Your devoted daughter,
Adina.
[LETTER XXIV.]
My Dear Father:
As I was closing my last letter to you, intelligence reached my Uncle Amos that Lazarus, the amiable brother of Martha and Mary, was very ill. The message was brought by Elec, the Gibeonite slave, who, with tears in his eyes, communicated to us the sad news. My Cousin Mary and I at once set out to Bethany with him.
"Knowest thou, Elec, the disease that has so suddenly seized my cousin?" asked Mary, as we wound slowly up the path that leads around the steepest side of Olivet.
"Ah, dear me, noble lady, I know not," answered Elec, shaking his head. "He had just returned from the city, where he had been staying night and day for a week, laboring industriously to complete a copy of the five books of the blessed Moses for the Procurator's chief captain, for which he was to receive a large sum in Roman gold."
"What was the name of this captain who seeks to obtain our holy books?" I asked, hope half answering the question in my heart.
"Æmilius, the brave knight, they say, who was made a proselyte at the last Passover."