He heard the storm of cheers in the street below. That patient silence was broken now in a hurricane of enthusiasm and even through it he could distinguish the words of the exultant cry:
"Rames is our man!"
He saw the Mayor return, much out of breath. He proposed the vote of thanks to the returning officers, with the usual eulogy of his opponents and depreciation of himself. But even at that moment the claim of the constituency would importunately obtrude and find acknowledgment in his words.
"You look to me very likely for more than I can do," he said simply. "At all events you shall have what I can."
But the most memorable achievement that night was the reply of Mr. Redling.
As he rose to his feet to acknowledge the vote of thanks, the man ran forward and got a fair start of the Mayor. He cried out, all one bubble of delight:
"I need hardly say, gentlemen, how utterly I rejoice at--" and then the Mayor put on a spurt and caught up the man--"at the admirable manner in which this contest has been conducted by both sides."
But the correction deceived no one. Mr. Redling's politics were known, and so, in a general splutter of good-humored laughter, the Ludsey election came to an end.
The Mayor turned from the table wiping his forehead.
"I nearly made a bad break there," he said in a whisper. "They won't come at you again, I think. I reckon you have got Ludsey, Captain Rames," and then Rames felt the hand of the chief constable laid upon his arm. He was rushed across the Mayor's parlor, down the stairs through the police station, where the police at their supper rose and gave him a loud cheer.