tern farmer for a Jernyngham?"
Mrs. Colston asked.

"Oh, that!" Muriel's laugh was scornful. "You were satisfied with the man
until you knew his name was Prescott. How was it that you didn't miss the
inherent superiority of the Jernynghams? Besides, I can't think Cyril
suffered by getting his friend to represent him. Though people won't talk
very freely, I've picked up some information since I've been here, enough
to show what kind of man Cyril was. He hadn't much to boast of, and one
must do him the justice to admit that he seems to have recognized it. You
probably know, though you hid it from me, that on the evening he should
have met us he was lying in the hotel after getting badly hurt in a
drunken brawl among some riotous Orangemen."

"I can't have any reflections cast upon Orangemen," Colston objected.
"There are a large number in my constituency; most worthy people, for
whom I've a strong respect."

"You have a respect for their votes, you mean," Muriel rejoined. "You
know you're really ritualistic High Church. If your constituents knew as
much about St. Cuthbert's as I do, they would turn you out."

"I have never hid my convictions," Colston declared. "Anyway, I have
ascertained that the greater proportion of the Orangemen were sober."

"Then," retorted Muriel, "I'm sorry that Cyril was not. But there are
more important points to consider."

"That is very true," said Mrs. Colston. "Will you tell Jernyngham that we
have seen Prescott, Harry?"

Colston hesitated.

"No; I don't think so. I'm afraid of the effect it may have on him; and
he won't be up when we get in. All the same, he's bound to hear the news
from somebody else very soon."

Neither of the others answered, and they drove on in silence until the
lights of the Leslie homestead blinked across the snow. The cheerfulness
which had marked the party when they set out had gone; they felt a sense
of constraint, and Muriel wondered uneasily whether she had spoken with
too much freedom.

The next morning they were sitting with Jernyngham and Gertrude when a
neighboring rancher came in.

"I thought Leslie might be here," he explained. "Don't mean to intrude."

Colston knew the man and he asked him to sit down. Jernyngham glanced up
from the Winnipeg paper he was reading. His face was worn and had set
into a fixed, harsh expression, but his manner conveyed a hint of
eagerness; of late it had suggested that he was continually expecting
something.