Dandy looked questioningly at Wiggie as their acquaintances melted into the dark. “Is there anything wrong? They seem put out, over there.” He shook his head. “I haven’t an idea. I saw Harriet about half an hour before the poll closed--all three of them have scarcely stirred out of the place since six o’clock--and I thought she looked tired and rather white, but it has been a big ordeal for her, and she’s--well--different to-day, anyhow. It just entered my head to wonder whether things were going right. Thorne was somewhere in the background, looking rather pleased with himself. They said Harriet’s votes were coming in like smoke this afternoon, but of course the luck may have turned since then.” “Oh, I do hope she won’t be out!” Helwise lamented. “It will send Stubbs simply running to the White Lion, and her grandfather will be so disappointed up in Heaven, or wherever it is Rural District Councillors go when they’re finished with. Lanty was saying only yesterday that Lancaster and Knewstubb had represented Bluecaster for many a long year, so it would be quite like old times to have the two names going to the Board together. I’m sure he will be disappointed if he has to be coupled with Thorne again. Lanty always gets in, of course. You see, he’s so frightfully well known. He always gets in.” Inside the room the last vote fluttered down, the last figure cut the air, and, at long last, Harriet, white to the lips, looked up and across at Lancaster. He smiled as he met her eyes, a smile of franker, kinder comradeship than he had ever given her, putting out his hand to her as she passed, and she felt the hot tears fill and burn her throat. Thorne smiled also, his own thin, furtive smile. The polling-clerk looked with some curiosity at all three, as, paper in hand, he turned to the door. Outside, there was a sharp murmur as the square of light broke the dark mass of the house, framing the figure in whose hands lay the will of the people. Dandy saw the keen face of the Bluecaster clerk thrust forward like that of a leashed hound, and afterwards her father’s, braced as if for shock; and then the far-away voice from the door came thinly over the heads of the silent crowd. Harriet Knewstubb 104 Ollivant Thorne 99 Lancelot Lancaster 95