good talk

In the mid-60's my brother, Bob, was stationed at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, home of the 101st Airborne, indeed the two servicemen's clubs were the "Bastogne" and the "Normandie." My brother had a car and he and a friend were going into the closest town, Clarksville, when they spotted something beside the road. It turned out to be some guy who had been beaten and bludgeoned unconscious and he was bleeding profusely. They were able to get him to come to and they helped him into my brother's car and drove him to the hospital in Clarksville. Of course at the Emmergency Room they had to leave their names and address. Four weeks later Bob and his friend received word that the guy was doing a lot better and wanted them to look him up the next time they went to Clarksville. So these two did look him up when they went to Clarksville and as it turned out he owned a jewelry store and he took them to his store and said "You both pick something out, anything you want in the store." As these two young men were gentlemen they said, "I'm sorry, but we can't do that." But he insisted on getting them something so he took them to a clothing store and bought them some clothes and then he took them out to dinner, so he really was grateful. I'd have to say that probably a number of cars passed this poor battered and bleeding man by because they didn't want to get involved, maybe somebody violent would be angry with them for helping him (they never heard who had done this to him), a lot of people wouldn't want him bleeding all over their car, maybe in his dazed condition he'd tell the authorities that they were the ones who had done this to him, and other sundry reasons for not stopping. This account isn't all that far from the story of "the Good Samaritan."