"I'm not," volunteered an angel-faced child with an engaging smile.

"I got a lickin' on Friday," added the round boy, who as sole member of his s.e.x felt that he must stand up for it.

The a.s.sistant shook a finger at them cheerfully and hurried away.

Desire became the focus of all eyes and a watchful dumbness settled down upon them like a pall. Frantically she tried to remember her instructions. But never had a light conversational manner seemed more difficult to attain.

"I hope," she faltered, seeking for a sympathetic entry, "that your regular teacher is not ill?"

The row of inquiring eyes showed no intelligence.

"Is she?" asked Desire, looking directly at the child opposite.

"Ma says she only thinks she is," said the child. The row rustled pleasantly.

"I understand," went on Desire hastily, "that we are to talk about Moses. How many here can tell me anything about Moses?"

The row of eyes blinked. But Moses might have been a perfect stranger for any sign of recognition from their owners.

"Moses," went on Desire, "was a very remarkable man. In his age he seems even more remarkable--"

A small hand shot up and an injured voice inquired: "Please, teacher, don't we have the Golden Text?"

"I suppose we do." There was evidently some technique here of which the hurried a.s.sistant had not informed her. "We will have it now. What is the Golden Text?"

n.o.body seemed to know.

"I don't see how we can have it, if you don't know it," said Desire mildly.

Another hand shot up. "Please teacher, you say it first."

There was also, then, an established order of precedence.

"I don't know it, either," said Desire.

This might have precipitated a deadlock. But, fortunately, the row did not believe her. They smiled stiffly. Their smile revealed more clearly than anything else how unthinkable it was for a teacher not to know the Golden Text. Desire, in desperation, remembered the paper-covered "Quarterly" which the a.s.sistant had put into her hands and, with a flash of inspiration, decided that what the children wanted was probably there. She opened it feverishly and was delighted to discover "Golden Text" in large letters on the first page she looked at. She read hastily.

"And thou Bethlehem in the land of Juda--"

A whole row of hands shot up. "Please teacher, that was last Christmas!" announced the cla.s.s reproachfully.

With shame Desire noticed that the lessons in the Quarterly were dated.

But she was regaining something of her ordinary poise.

"You ought to know it, even if it is," she remarked firmly. This was more according to Hoyle. The little boy's hand answered it.

"'Tain't review Sunday, teacher."

Teacher decided to ignore this. "Very well," she said. "We will now have the Golden Text for today. Who will say it first? I will give you a start--'As Moses--'"

"As Moses," piped a chorus of small voices.

"Lifted up," prompted Desire.

"Lifted up," shrilled the chorus.

"Yes?" expectantly.

The chorus was silent.

"Well, children, go on."

But n.o.body went on.

"You don't know it," declared Desire with mild severity. "Very well.

Learn it for next Sunday. Now I am going to ask you some questions.

First of all--who was Moses?"

She asked the question generally but her eye fell upon the one male member who swallowed his Sunday gum-drop with a gulp.

"Don't know his nother name," said the male member sulkily.

Desire realized that she didn't know, either. "I did not ask you to tell his name but something about him. Where he lived, for instance.

Where did Moses live?" Her eye swept down to the mite at the end of the row.

"Bulrushes!" said that infant gaspingly.

"He was hidden among bulrushes," explained Desire, "but he couldn't exactly live there. Does anyone know what a bulrush is?"

The row exchanged glances and nudged each other.

"Things you soak in coal-oil," began one.

"To make torches at 'lections," added another.

"Same as cat-tails," volunteered a third condescendingly.

"Well, even if they were anything like that, he couldn't live in them, could he?" Desire felt that she had made a point at last.

"Could if he was a frog," offered the male member after consideration.

To Desire's surprise the row accepted this seriously.

"But as he was a baby and not a frog," she went on hurriedly, "he must have lived with his mother in a house. The name of the country they lived in was Egypt. And Egypt had a wicked King. This wicked King ordered all the little boy babies--" She paused, appalled at the thought of telling these infants of that long-past ruthlessness. But, again to her surprise, the infants now showed pleasurable interest. An excited murmur rose.

"I like that part!" ... "Why didn't he kill the girl babies, too?"

... "Did he cut their heads right off?" ... "Did their mothers holler?" ... While the male member offered with an air of authority, "I 'spect he just wrung their necks."

"Well, well! Getting along nicely, I see," said the a.s.sistant, tiptoeing down the aisle. "I felt sure you would interest them, Mrs.