Chapter VI: Part 6

--I am not good. I am not virtuous. I am not sympathetic. I am not generous. I am merely and above all a creature of intense passionate _feeling_. I feel--everything. It is my genius. It burns me like fire.--

My Portrayal in its analysis and egotism and bitterness will surely be of interest to some. Whether to that one alone who may understand it; or to some who have themselves been left alone; or to those three whom I, on three dreary days, asked for bread, and who each gave me a stone--and whom I do not forgive (for that is the bitterest thing of all): it may be to all of these.

But none of them, nor any one, can know the feeling made of relief and pain and despair that comes over me at the thought of sending all this to the wise wide world. It is bits of my wooden heart broken off and given away. It is strings of amber beads taken from the fair neck of my soul. It is shining little gold coins from out of my mind’s red leather purse. It is my little old life-tragedy.

It means everything to me.

Do you see?--it means _everything_ to me.

It will amuse you. It will arouse your interest. It will stir your curiosity. Some sorts of persons will find it ridiculous. It will puzzle you.

But am I to suppose that it will also awaken compassion in cool, indifferent hearts? And will the sand and barrenness look so unspeakably gray and dreary to coldly critical eyes as to mine? And shall my bitter little story fall easily and comfortably upon undisturbed ears, and linger for an hour, and be forgotten?

Will the wise wide world itself give me in my outstretched hand a stone?

THE END

[Transcriber’s Notes:

Errors in punctuation were repaired.
Except for the following change, spelling has been preserved as
printed in the original.
On page 79, “buoyantly” was changed from “bouyantly” (float buoyantly
on air).]

End of Project Gutenberg's The Story of Mary MacLane, by Mary MacLane