He walked down the main street that connects the two cities. As he passed Beilinson Hospital, Uri saw a frum Yid standing outside, calling him over. “Can you help us with a minyan?”
“A minyan?” Uri asked in amazement. “Not even at Itzkovitz (a well-known minyan factory) are Yidden looking for a minyan at this hour!”
“You’re correct,” the Yid said. “My father is on his deathbed with only moments left to live. We’d like to have a minyan present when his soul returns to its Maker.”
Uri didn’t know what to do. He hadn’t expected his Yom Tov night to have such a turnout. The esrog he’d worked so hard for turned out to be pasul, he’d walked in the middle of the night to Petach Tikvah and back, and now he was being asked to join a minyan? Still, how could he say no to a son about to lose his father? He followed the Yid into the hospital to join them for their father’s last moments.
However, the dying father’s neshama wasn’t leaving him too quickly, and the overtired Uri was losing his patience. The children of the father begged him to remain, and so he busied himself with a Mishnah Berurah. When the father’s neshama finally departed, Uri was ready to leave right away, but the son of the deceased further requested that he wait to escort him home to Bnei Brak, and Uri agreed.
Finally, at 3 a.m., the two began their way home. At one point, the Yid turned to Uri and said, “I know why I’m walking on Jabotinsky Street at this hour, but what are you doing out here in the middle of the night?”
Uri explained to the Yid about how he and his chavrusa had learned the halachos of arba minim, how they’d checked esrogim for the dealer to score for themselves a “diamond” esrog, how only tonight he realized its pasul, and how he’d walked all the way to Petach Tikvah to inform his chavrusa of their predicament.
“Do you have parnassah?” the Yid asked Uri suddenly.
Uri was beside himself. “It’s Yom Tov, and it’s the middle of the night. What are you asking, whether my rosh kollel pays on time?”
The Yid said, “I’m not asking for no reason. Tell me your situation.”
