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Phillips, David Graham

"Susan Lenox"

"
Susan showed the alarm she felt. "I'm afraid you'll find at
the end that you've been wasting your time," said she.
"Put it straight out of your head," replied he. "I never
waste time. To live is to learn. Already you've given me a
new play--don't forget that. In a month I'll have it ready for
us to use. Besides, in teaching you I teach myself. Hungry?"
"No--that is, yes. I hadn't thought of it, but I'm starved."
"This sort of thing gives one an appetite like a field hand."
He accompanied her to the door of the rear dressing-room on
the floor below. "Go down to the reception room when you're
ready," said he, as he left her to go on to his own suite to
change his clothes. "I'll be there."
The maid came immediately, drew a bath for her, afterward
helped her to dress. It was Susan's first experience with a
maid, her first realization how much time and trouble one
saves oneself if free from the routine, menial things. And
then and there a maid was set down upon her secret list of the
luxurious comforts to which she would treat herself--_when?_
The craving for luxury is always a part, usually a powerful
part, of an ambitious temperament. Ambition is simply a
variously manifested and variously directed impulse toward
improvement--a discomfort so keen that it compels effort to
change to a position less uncomfortable. There had never been
a time when luxury had not attracted her.


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