The Prince would not claim shelter in the house, because long use had taught him to prefer a bed among the heather. And Rupert, lying near by o’ nights, learned more of the Stuart than all these last disastrous days had taught him. When a man sleeps in the open, forgetting there may be a listener, he is apt to lose his hold on the need for reticence that house-walls bring. The Prince, half between sleep and waking, would lift himself on an elbow, would murmur that men had died for him--men better than himself, who had followed him for loyalty and not for hire, men whom he should have shepherded to better purpose. And then he would snatch an hour or two of sleep, and would wake again with a question, sharp and hurried and unquiet. “Where’s Miss MacDonald? She’s in danger. The seas are riding high--they’re riding high, I say!--and there’s only my poor plaid to cover her.” And so it was always when the Prince rambled in his sleep. There was never a complaint on his own behalf, never a wild lament that he was skulking, a broken man, among the mountains after coming near to London and high victory. He had two griefs only, in the night hours that probe to the heart of a man--passionate regret for the slain, passionate regard for Miss MacDonald’s safety. And once the Prince, though he lay in a dead sleep, began to speak of Miss MacDonald with such praise, such settled and devout regard, that Rupert got up from the heather and went out into the still summer night, lest he pried too curiously into sacred things. And as he went up and down the glen, scenting the subtle odours that steal out at night-time, his thoughts ran back to Lancashire. It seemed long since he had roamed the moors in bygone summers, with just these keen, warm scents about him, counting himself the scholar, aching for Nance Demaine, dreaming high, foolish dreams of a day that should come which would prove him fit to wear her favour. And he was here, leaner and harder than of old, with a deed or two to his credit. And he had learned a week ago, while riding on the Prince’s business, that Lady Royd and Nance had come to Edinburgh, intent on sharing the work of brave women there who were aiding fugitives, by means fair or crafty, to reach the shores of France. He knew that his father and Maurice were safely overseas; and a sudden hope flashed across the hard, unremitting purpose that had kept his knees close about the saddle these last days. When the Prince was secure, when these hazards were over--the hazards that had grown strangely pleasant--there might be leisure to return to earlier dreams, to wake and find them all come true.