Valerie was amazed at the scene that followed. It seemed to her that everyone in that room went suddenly mad, and whether she was too tired or too detached to go mad too she did not know. The committee rushed Roger and wrung his hands, and rushed Mrs. Benton and wrung hers, while she laughed and cried alternately, and they sprang at Bob from all the corners of the room, and then she found herself being seized and whirled about. Men jumped on the chairs and down again and danced on their hats and yelled and cheered as only a crazy lot of Englishmen can cheer. Then Bob calmed himself to write the last screen announcement for the night. He did not trouble to open the other envelopes.
“The labour vote split. The labour vote split. That did it,” said Roger, dancing about.
“I thought it would,” said Mac, laconically, grinning at him. “I’ve heard talk of it about the bars for some time. Barrington got them. He knew how to handle them, and they like the way he goes around.”
Valerie was near enough to hear this, but she did not take her eyes off Jimmy who to the delight of two farmers was trying to stand on his head on a chair.
Bob led the way to the front room, yelling the news as he went, so that everybody crowded in to congratulate Roger and his wife. They were almost too excited to care about the raucous cheers that the crowd still had energy to give. And there were more than the roars of delight dying and swelling upon the still morning air. There were loud and insistent cries for a speech repeated from group to group. Members of his committee pushed Roger through the window. When the wild ovation had subsided he tried to speak. But he could only blurt out incoherent thanks, a promise to do his best to be worthy of the great honour done him, and a tribute to the decent
