And still the fugitive tarried. He had been used so long to night roads and the constant peril that this dim light, and the wind piping at his ear, pleased him more than any blaze of candles and lilt of dance-music. Deep knowledge came to him, bred of the hazards that had made him hard and lean. He sorrowed no more for Derby and Culloden; his present thirst and hunger went by him, as things of slight account; for he remembered the long months of hiding, the intimacy he had been privileged to share with Prince Charles Edward. There had been no glamour of the dance, no pomp, about these journeyings through the Highlands; there had been no swift, eager challenge and applause from ladies’ eyes; and yet Rupert had tested, as few had done, the fine edge and temper of the Stuart charm. Here, under the shadow of grey Holyrood, he loitered to recall their wayfaring together. There had been winter journeyings through incessant rain, or snow, or winds that raved down mountain passes; there had been summer travels through the heather, with the sun beating pitilessly on them, over the stark length of moors that had none but brackish water and no shade. They had slept o’ nights with danger for a pillow and the raw wind for coverlet. And through it all the Prince had shown a brave, unanswerable front to the sickness of defeat, the hiding when he longed for action. If food and drink were scarce, he sang old clan songs or recalled light jests and stories that had once roused the French Court to laughter. If danger pressed so closely from all four quarters of the hill that escape seemed hopeless, his cheeriness infected those about him with a courage finer than their own. Looking back on these days, Rupert knew that no ball at Holyrood here, no triumph-march to London, could have proved the Stuart as those Highland journeyings had done. The Prince and he had learned the way of gain in loss, and with it the gaiety that amazes weaker men. From Holyrood--the moon free of clouds and the grey walls finding faith again--a friendly message came to him. He caught the Stuart glamour up--the true, abiding glamour that does not yield to this world’s limitations. What he had read in the library at Windyhough was now a triumph-song that he had found voice to sing. He came to the house where Lady Royd was lodging, and knocked at the door; and presently a trim Scots lassie opened to him, and saw him standing there in the moonlight of the street, his face haggard, his clothes, made up of borrowed odds and ends, suggesting disrepute. She tried to close the door in his face; but Rupert had anticipated this, and pushed his way inside. “Is Miss Demaine in the house?” he asked. The maid recovered a little of her courage and her native tartness. “She is, forbye. Have you come buying old claes, or are you looking just for a chance to steal siller from the hoose?” Rupert caught at the help she gave him. “There’s the quick wit ye have, my lass,” he said.