I shook my head. “They just stand right there an’ keep a-yellin’ like they was in trouble.”
“Go on,” urged the missionary. “What next? What’s the man doing in the front of the other crowd you said was walking along?”
“They’ve all stopped, an’ he’s sayin’ something to the sick men. An’ the boys with the goats ’s stopped to look. Everybody’s lookin’.”
“And then?”
“That’s all. The sick men are headin’ for the houses. They ain’t yellin’ any more, an’ they don’t look sick any more. An’ I just keep settin’ on my horse a-lookin’ on.”
At this all three of my listeners broke into laughter.
“An’ I’m a big man!” I cried out angrily. “An’ I got a big sword!”
“The ten lepers Christ healed before he passed through Jericho on his way to Jerusalem,” the missionary explained to my parents. “The boy has seen slides of famous paintings in some magic lantern exhibition.”
But neither father nor mother could remember that I had ever seen a magic lantern.
“Try him with another picture,” father suggested.