“There is a striking resemblance between the act of love and the ministrations of a torturer.”

“Midnight, and the clock strikes. It is Christmas Day, the werewolves birthday, the door of the solstice still wide enough open to let them all slink through.”

“Why do you do up your hair in those tortured plaits, now, Melanie? Why?Because, she said.You know that's no answer. You're spoiling your pretty looks, pet. Come here.She did not move. He ground out his cigarette on the window-ledge and laughed.Come here, he said again, softly.So she went.”

“She has the mysterious solitude of ambiguous states; she hovers in a no-man’s land between life and death, sleeping and waking.”

“Though I still turn up my coat-collar in a lonely way and am always looking at myself in mirrors, they’re only habits and give no clue at all to my character, whatever that is. The most difficult performance in the world is acting naturally isn’t it? Everything else is artful.”

“The lovely Hazard girls', they used to call them. Huh. Lovely is as lovely does; if they looked like what they behave like, they'd frighten little children.”

“Love is desire sustained by unfulfilment.”