It would be extremely inconvenient to be known as a thief, merely.
When the world knows you are a thief it blinds itself completely to your other attributes. It calls you a thief, and there's an end. I am a genius as well as a thief--but the world would quite overlook that fact. "A thief's a thief," says the world. That is very true. But the mere fact of being a thief should not exclude the consideration of one's other traits. When the world knows you are a Methodist minister, for instance, it will admit that you may also be a violinist, or a chemist, or a poet, and will credit you therefor. And so if it condemns you for being a thief, it should at the same time admire you for being a genius. If it does not admire you for being a genius, then it has no right to condemn you for being a thief.
--And why the world should condemn any one for being a thief--when there is not within its confines any one who is not a thief in some way--is a bit of irony upon which I have wasted much futile logic.--
I am not trying to justify myself for stealing. I do not consider it a thing that needs to be justified, any more than walking or eating or going to bed. But, as I say, if the world knew that I am a thief without being first made aware with emphasis that I am some other things also, then the world would be a shade cooler for me than it already is--which would be very cool indeed.
And so in writing my Portrayal I have dwelt upon other things at some length before touching on my thieving propensities.
None of my acquaintances would suspect that I am a thief. I look so respectable, so refined, so "nice," so inoffensive, so sweet, even!
But, for that matter, I am a great many things that I do not appear to be.
The woman from whom I stole the three dollars, if she reads this, will recognize it. This will be inconvenient. I fervently hope she may not read it. It is true she is not of the kind that reads.
But, after all, it's of no consequence. This Portrayal is Mary MacLane: her wooden heart, her young woman's-body, her mind, her soul.
I will tell you what I did with the three dollars. In Dublin Gulch, which is a rough quarter of Butte inhabited by poor Irish people, there lives an old world-soured, wrinkled-faced woman. She lives alone in a small, untidy house. She swears frightfully like a parrot, and her reputation is bad--so bad, indeed, that even the old woman's compatriots in Dublin Gulch do not visit her lest they damage their own. It is true that the profane old woman's morals are not good--have never been good--judged by the world's standards. She bears various marks of cold, rough handling on her mind and body. Her life has all but run its course. She is worn out.