Lightning

the sky was overcast, and humidity was high. Holding open the front door of his small, neighborhood grocery in Santa Ana, Bob Shane decided that the prospects were good for one last big downpour of the season.
    The ficus trees in the yard of the house across the street and the date palm on the corner were motionless in the dead air and seemed to droop as if with the weight of the oncoming storm.
    By the cash register, the radio was turned low. The Beach Boys were singing their new hit "Surfin' U.S.A." Considering the weather, their tune was as appropriate as "White Christmas" sung in July.
    Bob looked at his watch: three-fifteen.
    There'll be rain by three-thirty, he thought, and a lot of it.
    Business had been good during the morning, but the afternoon had been slow. At the moment no shoppers were in the store.
    The family-owned grocery faced new, deadly competition from convenience-store chains like 7-Eleven. He was planning to shift to a deli-style operation, offering more fresh foods, but was delaying as long as possible because a deli required considerably more work.
    If the oncoming storm was bad he would have few customers the rest of the day. He might close early and take Laura to a movie.
    Turning from the door, he said, "Better get the boat, doll."
    Laura was kneeling at the head of the first aisle, across from the cash register, absorbed in her work. Bob had carried four cartons of canned soup from the stockroom, then Laura had taken over. She was only eight years old, but she was a reliable kid, and she liked to help out around the store. After stamping the correct price on each of the cans, she stacked them on the shelves, remembering to cycle the merchandise, putting the new soup behind the old.
    She looked up reluctantly. "Boat? What boat?"
    "Upstairs in the apartment. The boat in the closet. From the look of the sky, we're going to need it to get around later today."
    "Silly," she said. "We don't have a boat in the closet."
    He walked behind the checkout counter. "Nice little blue boat."
    "Yeah? In a closet? Which closet?"
    He began to clip packages of Slim Jims to the metal display rack beside the snack pack crackers. "The library closet, of course."
    "We don't have a library."
    "We don't? Oh. Well, now that you mention it, the boat isn't in the library. It's in the closet in the toad's room."
    She giggled. "What toad?"
    "Why, you mean to tell me that you don't know about the toad?"
    Grinning, she shook her head.
    "As of today we are renting a room to a fine, upstanding toad from England. A gentleman toad who's here on the queen's business."
    Lightning flared and thunder rumbled through the April sky. On the radio, static crackled through The Cascades' "Rhythm of the Rain."
    Laura paid no attention to the storm. She was not frightened of things that scared most kids. She was so self-confident and self-contained that sometimes she seemed to be an old lady masquerading as a child. "Why would the queen let a toad handle her business?"
    "Toads are excellent businessmen," he said, opening one of the Slim Jims and taking a bite. Since Janet's death, since moving to California to start over, he had put on fifty pounds. He had never been a handsome man. Now at thirty-eight he was pleasantly round, with little chance of turning a woman's head. He was not a great success, either; no one got rich operating a corner grocery. But he didn't care. He had Laura, and he was a good father, and she loved him with all her heart, as he loved her, so what the rest of the world might think of him was of no consequence. "Yes, toads are excellent businessmen indeed. And this toad's family has served the crown for hundreds of years. In fact he's been knighted. Sir Thomas Toad."
    Lightning crackled brighter than before. The thunder was louder as well.
    Having finished stocking the soup shelves, Laura rose from her knees and wiped her hands on the white apron that she was wearing over T-shirt and jeans. She was lovely; with her thick, brown hair and large, brown eyes, she bore more than a passing resemblance to her mother. "And how much rent is Sir Thomas Toad paying?"
    "Six pence a week."
    "Is he in the room next to mine?"
    "Yes, the room with the boat in the closet."
    She giggled again. "Well, he better not snore."
    "He said the same of you."
    A battered, rusted Buick pulled up in front of the store, and as the driver's door opened, a third thunderbolt blasted a hole in the darkening sky. The day was filled with molten light