But this did not
discourage her. For she realized at the same time that she
could learn--and his obvious belief in her as a possibility
was most encouraging.
When he bade her good-by at the front door and it closed
behind her, she was all at once so tired that it seemed to her
she would then and there sink down through sheer fatigue and
fall asleep. For no physical exercise so quickly and utterly
exhausts as real brain exercise--thinking, studying, learning
with all the concentrated intensity of a thoroughbred in the
last quarter of the mile race.
XV
SPENSER had time and thought for his play only. He no longer
tormented himself with jealousy of the abilities and income
and fame of Brent and the other successful writers for the
stage; was not he about to equal them, probably to surpass
them? As a rule, none of the mean emotions is able to
thrive--unless it has the noxious vapors from disappointment
and failure to feed upon. Spenser, in spirits and in hope
again, was content with himself. Jealousy of Brent about
Susan had been born of dissatisfaction with himself as a
failure and envy of Brent as a success; it died with that
dissatisfaction and that envy. His vanity assured him that
while there might be possibly--ways in which he was not
without rivals, certainly where women were concerned he simply
could not be equaled; the woman he wanted he could have--and he
could hold her as long as he wished.
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