he would come down.

Suddenly it had all become distasteful to her,
hollow--useless--vain--what was there in it?--a heavy sense of
disappointment was on her. After all, was life going to disappoint
her, cheat her--giving her so much, and yet withholding the greatest
joy of all?

She caught the roses in her arms, and kissed them fiercely. "I love
you--red roses," she said, "but you are not enough. You do not say
much either, but I wish you would tell me why he is so stingy with
me!"

* * * * *

In a week, the election was over, and the Government defeated. The
newspapers, in red headlines, gave the women the credit, and declared
it to be the most sensational campaign the country had ever seen. "The
barbed arrows of ridicule had pierced the strong man's armor," one
editorial said, "and accomplished something that the heaviest blows of
the Opposition had been powerless to achieve." Dr. Clay had defeated
George Steadman by a large majority, and the Millford "Mercury" was
free to express itself editorially, and did so with great vigor.

The Premier had fought valiantly to the last, but his power was
gone--the spell broken--he could no longer rouse an audience with his
old-time eloquence. His impassioned passages had lost their punch, for
the bitterness, the rage which filled his heart, showed in his words
and weakened them; and the audiences who before had been kindled with
his phrases, showed a disposition now to laugh in the wrong place.

The week of the campaign had been to him a week of agony, for he knew
he was failing as a leader, and only his stern pride kept him going.
He would let no one say he was a "welsher." The machine worked night
and day, and money was freely spent, and until the last, he hoped,
his party would be returned, and then he could resign and retire
honorably. He did not believe the machine could be defeated. They had
too many ways of controlling the vote.

When the news of the Government's defeat began to come in from the
country places--the city seats having all gone to the Opposition--the
old man went quietly home, with a set face of ashy pallor. He walked
slowly, with sagging shoulders, and the cane which he used, did not
beat the pavement in rage, but gropingly felt its way, uncertainly, as
if the hand which guided it was hesitant and weak.

In his house on Water Street, a big, square brick house, with
plain verandahs, the ex-Premier sat alone that night.