| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Gentle Grafter by O. Henry: the greatest street man in the West, barring only Montague Silver,
which you can no more than allow."
I let him shake hands with me.
"I learned under Silver," I said; "I don't begrudge him the lead. But
what's your graft, son? I admit that the phantom flight of the non-
existing animals at which you remarked 'Whoa!' has puzzled me
somewhat. How do you win out on the trick?"
Buckingham Skinner blushed.
"Pocket money," says he; "that's all. I am temporarily unfinanced.
This little coup de rye straw is good for forty dollars in a town of
this size. How do I work it? Why, I involve myself, as you perceive,
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Tapestried Chamber by Walter Scott: ear, "against the stomach of his sense," they gained the middle
of the gallery, when he beheld General Browne suddenly start, and
assume an attitude of the utmost surprise, not unmixed with fear,
as his eyes were suddenly caught and riveted by a portrait of an
old lady in a sacque, the fashionable dress of the end of the
seventeenth century.
"There she is!" he exclaimed--"there she is, in form and
features, though Inferior in demoniac expression to the accursed
hag who visited me last night!"
"If that be the case," said the young nobleman, "there can remain
no longer any doubt of the horrible reality of your apparition.
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Blix by Frank Norris: brushing the fallen leaves from his hair. Blix had taken a deck
of cards from the lunch-basket, and four rolls of chips wrapped in
tissue paper. He stared at her in speechless amazement.
"What do you say?" she repeated, looking at him and smiling.
"Why, Blix!" he exclaimed in amazement, "what do you mean?"
"Just what I say. I want you to play cards with me."
"I'll not to do it," he declared, almost coldly.
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