and we may perceive it in Miss Cameron and Mrs Kilbannon.  They come in couples and in companies from those little imperial islands, bringing the crusted qualities of the old blood bottled there so long, and sink with grateful absorption into the wide bountiful stretches of the further countries.  They have much to take, but they give themselves; and so it comes about that the Empire is summed up in the race, and the flag flies for its ideals.

Mrs Forsyth had been told of the approaching event; but neither Dr Drummond, who was not fond of making communications he did not approve of, nor the Murchisons, who were shy of the matter as a queer business which Advena seemed too much mixed up with, had mentioned it to anyone else.  Finlay himself had no intimates, and moved into his new house in River Street under little comment.  His doings excited small surprise, because the town knew too little about him to expect him to do one thing more than another.  He was very significant among his people, very important in their lives but not, somehow, at any expense to his private self.  He knew them, but they did not know him; and it is high praise of him that this was no grievance among them.  They would tell you without resentment that the minister was a “very reserved” man; there might be even a touch of proper pride in it.  The worshippers of Knox Church mission were rather a reserved lot themselves.  It was different with the Methodists; plenty of expansion there.

Elgin, therefore, knew nothing, beyond the fact that Dr Drummond had two ladies from the old country staying with him, about whom particular curiosity would hardly be expected outside of Knox Church.  In view of Finlay’s absence, Dr Drummond, consulting with Mrs Kilbannon, decided that for the present Elgin need not be further informed.  There was no need, they agreed, to give people occasion to talk; and it would just be a nuisance to have to make so many explanations.  Both Mrs Kilbannon and her niece belonged to the race that takes great satisfaction in keeping its own counsel.  Their situation gained for them the further interest that nothing need be said about it; and the added importance of caution was plainly to be discerned in their bearing, even toward one another.  It was a portentous business, this of marrying a minister, under the most ordinary circumstances, not to be lightly dealt with, and even more of an undertaking in a far new country where the very wind blew differently, and the extraordinary freedom of conversation made it more than ever necessary to take heed to what you were saying.  So far as Miss Cameron and Mrs Kilbannon were aware, the matter had not been “spoken of” elsewhere at all.  Dr Drummond, remembering Advena Murchison’s acquaintance with it, had felt the weight of a complication, and had discreetly held his tongue.  Mrs Kilbannon approved her nephew in this connection.  “Hugh,” she said, “was never one to let on more than necessary.”  It was a fine secret between Hugh, in Winnipeg, whence he had written all that was lawful or desirable, and themselves at Dr Drummond’s.  Miss Cameron said it would give her more freedom to look about her.