... And now where is it? He had what all the world wants
most, _flight_, and the world stalled him in its own mud. You saw it....
That's why I shall stay here. It's the only place with _his_ atmosphere.
All these things are _he_. I face them here in silence, and I bare my
breast to the arrow. Here I am, the only one who knows Paul's music in its
possibility. To the rest, it is a heap of stones by the roadside. The
architect is dead.
VERA
But didn't he ever ... why didn't he...?
JEAN
You ask it, of course. You have the right. Sometimes I ask it, too, why
Paul never _succeeded_. While we were struggling along, the things that
held him back seemed only details. Only now do I see them as a whole.
In the first place, Paul never aimed directly at success. He was
all-round. If it had been merely a question of exploiting his talent,
sticking to the one idea day in, day out, never letting an opportunity
slip by of meeting the right people and getting to the right places ...
that would have been easy. He had tremendous energy. I used to grudge his
interest in other things.
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