The Turnstile by A.E.W. Mason

St. Anne's Hall stands tucked away in a narrow street of Ludsey by the spacious square; and from its ancient windows you look out between the lozenges of stained glass upon the great church of St. Anne with its soaring spire and its wide graveyard. Into this hall the ballot-boxes were brought from the polling-booths on the next evening, and at long tables in the Council Chamber the voting papers were sorted and counted. Harry Rames walked from table to table. He seemed to see nothing but crosses against his opponent's name. He did not dare to put a question to any of the scrutineers standing behind the sorters.

The very swiftness with which the votes were counted impressed him with a sense of disaster. For the first time he began to ask himself how he was to shape his life if to-night he were defeated. Thus an hour passed and then the chief constable drew him aside to a bench under the musician's gallery at one end of the room.