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| Link | Quote | Stars | Tags | Author |
| b019aba | He had been as careful as he knew how to be, but it had not been enough because he too had been hurt, by a loss he could afford less than Richard. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 0286d6b | The pain beating in his brows was beyond belief. He wanted only to go while he was still master of himself; before this primitive desire to devastate them both should overpower him. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 55bcfbb | He had ridden through the night, without rest and without sleep, for this. It ought, surely, to give someone a moment of wry amusement. He understood--but then he had always understood--how Richard had felt at Philorth. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 8610446 | What will you not achieve next time? You should be relieved. A lifetime of desertion, and you are still her favourite son. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| dbf3712 | To see what I would say,' Lymond said and smiling, destroyed all his own controls as they looked at him. 'She had no intention of going. But if you hadn't come in, who knows what she would have learned? Who knows what I should have learned? There is no end, is there,' he said to Sybilla, 'to the dues you demand from your children?' 'You have all the weapons,' Sybilla said. Her voice, even yet, was quite steady. But then, she had been prepar.. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 6940f62 | How nice to be married with ... how many children, Richard? You don't have quite this problem. You don't have any problems really, do you, sitting there in your lordship pontificating? It seems to be beyond you even to get yourself decently drowned. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 7b9cbb1 | How about that, my own brother, my own bright light, thou Igor? | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| f3fbc08 | He held her eyes and said clearly, 'You have a great deal to be responsible for.' 'She gave you birth,' Richard said. 'That was her first mistake. The next was to spoil you. So that everything you want, you must have immediately. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 6c9d3f2 | It sounded well. It sounded rational, even, if you were not Francis Crawford. Put him, blindfold, in a closed room anywhere in the world ... Lymond said, 'And that is your only excuse?' And Sybilla met his gaze with eyes as uncompromising as his own. 'I thought I was the excuse for your whole way of life?' she said calmly. And nothing had prepared him for that. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 933b2b2 | Richard's angry grey eyes ... honest grey eyes ... were looking at him. Sybilla was not watching. He supposed she knew that however near he might tread to the crevasse, he did not mean to fall in, and drag Richard with him. Instinct had been right, when last year he had fled such a confrontation. As no living soul could hurt him, Sybilla could. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| ee9a6d1 | What I am?' he said. He laughed. 'Don't wait. Ask anyone in London, or Malta, or Russia.' He made his way to the casement and flung it open. The rumour of a crowd, muffled hitherto by the windowpanes, burst fresh upon them. The courtyard and the road beyond the gardens were jostling with people, and the name they were calling was audible: | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| a381129 | I had a sense, I believe, of indebtedness. But someone trussed it in black felt and kicked it to death, as the Turks do. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 477f735 | Good God, here am I with stockings in either hand, panting towards restitution. I merely require you to keep my soul out of the general conversation.' 'And your brother's soul?' said James Stewart. He was drawling again. 'I understood,' said Lymond, 'that you had that in hand. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| fc59bc5 | The gorgeous creature by the window did not move, nor was there a notable change in his plumage. But by some means it was made clear that against the latticed panes of the casement stood a man trained for war, and with skills of a sort which had protected Lyons; had saved Paris; had recovered Calais for an alien monarch. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 4028796 | Religion in recent years has become a political sport, and politicians are more skilful than honest men at extracting themselves from disasters. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| b562bec | Whatever is wrong, I am sure with his sense of the picturesque, Francis will succeed in manifesting a | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 1984c1d | Now a curse upon Because and his kin! | Aleister Crowley | ||
| e17d69a | May Because be accursed for ever! | Aleister Crowley | ||
| ecdf3c1 | Nostradamus said, according to Archie, that the Gods sell the goods that they give us. We had been shown a fine instrument. But the bow could be overlong bent; the harp lose its voice if its strings were not loosened.' 'I hope he said so in Francis's hearing. Poor Archie,' said Marthe. 'Did he say what should be loosened? His morals? | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 1d9efd0 | The trouble with Austin was that he believed so deeply in the chivalrous virtues that he found it impossible to refer to them. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| e2b09ae | It is not advisable to crow. It might be oneself next time. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 8c483d1 | Warfare and trickery. It is your natural element. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 74b8e08 | That night Lymond, too, broke free from the prison he had made for himself. He drank of intent, until one by one the barriers crumbled and let run loose all those qualities he possessed, like Alkibaides, of a tarnished and insolent profusion, to set alight in his fellow-men that killing flame of excitement, of passion, of pleasure. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 66e23a7 | War had given Francis his respite, and success had brought him his final reward: the freedom he wished from his marriage. The licence, if he desired it, to go back to Russia. The knowledge, one supposed, that, severed from Philippa, he could allow the past to lie in peace, and cease troubling him. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 5c3b4ce | Archie?' said Lymond. 'It is half past four o'clock in the morning, and I am exceedingly drunk. Do you suppose these two statements have anything to do with each other?' 'No,' said Archie tolerantly. 'And neither will you, come the morning. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| d6df5df | He looked well. And as if somewhere, lately, he had tasted happiness. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 41864f0 | If he is tired, and they put a foot wrong, he will choose the one unmentionable response and make it. He did it last night. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| bb0309a | I'm going back to Russia. That's where the money is, and the power. And, of course, the ladies. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| c077d73 | You know we believe Philippa.' 'Perhaps I envy her,' Lymond said. 'No one believes me. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| abe177c | Give me a moment. Sit down on that bloody rock for a minute, and let me try to explain. And listen to me as if I weren't related. Can you make some sort of frenetic endeavour, and pretend to do that? Because in the only sense that matters, Richard, it's true. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| d13ebe4 | You rode sixty miles through the night for a brother who doesn't exist. I haven't been here for four years. I have been growing and changing, somewhere else, with different people, speaking a different language. The old ties are gone: my family wouldn't recognize me: what in God's name do you think I could find to say to them? | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 5cccba5 | Richard, I am not worth anyone's heartache.' 'I know that,' Richard said. 'But she does not.' 'She will have to learn,' Lymond said. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| eeeb503 | Danny Hislop touched his horse to ride, busily, beside Adam's. 'He remembered an appointment?' 'He remembered something you have forgotten,' Adam said. 'That this is his country. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| f055d28 | I'm not in St Mary's because I like it. I am embarked spellbound on a study of devil-worship. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| ead2987 | Since I hear you are leaving, I have come to put certain matters before you. They are important. If I were a different manner of person, no doubt I should do more than this; I should plead, and I should cajole. I mean you to understand that if I cannot do that, it is not because I don't think them worthy. I wish you to listen to them and I will accept the answer you give me. I should only warn you, Francis, that on these matters, I will not.. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| a9470ff | Tact,' Lymond said, 'is the name you should have upon your tombstone. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| d0cf37d | Lymond was drawing long breaths now, his hands forced back rigid behind him, driven into the lime of the wall. 'That is as far as I go,' he said flatly. 'I have never in my life subjected you to this kind of inquisition about your purpose, your doings or your relationships. I have answered you fairly enough. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| af925fe | You will not face Sybilla because alone of all of us, she does not know you are venal. She still thinks you care for Scotland and for us, and are prepared to think both more important than riches; for our sake to govern your ambition; for the boy's sake to master your emotions. And when she sees you----' 'She will know she was wrong,' Lymond said. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| cd7b34e | Richard walked over to him. It was not a long way but he walked slowly, as if he were tired, and halted, eventually, face to face with his younger brother. He said, 'Change your mind. It is the last chance in life you may have.' Spoken soberly, with all the honesty of which he was capable, it was neither threat nor impassioned appeal but a simple plea, simply put. To which Lymond, looking him in the eyes, shook his head. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 01743eb | Evil the drink and ill the resting place. I am not, unfortunately, asleep. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 7e609a3 | Piero Strozzi and Francis Crawford looked at one another. 'A hint,' said Lymond, 'sufficeth for the wise, but a thousand speeches profit not the heedless. Did you hear what she said?' 'Unfortunately,' said Piero Strozzi, 'I heard what she said. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 15fa8f3 | I give you a friendly warning. You think M. de Sevigny is drunk. He is not.' 'You might not think so,' said Lymond amiably. 'But in ten minutes or so, I am going to slip under the table and lie there. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| 41e0e53 | Piero Strozzi closed his mouth, which had fallen ajar. 'Of course,' he said. 'You have a son, don't ...' He roared. 'I beg your pardon. My foot slipped,' said Philippa. 'Have a date flan, and don't talk so much while the hautboys are playing. If you lose your voice, none of us will know what to do. | Dorothy Dunnett | ||
| daf55ed | Lymond said, 'Have I been talking?' 'We all have, in nightmares. But yours have not been about the sea. | Dorothy Dunnett |