Rupert had yet to win his spurs, he thought. And yet, as Pendle Hill viewed the matter, he had won them long ago. Day by day, year by year, through his unhappy and disastrous boyhood, the lad had come to the windy lands, for strength and solace. He had been loyal to the hills, steadfast when stronger men had taken their ease. And to-night, because it saw a soldier in the making, gruff Pendle sent out a welcome to Sir Jasper’s heir. “God knows me for a fool,” said Rupert, afraid of the new message that had reached him. And there was stillness, while the sun’s red died behind the moor. No voice answered Rupert’s challenge to the over-world; but, for all that, he limped down to Windyhough with a sense that all the birds were singing. Through the misery and darkness of these days he was reaching out, with stubborn gallantry, to grasp the forward hope. The forward hope! He had lived on little else since he was breeked. As he came down to Windyhough, he met Nance and old Simon Foster at the courtyard gate; Simon was carrying a musket, and polishing the barrel with his sleeve as he hobbled at the girl’s side. “I’ve news for you, Rupert!” she said gaily. “Of the Rising?” He was eager, possessed of the one thought only. “Is trouble nearing Windyhough? Nance, is there real work to be done at last?” “Oh, my dear, you ask too much. Nothing ever happens at Windyhough; nothing will ever happen again, I think. We’re derelict, Rupert; the Highlandmen are playing their Prince into his kingdom by this time, and we”--she grew bitter, petulant, for the silence and the waiting were sapping her buoyant health, her courage, her trust in high endeavour--“and we in Lancashire are churning our butter every week, Rupert, and selling cows on market days, and dozing by the hearth. _I am ashamed._” Simon Foster glanced sharply at Rupert. He knew the lad through and through, was prepared for the whiteness of his face, the withdrawal as if a friend had struck him wantonly. “Miss Nance,” he said bluntly, “shame is for folk that’s earned it. There’s three of us here, and we’d all be marching into London, if only it could have happened that way, like.” Nance would not look at Rupert, though she guessed how she had wounded him. She did not know this mood that had settled on her since coming to the draughty, loyal house of Windyhough. The long inaction, the waiting for news gathered from gruff, hard-ridden messengers, the day-long wish to be out in the thick of battle, had troubled her; but there was a deeper trouble--a trouble that was half delight, a turmoil and unrest to which she could not give a name. And the trouble centred round Rupert. She liked him so well, had grown up with his queer, dreamy ways, his uncomplaining courage.