For Jaikie used to lie awake and count the hours when the pain was at the worst.  Jaikie now lived at the manse all the time (did I tell you that before?), for his father was dead.

So in the little room next to Jiminy’s, Jaikie lay awake and hearkened to the gentle breathing of his friend.  Jiminy always said when he went to bed, “I’ll keep awake to-night sure, Jaikie, and talk to you.”

And Jaikie only smiled a wan smile with a soul in it, for he knew that as soon as Jiminy’s head touched the pillow he would be in the dim and beautiful country of Nod, leaving poor Jaikie to rub the leg in which the pains ran races up and down, and to listen and pray for the next striking of the clock.

As he lay, Jaikie thought of the flowers in the corner of the orchard thirsty and sick.  It might be that they, like him, were sleepless and suffering.  He remembered the rich clove carnations with their dower of a sweet savour, the dark indigo winking “blueys” or cornflowers, the spotted musk monkey-flowers, smelling like a village flower-show.  They would all be drooping and sad.  And it might be that the ferns would be dead—­all but the hart’s-tongue; which, though moisture-loving, can yet, like the athlete, train itself to endure and abide thirsty and unslaked.  But the thought of their pain worked in Jaikie’s heart.

“Maybe it will make me forget my foot if I can go and water them.”

So he arose, crawling on his hands and knees down-stairs very softly, past where Jiminy tossed in his bed, and softer still past the minister’s door.  But there was no sound save the creak of the stair under him.

Jaikie crept to the water-pail, and got the large quart tankard that hung by the side of the wall.

It was a hard job for a little lad to get a heavy tin filled—­a harder still to unlock the door and creep away across the square of gravel.  “You have no idea” (so he said afterwards) “how badly gravel hurts your knees when they are bare.”

Luckily it was a hot night, and not a breath of air was stirring, so the little white-clad figure moved slowly across the front of the house to the green gate of the garden.  Jaikie could only reach out as far as his arms would go with the tin of water.  Then painfully he pulled himself forward towards the tankard.  But in spite of all he made headway, and soon he was creeping up the middle walk, past the great central sundial, which seemed high as a church-steeple above him.  The ghostly moths fluttered about him, attracted by the waving white of his garments.  In their corner he found the flowers, and, as he had thought, they were withered and drooping.

He lifted the water upon them with his palms, taking care that none dripped through, for it was very precious, and he seemed to have carried it many miles.

And as soon as they felt the water upon them the flowers paid him back in perfume.  The musk lifted up its head, and mingled with the late velvety wallflower and frilled carnation in releasing a wonder of expressed sweetness upon the night air.