| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: sitting much as she had that night on the beach, - her chin in her
hands, her eyes fixed unseeingly on the trees and lights of the
square across. She was even whistling a little, softly. But this
time the plaintiveness was gone. It was a tender little tune. She
did not move, as I stood beside her, looking down. And now, when
the moment had come, all the thousand and one things I had been
waiting to say forsook me, precipitately beat a retreat, and left
me unsupported. The arc-moon sent little fugitive lights over her
hair, her eyes, her gown.
"Don't - do that," I said unsteadily. "You - you know what I want
to do when you whistle!"
The Man in Lower Ten |
The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from Gambara by Honore de Balzac: disgraced your magnificent service of plate? And when I awoke this
morning I remembered the promise you once made me of a place as
/chef/. Henceforth I consider myself as a member of your household."
"I thought of the same thing a few days ago," replied Andrea. "I
mentioned you to the secretary of the Austrian Embassy, and you have
permission to recross the Alps as soon as you please. I have a castle
in Croatia which I rarely visit. There you may combine the offices of
gate-keeper, butler, and steward, with two hundred crowns a year. Your
wife will have as much for doing all the rest of the work. You may
make all the experiments you please /in anima vili/, that is to say on
the stomach of my vassals. Here is a cheque for your traveling
Gambara |
The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Droll Stories, V. 1 by Honore de Balzac: for it would be tempting the devil to try and oust the cardinal, the
more so as at that time it was not known who would be pope, three
aspirants having resigned their hoods for the benefit of Christianity.
The cardinal, who was a cunning Italian, long bearded, a great
sophist, and the life and soul of the Council, guessed, by the
feeblest exercise of the faculties of his understanding, the alpha and
omega of the adventure. He only had to weigh in his mind one little
thought before he knew how to proceed in order to be able to
hypothecate his manly vigour. He arrived with the appetite of a hungry
monk, and to obtain its satisfaction he was just the man to stab two
monks and sell his bit of the true cross, which were wrong.
Droll Stories, V. 1 |
