| The first excerpt represents the past or something you must release, and is drawn from The Coxon Fund by Henry James: sociably conversed. I saw things weren't well with him, but I
asked no question till something dropped by himself made, as it had
made on another occasion, an absence of curiosity invidious. He
mentioned that he was worried about his good old friend Lady Coxon,
who, with her niece likely to be detained some time in America, lay
seriously ill at Clockborough, much on his mind and on his hands.
"Ah Miss Anvoy's in America?"
"Her father has got into horrid straits--has lost no end of money."
I waited, after expressing due concern, but I eventually said: "I
hope that raises no objection to your marriage."
"None whatever; moreover it's my trade to meet objections. But it
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The second excerpt represents the present or the deciding factor of the moment, and is drawn from The Lock and Key Library by Julian Hawthorne, Ed.: reader may draw his own inference.
Another surprising circumstance,--my watch was restored to the
table from which it had been so mysteriously withdrawn; but it had
stopped at the very moment it was so withdrawn, nor, despite all
the skill of the watchmaker, has it ever gone since,--that is, it
will go in a strange, erratic way for a few hours, and then come to
a dead stop; it is worthless.
Nothing more chanced for the rest of the night. Nor, indeed, had I
long to wait before the dawn broke. Not till it was broad daylight
did I quit the haunted house. Before I did so, I revisited the
little blind room in which my servant and myself had been for a
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The third excerpt represents the future or something you must embrace, and is drawn from Little Britain by Washington Irving: are recorded the names of previous occupants for many
generations, mingled with scraps of very indifferent
gentlemanlike poetry, written in characters which I can scarcely
decipher, and which extol the charms of many a beauty of
Little Britain who has long, long since bloomed, faded, and
passed away. As I am an idle personage, with no apparent
occupation, and pay my bill regularly every week, I am looked
upon as the only independent gentleman of the neighborhood;
and, being curious to learn the internal state of a community so
apparently shut up within itself, I have managed to work my
way into all the concerns and secrets of the place.
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