| The first excerpt represents the element of Air. It speaks of mental influences and the process of thought, and is drawn from Wyoming by William MacLeod Raine: silver spurs he jingled on his sprightly heels. Strikingly
handsome in a dark, sinister way, one would say at first sight,
and later would chafe at the justice of a verdict not to be
denied.
Ned Bannister rose from his seat beside Helen. "Wish me luck," he
said, with his gay smile.
"I wish you all the luck you deserve," she answered.
"Oh, wish me more than that if y'u want me to win."
"I didn't say I wanted you to win. You take the most
unaccountable things for granted."
"I've a good mind to win, then, just to spite y'u," he laughed.
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The second excerpt represents the element of Fire. It speaks of emotional influences and base passions, and is drawn from Melmoth Reconciled by Honore de Balzac: credit drawn on the firm of Watschildine of London. Then he had taken
up the pen and imitated the banker's signature on each. NUCINGEN he
wrote, and eyed the forged signatures critically to see which seemed
the most perfect copy.
Suddenly he looked up as if a needle had pricked him. "You are not
alone!" a boding voice seemed to cry in his heart; and indeed the
forger saw a man standing at the little grated window of the
counting-house, a man whose breathing was so noiseless that he did not
seem to breathe at all. Castanier looked, and saw that the door at the
end of the passage was wide open; the stranger must have entered by
that way.
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