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At last, interest and care shown adopting Pole (2,3,3)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

in the end

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'at last' is the definition.
(synonyms)

'interest and care shown adopting pole' is the wordplay.
I cannot really understand how this works, but
'interest' could be 'int' and 'int' is found in the answer.
'and' could be 'n' (common abbreviation for 'and') and 'n' is found within the answer.
The remaining letters 'heed' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This explanation may well be incorrect...

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for in the end that I've seen before include "At long last" , "Then Enid came at last" , "Ultimately" , "Eventually" , "Finally" .)

I've seen this clue in The Everyman puzzle in The Observer.
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