“Oliver liked to keep the windows and shutters wide open in the afternoon, with just the swelling sheer curtains between us and life beyond, because it was a 'crime' to block away so much sunlight and keep such a landscape from view, especially when you didn't have it all life long, he said. Then the rolling fields of the valley leading up to the hills seemed to sit in a rising mist of olive green: sunflowers, grapevines, swatches of lavender, and those squat and humble olive trees stooping like gnarled, aged scarecrows gawking through our window as we lay naked on my bed, the smell of his sweat, which was the smell of my sweat, and next to me my man-woman whose man-woman I was, and all around us Mafalda's chamomile-scented laundry detergent, which was the torrid afternoon world of our house.”

“Real terror is a crippling experience. You sweat so much that your skin goes all wrinkly like when you've been in the bath all afternoon. And then the scent of your sweat changes. It smells like cat pee, no doubt from the adrenalin. However hard you wash, it won't come off. It smothers you, as your muscles become frozen with acid and your mind paralysed by despair.”

“Author describes one character's optimism as, that quiet well-being which perhaps you and I have felt on a sunny afternoon when, in our brightest youth and health, life has opened a new vista for us, and long to-morrows of activity have stretched before us like a lovely plain which there was no need for hurrying to look at, because it was all our own.”

“Smell my exhaust, fire boy.” Mason said. He rolled up the window and pulled in front of us. I laughed at his license plate, it read: TEMPTER.”

“Oliver heard Louis’ voice before he saw him. “Beautiful women?” he was saying. Then the door opened and the woman reappeared, holding the wooden lion between her arms. “Where are they? Have they come to see the -- Oliver!” “Hello, Louis,” Oliver said. Louis pointed at him. “He’s no beautiful woman!” he said. Then he noticed Sophie and Julia and his whole attitude changed. He dropped his voice to a husky tone. “Why, hello there, ladies.”

“And we saved your life, y’know,” Andrew said, jerking his head in Oliver’s direction. “I mean, the least you could do is thank us.”“Of course!” Oliver said hastily. “Thank you very much.”“It was really dangerous back there,” Patricia said earnestly, as though wanting to make sure he understood the severity of the situation. “Yes, beheading is a serious business, I suppose,” Oliver said kindly. “I think it would have been difficult to keep on living once my head was chopped off.”