One evening when I was at a chasunah, a friend came over and made a somewhat rare request: “Would you allow me to drive your car?”
“Do you have a license?” I asked him
“That’s the thing. I want to get a license, and I need to practice. Do you agree to let me drive a few meters in your car?”
I thought for a moment and said, “It’s a bit scary for me to give the wheel over to someone who doesn’t know how to hold it, but if we drive on some side street where there is no danger to passersby, then I agree.”
We went out of the chasunah and drove quite a distance until we reached a quiet, anonymous alleyway where I stopped the car. I switched places with my friend and allowed him to drive. He wanted to practice parallel parking. He tried parking between two cars, and...oops, he hit the car in front of us.
We went out of the car to ascertain the degree of damage; we checked my car as well as the car parked in front of it, and baruch Hashem, we saw nothing at all. Right near the car, on the street, we found the sefer Noam Elimelech, with several papers and Torah pamphlets near it. It seemed that someone had thrown the contents of a bag onto the street; someone who didn’t know the value of sacred writings.
We picked up the pamphlets and found a name and phone number on one of the pages. I called the number, and the person who answered was very excited. “Where did you find my number? Was it together with the Noam Elimelech? Tell me exactly where.”
I told him.
“All those things were in my car. My car was stolen, and the thief probably threw out my pamphlets. Can you describe the car that was parked near where you found these sheets?”
I described the color and shape, and I read him the license number, and indeed, it became obvious that the car we had hit belonged to this Yid. We were all very excited.
While I was speaking to him, my friend was feeling badly about hitting the car. He scanned the de-
