With his long, broad-bladed sheath-knife Jock was not long in piling under the sheltered underside of a great rock over which the heather grew, such a heap of heather twigs as Ralph could hardly believe had been cut in so short a time.  These he compacted into an excellent mattress, springy and level, with pliable interlacings of broom.

“Lie ye doon there, an’ I’ll mak’ ye a bonnie plaidie,” said Jock.

There was a little “cole” or haystack of the smallest sort close at hand.  To this Jock went, and, throwing off the top layer as possibly damp, he carried all the rest in his arms and piled it on Ralph till he was covered up to his neck.

“We’ll mak’ a’ snod [neat] again i’ the mornin’!” he said.  “Noo, we’ll theek [thatch] ye, an’ feed ye!” said Jock comprehensively.  So saying, he put other layers of heather, thinner than the mattress underneath, but arranged in the same way, on the top of the hay.

“Noo ye’re braw an’ snug, are ye na’?  What better wad ye hae been in a three-shillin’ bed?”

Then Jock made a fire of broken last year’s heather.  This he carefully watched to keep it from spreading, and on it he roasted half a dozen plover’s eggs which he had picked up during the day in his hillside ranging.  On these high moors the moor-fowls go on laying till August.  These being served on warmed and buttered scones, and sharpened with a whiff of mordant heather smoke, were most delicious to Ralph, who smiled to himself, well pleased under his warm covering of hay and overthatching of heather.

After each egg was supplied to him piping hot, Jock would say: 

“An’ isna that as guid as a half-croon supper?”

Then another pee-wit’s egg, delicious and fresh—­

“Luckie Morrine couldna beat that,” said Jock.

There was a surprising lightness in the evening air, the elastic life of the wide moorland world settling down to rest for a couple of hours, which is all the night there is on these hill-tops in the crown of the year.

Jock Gordon covered himself by no means so elaborately as he had provided for Ralph, saying:  “I hae covered you for winter, for ye’re but a laddie; the like o’ me disna need coverin’ when the days follow yin anither like sheep jumpin’ through a slap.”

Ralph was still asleep when the morning came.  But when the young sun looked over the level moors—­for they were on the very top of the heathery creation—­Jock Gordon made a little hillock of dewy heather to shelter Ralph from the sun.  He measured at the same time a hand’s breadth in the sky, saying to himself, “I’ll wakken the lad when he gets to there!” He was speaking of the sun.

But before the flood of light overtopped the tiny break-water and shot again upon Ralph’s face, he sat up bewildered and astonished, casting a look about him upon the moorland and its crying birds.

Jock Gordon was just coming towards him, having scoured the face of the ridge for more plover’s eggs.