| The third excerpt represents the element of Water. It speaks of pure spiritual influences and feelings of love, and is drawn from The Wrecker by Stevenson & Osbourne: turned to and drove the boat slap ashore in the thick of it, and
was all drowned but one. No; boat trips are my eye,"
concluded the captain, gloomily.
The tone was surprising in a man of his indomitable temper.
"Come, Captain," said Carthew, "you have something else up
your sleeve; out with it!"
"It's a fact," admitted Wicks. "You see there's a raft of little
bally reefs about here, kind of chicken-pox on the chart. Well,
I looked 'em all up, and there's one--Midway or Brooks they
call it, not forty mile from our assigned position--that I got
news of. It turns out it's a coaling station of the Pacific Mail,"
|
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 Circular Staircase by Mary Roberts Rinehart: "He has disappeared, doctor. Not only that, but there is every
evidence that he has been either abducted, or--" I could not
finish. The doctor helped me into his capacious buggy in
silence. Until we had got a little distance he did not speak;
then he turned and looked at me.
"Now tell me about it," he said. He heard me through without
speaking.
"And you think Louise knows something?" he said when I had
finished. "I don't--in fact, I am sure of it. The best evidence
of it is this: she asked me if he had been heard from, or if
anything had been learned. She won't allow Walker in the room,
The Circular Staircase |
