“No point in wasting time with false vanity when you possess the real thing.”

“I reached out and touched his hands and they stilled at once. I had observed—although I did not often make use of the fact—that there were times when a touch could say things that words could not.”

“Thinking and prayer are much the same thing anyway, when you stop to think about it -- if that makes any sense. Prayer goes up and thought comes down -- or so it seems. As far as I can tell, that's the only difference.”

“You never know what you're getting into when you stick your nose in other people's rubbish.”

“You are unreliable, Flavia,' he said. 'Utterly unreliable.'Of course I was! It was one of the things I loved most about myself.”

“There's an unwritten law of the universe which assures that the thing you seek will always be found in the last place you look. It applies to everything in life from lost socks to misplaced poisons. . .”

“Still, one of my Rules of Life is this: When you want something, bite your tongue.”