Jake stood by the hole. He no longer felt young: his arms ached, his back felt like a tangle of bad-tempered adders that had been tossed into a slow fire, and his toasted shoulders were threatening a blistery revenge by morning.

But he had done it! The Vision in his heart had told him to come to this specific part of his drought-wracked homeland - no sane person could have picked a less likely spot - to dig for water. The unmistakable pile of shells and cornhusks, dumped off after someone's backyard clambake, had matched the one in his inner memory exactly. And he had dug. And dug. And dug some more.

For hours, for days he had dug, propelled beyond the possibility of failure by the assurance that his heart did not lie. For hours and days he had endured the mockery of passersby, laughing through parched lips at this fool digging in the garbage dump of their capital city: Imagine expecting to find water in a refuse heap!

But his Vision hadn't told him he would find water in the garbage midden: it had said he would find water below it. And so he had dug, with infinite patience and one-pointedness, through layer after layer, stratum after stratum, of filth and litter and cast-off relics, giving them no more thought than he gave to the buzz of traffic in the distant city. And relatively shortly - amazingly shortly, actually - his shovel had struck first muck, then ooze, then clear cool water flowing abundantly from a subterranean spring. After a heartfelt prayer of joy and thanks, Jake built himself a modest little shanty next to his hole, then settled down to enjoy the fruits of his labor.

Soon Jake's "yard" was crowded with people who had come to drink from his hole. This was fine at first, for he was a generous person and saw no reason not to share his bounty. But then the quibbling started: those closest to the hole would refuse to give up their places, even when they were sated, as though proximity to the hole itself gave them some sort of divinely-appointed status; others were debating about whose drink had been the most pure, or who had drunk the most, or who was the most satisfied; one committee of oddly-robed men even approached Jake with a proposal to put a thick wall around themselves and the hole, with openings through which they could pass measured amounts of water to 'the deserving.'

The muck fights were the last straw. Jake had placed no restrictions on who could come to share his water; but as their issues escalated beyond self-control, they began scooping up huge handfuls of compost - the half-decayed excrement of their ancestors - and throwing it at each other. Even Jake wasn't immune to these malodorous missiles; but worse, hundreds of poorly aimed muckballs were finding their way into the hole and beginning to fill it up again.

Jake realized it was time for the next step: "Look, you folks seem to have forgotten why you're here, and you're screwing up a good thing for everybody. I dug this hole because my heart told me there was water here, and I also know there's plenty more to be found. So it's time for you all to stop wasting your time, and dig your own holes; maybe you'll learn to value the water as I do, as a result of your commitment."

"But Jake," they said, we've never dug a hole; we wouldn't even know how to begin!"

"It's easy," he replied: "I'll teach you."

Soon the refuse site was a hive of activity as the more adventuresome set to their projects; the less bold had simply taken what water they could and gone home, grumbling among themselves about "tainted water" and "control issues" and "cultic elitism."

The excavations began with a great deal of enthusiasm. The digging wasn't difficult, and Jake made sure that each seeker had the full benefit of his experience. It wasn't long, however, before early signs of discouragement began to set in:

"Jake, your hole is so splendid and your water so clear! And mine is so pitiful; it will never be like yours." --"Just keep digging. This is only your, what, sixth shovelful?"

"This is so frustrating, Jake! I just keep hitting garbage. Didn't you have some special way of pushing through all this?" --"No, I just dug. The three feet of garbage you've already excavated is hardly a major obstacle, but it's three feet you won't have to dig again."