"Friends and rest and love," he repeated, and the expression of weariness on his face gave place to a smile. "All these I found under one roof, which was to me a home."
"And who were these kindly ones and generous?"
"A young man, Lazarus of Bethany, and his two sisters. And the one of them is Martha, much given to cooking fine meats and sweeping for dust where it is not."
The woman laughed and asked of him, "Doth this Martha love thee?"
"Yea, as she loveth her brother."
"And the other sister, doth she too brew gravy and seek the dust?"
"Nay. She doth make lilies grow and seek the pearl of greatest price.
At my feet hath she chosen the better way than that of meat and drink.
She is born into the Kingdom."
"Doth this sister, too, love thee?"
"Doth she love me?" he repeated. But he made no answer save as it was written in the face he turned toward the distance beyond the plowed fields.
"What is her name?" his mother inquired very softly, lest she dispel some pleasant thought.