| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart: No one moved to get the whisky, from which I judged there were
three pocket flasks ready for emergency. Gertrude threw a
shawl around my shoulders, and we all started down over the hill:
I had made so many nocturnal excursions around the place that I
knew my way perfectly. But Thomas was not on the veranda, nor
was he inside the house. The men exchanged significant glances,
and Warner got a lantern.
"He can't have gone far," he said. "He was trembling so that he
couldn't stand, when I left."
Jamieson and Halsey together made the round of the lodge,
occasionally calling the old man by name. But there was no
The Circular Staircase |
The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from When a Man Marries by Mary Roberts Rinehart: it on the dressing table when I undressed. I meant to put it
under my pillow, but I forgot. And I didn't sleep well; I was
awake half the night. Wasn't I, Dal? Then, when the clock
downstairs in the hall was chiming five, something roused me, and
I sat up in bed. It was still dark, but I pinched Dal and said
there was somebody in the room. You remember that, don't you,
Dal?"
"I thought you had nightmare,:" he said sheepishly.
"I lay still for ages, it seemed to me, and then--the door into
the hall closed. I heard the catch click. I turned on the light
over the bed then, and the room was empty. I thought of my
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