Publisher's Synopsis
Then, in the hour of his dire necessity, his old friends Schurka (the dog) and Waska (the cat) remembered how Martin had once saved them from a cruel death; and they took counsel together as to how they should help him. And Schurka growled, and was of opinion that he would like to tear everyone in pieces; but Waska purred meditatively, and scratched the back of her ear with a velvet paw, and remained lost in thought. At the end of a few minutes she had made up her mind, and, turning to Schurka, said: 'Let us go together into the town, and the moment we meet a baker you must make a rush between his legs and upset the tray from off his head; I will lay hold of the rolls, and will carry them off to our master.' No sooner said than done. Together the two faithful creatures trotted off into the town, and very soon they met a baker bearing a tray on his head, and looking round on all sides, while he cried: 'Fresh rolls, sweet cake, Fancy bread of every kind.Come and buy, come and take.Sure you'll find it to your mind.'At that moment Schurka made a rush between his legs--the baker stumbled, the tray was upset, the rolls fell to the ground, and, while the man angrily pursued 13Schurka, Waska managed to drag the rolls out of sight behind a bush. And when a moment later Schurka joined her, they set off at full tilt to the stone tower where Martin was a prisoner, taking the rolls with them.Waska, being very agile, climbed up by the outside to the grated window, and called in an anxious voice: 'Are you alive, master?''Scarcely alive--almost starved to death, ' answered Martin in a weak voice. 'I little thought it would come to this, that I should die of hunger.''Never fear, dear master. Schurka and I will look after you, ' said Waska. And in another moment she had climbed down and brought him back a roll, and then another, and another, till she had brought him the whole tray-load. Upon which she said: 'Dear master, Schurka and I are going off to a distant kingdom at the utmost ends of the earth to fetch you back your magic
