He [Hugh
Person] saw a very black 313 on a very white door and recalled
instantly how he had told Armande (who had promised to visit him and did not
wish to be announced): "Mnemonically it should be imagined as three little
figures in profile, a prisoner passing by with one guard in front of him and
another behind." (25)
In Pushkin's story Pikovaya dama ("Queen of Spades," 1834)
mad Hermann says upon seeing a young girl: "How slender she is!.. A real
tray of heart."
Тройка, ceмёрка, туз — не выходили из его головы и
шевелились на его губах. Увидев молодую девушку, он говорил: "Как она стройна!..
Настоящая тройка червонная." У него спрашивали: "который час", он отвечал: "без
пяти минут семёрка".
"Three, seven, ace," were perpetually running through his head and
continually being repeated by his lips. If he saw a young girl, he would say:
"How slender she is! quite like the three of hearts." If anybody asked: "What is
the time?" he would reply: "Five minutes to seven." Every stout man that he saw
reminded him of the ace. "Three, seven, ace" haunted him in his sleep, and
assumed all possible shapes. The threes bloomed before him in the forms of a
grandiflora, the sevens were represented by Gothic portals, and the aces became
transformed into gigantic spiders. (chapter
VI)
3 + 1 + 3 = 7
Alexey Sklyarenko