no longer need, now that I am going to leave Jerry. (Jerry is
my husband.) And in the bottom of my little trunk I found this
manuscript. I had forgotten that such a thing existed; but with its
laboriously written pages before me, it all came back to me; and I
began to read; here a sentence; there a paragraph; somewhere else a
page. Then, with a little half laugh and half sob, I carried it to an
old rocking-chair by the cobwebby dormer window, and settled myself to
read it straight through.

And I have read it.

Poor little Mary Marie! Dear little Mary Marie! To meet you like this,
to share with you your joys and sorrows, hopes and despairs, of
those years long ago, is like sitting hand in hand on a sofa with a
childhood's friend, each listening to an eager "And do you remember?"
falling constantly from delighted lips that cannot seem to talk half
fast enough.

But you have taught me much, little Mary Marie. I understand--oh, I
understand so many things so much better, now, since reading this
little story in your round childish hand. You see, I had almost
forgotten that I was a Mary and a Marie--Jerry calls me Mollie--and I
had wondered what were those contending forces within me. I know now.
It is the Mary and the Marie trying to settle their old, old quarrel.

It was almost dark when I had finished the manuscript. The far corners
of the attic were peopled with fantastic shadows, and the spiders in
the window were swaying, lazy and full-stomached, in the midst of the
day's spoils of gruesome wings and legs. I got up slowly, stiffly,
shivering a little. I felt suddenly old and worn and ineffably weary.