RICHES

Financially secure in their old age, hard-working Samuel and his wife seek the advice of a revered rabbi: Should they give up their store so that Chaya-Rivka can ``read holy books in peace'' while Samuel also does something ``pleasing to the Almighty?'' Approving this plan, the rabbi tells Samuel to drive his horse and cart around the roads beyond his village for three months. Mystified, the old man complies, soon finding himself enjoying the landscape and helping strangers along the way: good deeds to parallel stories of the prophets his wife is studying. In the tradition of I. B. Singer, a gentle setting for a precious nugget of wisdom, voiced by the rabbi: ``Give charity, as ever. But also give of yourself whenever and wherever you can.'' Diamond's soft gray-and-white art unobtrusively reflects the story's kindly warmth and helps realize the Eastern European setting. (Fiction. 8+)