<TITLE>12. Par 39-41</TITLE>L-39 And I'm a Southerner, but I--that's still wrong. I'm a Abraham Lincoln man. I--I believe that--that God made us all the same. That's right.
So then... And I seen the girl coming, and--and I seen her--her eyes was as white with cataracts as my--my shirt. And she was... Nobody would help her. She was just pushing through the crowd hollering, "Daddy! Daddy!" like that.
And I thought, "Poor old thing." And I thought, "I believe I'll get over to see what she wants. Nobody knows me." And I was watching for those ushers to come around the corner. They was trying to get through the crowd. So I pushed up close to where she was. And when started this way, I'd get over this way. So I'd get right in front of her. And so that looked like awful to do that.
So she bumped right in to me. She said, "Pardon me."
I said, "Yes, ma'am."
She said, "Pardon me, sir." When she heard my voice of being a man.
And I said, "What's--what's the matter?"
She said, "Sir, I've lost my daddy. I can't find him." Said, "I's blind. And I can't find my daddy."
And I said, "Well, where you from?"
She said, "I'm from Memphis."

L-40 And I looked over, and I seen the chartered bus setting there from Memphis. And I thought, "I can get her back there before them ushers... If I can't, I'll let one of them get her over there."
And she said, "I come over here from Memphis." And said, "I lost my daddy."
I said, "Well, I don't see no more colored people in the--in the--this crowd of people."
Said, "Oh, will you help me to get to the bus?"
And I said, "What did you come over here for?"
She said, "I come over to see the healer."
I said, "The what?"
She said, "The healer."
And I said, "Do you believe that?" She said... I thought I'd test her faith right good, you know.
I said, "Do you believe that?" She said, "Yes, suh, I believe it."
And I said... Well, that made me feel little, you know. So I said, "Well, do you believe in the days of all these great fine doctors and hospitals, that God would send an Angel down to earth and would heal people?"
She said, "Yes, suh, I believes it."
I said, "How'd you ever hear about it?"

L-41 She said, "I's hearing this morning on the radio a man up here at Kennett, Missouri, that had been blind ten years and he got his sight." That was him testifying on the radio. See? And she said, "I's come over. We formed a big committee, and we come over by da bus." And she said, "They tell me this is the healer's last night here." And said, "I can't even get near the building." And said, "I've lost my father. I's blind. I--I's just don't know what to do."
And I thought, "Poor girl." She wasn't... She was in her teens, seventeen, eighteen years old. And I said, "What's wrong?"
She said, "Well, I got cataracts." And she said, "The doctor told me when they were ripe, he would take them off." But said, "Now, since they got ripe..." Said, "He says he can't take them off, because they're wrapped around the optical nerve of my eyes. And he'd take it out, he'd have to take the optical nerve with it."
And I said, "And you believe that that healer would heal you?"
She said, "Yes, suh. I believe it." And I said, "Well, look at the doctor."
She said, "They can't help me."
And I thought of that song of old blind Fanny Crosby:
Pass me not, O gentle Saviour,
Hear my humble cry;
While on others thou art calling,
Do not pass me by.
And I thought of it. She--she said... I said, "Oh, you don't believe that kind of stuff, do you?" I questioned her again.
She said, "Sir," she said, "I perceive that you are a white man. I believe that you're a white man."
I said, "Yes, ma'am."


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