| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart: She couldn't speak. She looked at the spoon she still held--I
wasn't so anxious about it: thank Heaven, it wouldn't chip--and
then she stared at me.
"I appreciate your desire to have everything nice for him," I
went on, "but the next time, you might take the Limoges china
It's more easily duplicated and less expensive."
"I haven't a young man--not here." She had got her breath now,
as I had guessed she would. "I--I have been chased by a thief,
Miss Innes."
"Did he chase you out of the house and back again?" I asked.
Then Rosie began to cry--not silently, but noisily, hysterically.
 The Circular Staircase |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Silverado Squatters by Robert Louis Stevenson: increasing strength. It was a wonder how the two stout
horses managed to pull us up that steep incline and still
face the athletic opposition of the wind, or how their great
eyes were able to endure the dust. Ten minutes after we went
by, a tree fell, blocking the road; and even before us leaves
were thickly strewn, and boughs had fallen, large enough to
make the passage difficult. But now we were hard by the
summit. The road crosses the ridge, just in the nick that
Kelmar showed me from below, and then, without pause, plunges
down a deep, thickly wooded glen on the farther side. At the
highest point a trail strikes up the main hill to the
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy: "Yes."
"You still bear in mind what it means?"
"Yes. It is my duty!"
Placing the candlestick on the chest of drawers he led her
through the doorway, and lifting her bodily, kissed her.
A quick look of aversion passed over her face, but clenching her
teeth she uttered no cry.
Mrs. Edlin had by this time undressed, and was about to get
into bed when she said to herself: "Ah--perhaps I'd better
go and see if the little thing is all right. How it do blow
and rain!"
 Jude the Obscure |