| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Figure in the Carpet by Henry James: my mouth and accordingly bounded to the window - a movement which
gave me a view of a young lady erect on the footboard of the
vehicle and eagerly looking up at my house. At sight of me she
flourished a paper with a movement that brought me straight down,
the movement with which, in melodramas, handkerchiefs and reprieves
are flourished at the foot of the scaffold.
"Just seen Vereker - not a note wrong. Pressed me to bosom - keeps
me a month." So much I read on her paper while the cabby dropped a
grin from his perch. In my excitement I paid him profusely and in
hers she suffered it; then as he drove away we started to walk
about and talk. We had talked, heaven knows, enough before, but
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Red Inn by Honore de Balzac: prison. He inspired me with the profoundest pity. Though pale,
distracted, and covered with blood, his whole countenance had a
character of truth and innocence which struck me forcibly. To me his
long fair hair and clear blue eyes seemed German. A true image of my
hapless country. I felt he was a victim and not a murderer. At the
moment when he passed beneath my window he chanced to cast about him
the painful, melancholy smile of an insane man who suddenly recovers
for a time a fleeting gleam of reason. That smile was assuredly not
the smile of a murderer. When I saw the jailer I questioned him about
his new prisoner.
"He has not spoken since I put him in his cell," answered the man. "He
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie: Poirot stepped forward briskly. Manning's eye swept over him
with a faint contempt.
"You were planting a bed of begonias round by the south side of
the house yesterday afternoon, were you not, Manning?"
"Yes, sir, me and Willum."
"And Mrs. Inglethorp came to the window and called you, did she
not?"
"Yes, sir, she did."
"Tell me in your own words exactly what happened after that."
"Well, sir, nothing much. She just told Willum to go on his
bicycle down to the village, and bring back a form of will, or
The Mysterious Affair at Styles |
