"You've done a great, big thing for me, dearest friend, and I am your
ever grateful Carnac"--that was the way he had put it. Twice she had
gone to visit his mother, and had been told that Mrs. Grier was too ill
to see her--overstrain, the servant had said. She could not understand
being denied admittance; but it did not matter, for one day Mrs. Grier
should know how she--Junia-had saved her son's career.

So she thought, as she gazed before her into space from the
chintz-covered lounge on the night of the day Barode Barouche was
buried. There was a smell of roses in the room. She had gathered many
of them that afternoon. She caught a bud from a bunch on a table, and
fastened it in the bosom of her dress. Somehow, as she did it, she had
a feeling she would like to clasp a man's head to her breast where the
rose was--one of those wild thoughts that come to the sanest woman at
times. She was captured by the excitement in which she had moved during
the past month--far more now than she had been in all the fight itself.

There came a knock at the outer door, and before that of her own room
opened, she recognized the step of the visitor. So it was Tarboe had
come. He remembered that day in the street when he met Junia, and
was shown there were times when a woman could not be approached with
emotion. He had waited till the day he knew she was alone, for he had
made a friend of her servant by judicious gifts of money.

"I hope you're glad to see me," he said with an uncertain smile, as he
saw her surprise.

"I hope I am," she replied, and motioned him to a seat. He chose a
high-backed chair with a wide seat near the lounge. He made a motion of
humorous dissent to her remark, and sat down.

"Well, we pulled it off somehow, didn't we?" she said. "Carnac Grier is
M.P."

"And his foe is in his grave," remarked Tarboe dryly. "Providence pays
debts that ought to be paid. This election has settled a lot of things,"
she returned with a smile.

"I suppose it has, and I've come here to try and find one of the
settlements."

"Well, find them," she retorted.

"I said one of the settlements only. I have to be accurate in my life."

"I'm glad to hear of it. You helped Mr. Grier win his election. It was
splendid of you. Think of it, Mr. Tarboe, Carnac Grier is beginning to
get even with his foes."

"I'm not a foe--if that's what you mean. I've proved it."

She smiled provokingly. "You've proved only you're not an absolute
de