The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Man in Lower Ten by Mary Roberts Rinehart: to go to Richmond on Sunday. I - I want to see a girl."
"Oh, don't mind me," I observed politely. "Personally, I wouldn't
change places with you. What's her name - North? South?"
"West," he snapped. "Don't try to be funny. And all I have to say,
Blakeley, is that if you ever fall in love I hope you make an
egregious ass of yourself."
In view of what followed, this came rather close to prophecy.
The trip west was without incident. I played bridge with a
furniture dealer from Grand Rapids, a sales agent for a Pittsburg
iron firm and a young professor from an eastern college. I won
three rubbers out of four, finished what cigarettes McKnight had
 The Man in Lower Ten |
The fourth excerpt represents the element of Earth. It speaks of physical influences and the impact of the unseen on the visible world, and is drawn from The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald: deliberately to the other side of the car. I suppose there'd be a
curious crowd around there all day with little boys searching for dark
spots in the dust, and some garrulous man telling over and over what
had happened, until it became less and less real even to him and he
could tell it no longer, and Myrtle Wilson's tragic achievement was
forgotten. Now I want to go back a little and tell what happened at the
garage after we left there the night before.
They had difficulty in locating the sister, Catherine. She must
have broken her rule against drinking that night, for when she
arrived she was stupid with liquor and unable to understand that the
ambulance had already gone to Flushing. When they convinced her of
 The Great Gatsby |