Sam Zehedi swallowed hard. "I'm okay," he said. And he concentrated on
the twin red lights ahead of him, the beating raindrops that slipped
into the cones of the headlights and out again faster than the eye
could follow. He concentrated on the feel of the gas pedal, feeding the
gas delicately. _You're driving_, he told himself. _So drive and don't
worry._
But in less than five minutes he humbly asked Groff, "You know anything
about insurance?"
"Some," Groff said reluctantly. He could guess what was coming.
"Well, to tell you the truth I don't remember what my policy on the
store was like. Fire, of course, and extended coverage. That means
water damage, doesn't it?"
"I'm afraid not," Groff told him, feeling rotten. "Under some special
circumstances, yes--but what's back there, no. If it were primarily
windstorm damage with water damage secondary--for instance, if wind
tore your roof off and rain ruined your stock, you could collect. But
nobody's covered against--flood."
The word was out in the open at last. Zehedi choked back a sob. _You're
driving. So drive._
But in less than five minutes he found himself railing to Groff that it
wasn't fair, that he'd lost five years of work, that he would have been
ready to look for a wife in another three years, a good old-fashioned
girl from the New York or Detroit colonies of Syrians, somebody who
could cook the old-country food--God, how sick he was of hamburgers and
soda pop, sometimes he looked at a hamburger when he thought he was
hungry and just put it down and walked away with a pain in his belly.
"So why," he asked indignantly, a little hysterically, "didn't I stay
in the colony and eat my mother's cooking? I'll tell you why. Because
I wanted to be my own boss, I wanted to be a pioneer, it's no good
crowding into the big cities and working for other people. In this
country you have to make money to be respected, nobody respects you if
you're just a working stiff all your life. So I saved and I bought that
place through a broker and I've been slaving for five years, eating the
lousy food and thinking about broiled lamb I'm going to eat every day
when I find a wife, and then...."
He subsided and the rain drummed down.
They're an emotional people, Mickey Groff thought automatically, and
then cursed himself. Damned fool! Here you are thirty years old and
you're babbling stereotypes to save yourself the trouble of thinking.
Why the hell shouldn't he be emotional with his store washed away? I
seem to remember that when Zimmerman slipped the old knife between your
ribs with the trick specially printed discount sheet and cost you forty
thousand dollars you didn't have, forty thousand dollars for him and
Brody to spend on likker and wimmen, forty thousand dollars you might
have air-conditioned the plant with for better productivity and fewer
rejects, you weren't exactly philosophical about it. Your screams,
in fact, were allegedly heard as far west as Council Buffs, Iowa. So
less guff, please, about any "they," who exist only in your head, being
emotional, or stingy, or stoical, or vindictive or, for that matter,
generous and good-hearted. Take 'em as they come, one by one, for what
they show they are.