“Somewhere, in a distant land he barely knew the name of, people had stopped buying washing machines, and so his city had died.”

“He has got his discharge, by G-! said the man.He had. But he had grown so like death in life, that they knew not when he died.”

“RAND scientists tried to tell their wives that the decision whether to buy or not to buy a washing machine was an 'optimization problem'.”

“His ears were attuned for the steady firing of Couzens' heavy machine guns, which he knew should now commence, and the thud of his carefully sited mortars, but he did not hear them and he realized, suddenly and sickeningly, that the Chinese had not attacked across the spit of land. They were pouring across the ice, and had taken Dog Company in the rear.”

“In that moment he had loved her far more than he had ever done when they were together and free. Also he knew that somewhere or other she was still alive and needed his help.”

“He wondered if the German girl ever knew that someone had loved her so much that he painted her twice on the cold cement wall of a machine-gun pillbox.”