Maybe it was none of my business—maybe not—but something happened this week in the Aspen core that disturbed me to the core, something that had little or nothing to do with me or even you, but everything to do with this hot dog burg we all call home.

It was one of those beautiful baby bluebird not-a-cloud days, when everyone feels just a little warmer after all those splotches of cold. I was walking down the street within sight of the gondola, just up a block from Zele, when I heard to shouting come from inside one of the stores.

Shouting doesn’t quite say it—screaming is closer to the truth, or maybe even shrieking, though maybe not.

I was walking down the street minding my own business when I heard this shrieking coming from the open door of a store. I looked inside long enough to see a man behind the counter berating a beautiful young woman whom I have seen at Zele many times but never met. She was not even an acquaintance, in other words, just part of the endless supply of beautiful young women who people our town before moving on or settling down.

“I cannot run a business this way”—that was all I could hear him shriek before I walked on by.

I took another ten steps before my crisis of conscience kicked in. Another man was walking by and had the same holy-shit reaction—but he kept walking. I had to go back for the same reason you pull a U-turn at the scene of a horrible accident. You don’t know, but maybe there’s something you can do, and I knew that if I walked in that shop door then the shrieking would have to stop. I knew that would be good for the beautiful young woman, but for the shrieking man as well. I knew that, because I know how to be a customer. And I also knew what I would say: Can I be of any help?

I knew that would end it, at least for the moment, and that ending it would be a good thing.

So I turned around and walked back inside just as the man turned his back on the woman and stomped downstairs. The space was empty then but for me, the beautiful young woman, and the things they sold that hung on the walls. For a nanosecond she had that glazed look that animals get before their eyes lose all life, a moment when perhaps the soul can be said to be shrieking, but she came back to the living much faster than I would have thought humanly possible.

Are you all right? I said.

Yes, she said.

Is that the boss? I said.

Yes, she said.

Are you all right? I said.

Yes, she said.

You’re sure? I said.

Yes, she said.

I waited for something more—a confession perhaps, or at least a human moment that would make me feel suitably virtuous or even chivalrous. It never came. She ducked her head and went back to work. I walked back out the door and up the street.

Her boss had been shouting so loud that if I told you who it was you would never go in his store again, not ever. You would never buy a thing. That’s how bad it was. But everyone is entitled to a bad day, even a boss—and besides, I owe one to this particular store owner, even if he doesn’t know it. For all he knows, I owe him one still.