the huge parched property exclusively on foot, from one farthest end to the other, armed only with a large borrowed machete that hung loosely at her belt. She returned punctually at lunchtime, was always covered from head to toe with a thick layer of light dust, ate completely silently in a quiet corner of the hot kitchen, and disappeared immediately afterwards into the shimmering heat. She did not drill a single hole, she did not ask for any heavy machinery, and she did not utter the word water even once.
Do you see that? called Andreas triumphantly from his veranda down to anyone who wanted to hear it or not. The esteemed lady doctor is merely taking a relaxed, free hiking vacation here with us. Just wait.
In no more than two days, she’ll ask someone for a ride back to the highway and disappear forever. I bet a full bottle of my best whiskey on it. But the hard-working men, scattered across the entire yard doing their endless tasks, slowly began to notice very strange and fascinating things about her. They watched with growing astonishment as the woman literally tasted the bare earth.
She took a handful of the dry soil, rubbed it intensely and probingly between her experienced fingers, smelled it deeply and concentratedly, and sometimes even carefully touched it to the tip of her tongue, as if she were tasting a complex, invisible soup for its exact salt content. They also noticed that she often stood for an incredibly long time, completely motionless, in front of the few remaining trees that no one else would deign to give even the slightest glance. The crooked old apple tree near the dilapidated fence, the three dead oaks at the far edge of the property, and the strangely stubborn bush that, despite everything, miraculously still bore green leaves in a completely abandoned corner, while everything else around it had long since crumbled to dust. The men watched wide-eyed as she repeatedly struck rhythmic blows with the hard, blunt handle of her machete against huge boulders anchored in the ground.
Then she pressed her ear firmly against the sun-heated rock, closed her eyes, and listened with the utmost concentration. Exactly like an experienced, worried doctor listening to the weak heart of a sick patient with a stethoscope. She is completely crazy, judged young Tobias at the sparse evening meal with firm conviction. A crazy person does not move in such a focused manner, countered Clemens, who was by far the oldest in the group and had seen considerably more of the world in his long life than the younger lads.
A madman walks around aimlessly and completely lost. She, on the other hand, moves exactly like someone who is looking for something specific and is absolutely certain that it exists. Early in the morning of the fourth day, Theresa appeared in the kitchen before the first coffee and watched intently as Zelda struggled to scoop some water from the old masonry cistern that adjoined the main house directly. This was the absolutely only remaining place on the entire huge property that still yielded any water at all.
It was an extremely thin, murky, and muddy trickle that barely sufficed to fill two buckets a day and not a drop more. Was this old cistern always so incredibly weak? asked Theresa quietly. Zelda let out a deep, sad sigh.
No, it used to be very strong and reliable. Back then, when Andreas’s father was still in charge, you could fill bucket after bucket here without it ever stopping. It has diminished slowly and insidiously. Over the last 12 years or so, it has degenerated into this miserable trickle you see here.
Did it diminish slowly or did it stop suddenly at a certain point? Theresa pressed on. Very slowly, a little less every day, like a person losing his will to live bit by bit. Theresa squatted down nimbly at the edge of the shaft, peered attentively into the dark, damp bottom, threw a tiny pebble in, and listened intently for the distant, faint sound of impact.
Then she sat completely still for many long minutes, hastily drawing something complex in her book. Frau Zelda, could you please lend me that thick rope there and the old leaky tin bucket that you were actually planning to throw away? She spent the entire morning deep down in the dark cistern. She climbed down on the rough rope, armed only with a flickering oil lamp, and stayed down there for countless hours.
She scraped stubborn, petrified dirt off the walls, repeatedly sent buckets full of stinking black mud up on the rope, and measured the walls precisely with her bare hands. When she finally climbed back into the blinding daylight, covered completely in dark mud from the tips of her hair to the soles of her boots, a small, but genuine smile adorned the corners of her mouth. It was the very first time she had smiled since she had arrived at the farm. What happened?
asked Zelda with wide eyes. Your old cistern is not dying because of the terrible drought. It is simply suffocating. because it is completely blocked.
Deep down there runs a hidden water vein that is still pulsating strongly. It is weak, but it is still alive, and it comes from exactly that direction. Theresa raised her dirty arm and pointed directly east toward the low, extremely rocky and inhospitable hills at the farthest edge of the property. And a weak vein down here, good Frau Zelda, is almost always the direct daughter of a far more powerful main vein somewhere else nearby.
And that is exactly what we have to find. And what exactly do you plan to do now? asked the cook, bewildered. First, I will completely free your cistern.
The rescue of a dying farm always begins at the heart of the house, and that is the kitchen. She worked tirelessly for two full days on this task, supported by the slightly ashamed but fascinated help of young Tobias, who suddenly claimed that he had nothing more important to do anyway. Together they cleared the entire muddy bottom, removed huge blocking stones, re-stacked the walls in the old traditional way according to the sketches in her book, and finally laid out a clean trench that Theresa expertly called a drainage. On the morning of the third day, Zelda lowered her wooden bucket on the thick rope with great mistrust.
The bucket dipped in. It actually dipped deeply in with exactly that rich, heavy sound of deep, abundant water that she had not heard for many years. When she pulled the rope up with great effort, the bucket was filled to the absolute brim, and the water splashing over the edge was absolutely crystal clear and ice cold. The old cook stood frozen for minutes, clutching the wet bucket, while her chin began to tremble uncontrollably.
My good heavens, she whispered with a breaking voice. My good God, what have you done, girl? On a rural farm, such incredible news spreads faster than a galloping horse. By the time the midday sun was at its highest, all the workers had already crept over one by one to secretly peer into the miraculous cistern, as if they were looking at a holy apparition.
They pulled water up for no reason, just to see it splash. They laughed loudly and carefree. Tobias told everyone again and again the adventurous story of the cleaning, and with each retelling, the technical details became more heroic and exaggerated. Andreas was the last to appear at the scene.
He came only after the late lunch, with the heavy, angry steps of a man determined to expose an obvious lie immediately. He leaned over the edge, stared into the darkness of the cistern, harshly ordered the bucket to be lowered, watched as it came back up brimming full, and then remained silent for a very, very long time. Kitchen water, he finally said dismissively, shrugging his shoulders indifferently. That’s just a bit of kitchen water.
You can’t irrigate a single pasture with that. It will never fill a large pond, and above all, it doesn’t pay a single one of my pressing debts. This doesn’t save us at all. You are absolutely right, Theresa agreed calmly, without letting herself be provoked.
This doesn’t save anything yet. That was merely the earth kindly saying good morning. Andreas glared at her angrily. She withstood his hostile gaze fearlessly, and again that small, extremely irritating feeling stirred deep inside him.
It was that damned thin thread of doubt that he otherwise successfully drowned every evening in his expensive whiskey on the veranda. Do the following, Frau Doctor. Just let me know immediately as soon as the earth decides to say good day. With these cynical words, he turned around abruptly and walked away.
But this time, not a single worker laughed with him. Late that evening, Theresa sat exhausted in the kitchen, eating dinner in silence, when Zelda suddenly sat down opposite her with two steaming cups of strong coffee. Zelda had that certain determined expression on her face that unmistakably said she would not get up again until she had received an honest answer. Where in the world did you learn something like that?
she asked directly. Theresa stirred her black coffee slowly and thoughtfully, her dark eyes directed into the past. My father was a traditional well builder, one of the old wandering kind. He traveled through the whole wide country with a simple bundle on his back and exactly this leather notebook here, and found clear water everywhere where all the other men only ever struck hard rock.
The simple country people back then always called him the Water Whisperer. They firmly claimed he could hear the earth speak. She smiled softly at the memory, but he did not just listen. Good Frau Zelda, he intensely studied nature.
He watched specific plants for hours. He observed the paths of tiny ants. He paid extremely close attention to the exact discoloration of stones and to the way the massive hills folded in the landscape. When you observe nature so closely with your eyes for 50 long years, then this gift eventually becomes an exact, infallible science.
And you learned all that from him, the cook pressed on, fascinated. First, I learned it from him out in the field, and much later I supplemented all of that with thick scientific books. I studied very intensely, Frau Zelda. I really learned tirelessly.
I went to the big city, completed my difficult studies, got my high degree, and finally became a respected expert with an important nameplate on my chest. Her voice darkened noticeably, lost its tone, and became a trace more bitter. I spent fifteen long and successful years locating gigantic water reserves for very rich and powerful people. I led massive irrigation projects, planned the construction of huge dams and deep industrial boreholes.
There was a chic, enormous office in the capital, and on the heavy door stood in shiny letters: my name. Zelda looked thoughtfully at the worn, dusty boots under the table, the faded, simple clothing, the tattered thin backpack hanging lonely on a rusty nail. And what happened then that you fell so low? Theresa drank the last sip of her coffee and closed her hand tightly around the empty, warm cup.
What always happens happened. I trusted a man I should never have trusted. And in my blindness, I signed an important document without reading it carefully beforehand. What did you sign?
My own merciless verdict, my complete destruction. She stood up abruptly, washed her cup under the new strong stream of water from the clean cistern, and stared for a long, silent moment at the clear water running softly through her fingers. I will tell you the sad rest of this story another day. For this evening, I absolutely want to look at something up on the hill before the sun completely sets.
Zelda remained alone in the dim kitchen. Her head was spinning with more questions than she had had before the conversation. But at exactly that moment, while drying the second cup, the old wise cook understood something that the others on the farm would only grasp much later. This extraordinary woman had by no means ended up on this dry piece of land purely by chance.
People with such immense, profound knowledge do not wander aimlessly and completely destitute on foot through the country to beg for a place to sleep at strange doors. When such people suddenly appear at a stranger’s gate like homeless beggars, they always do so only because they are either fleeing from something very bad, or because they are searching for something very specific and valuable, or both at the same time. The valuable water brought back far more than just the financial wealth of Gut Bärenbach. It washed away the hard, relentless cynicism from Andreas’s soul and gave the simple, hard-working people their lost faith in themselves.
Often in our lives, it is not the comfortable, easily reachable paths in front of our own front door that lead us to true salvation, but rather the extremely rocky, steep paths that demand our complete determination. The greatest and worst drought that a person can ever suffer never takes place in the external dry soil, but solely and exclusively in one’s own heart, when, out of pure, wounded pride, we stop listening properly to the wise voices of nature and to the honest, good people around us. True healing and profound change can only come about when we finally let go of our inner arrogance, work together as a unit, and trust even the tiniest, most inconspicuous clues.
In the end, the earth always keeps its precious treasures for those who still possess the infinite patience, the deep respect, and the courageous, unwavering will to really dig deep into it.
