“But I was used to finding something deadly in things that attracted me; there was always something deadly lurking in anything I wanted, anything I loved.”

“What I mean is, I love winter, and when you really love something, then it loves you back, in whatever way it has to love.”

“But something held me back. Perhaps I was stopped by that level of feeling, deeper than thought, which contains the truth.”

“Someone knocked me down; I pushed Brinker over a small slope; someone was trying to tackle me from behind. Everywhere there was the smell of vitality in clothes, the vital something in wool and flannel and corduroy which spring releases. I had forgotten that this existed, this smell which instead of the first robin, or the first bud or leaf, means to me that spring has come. I had always welcomed vitality and energy and warmth radiating from thick and sturdy winter clothes. It made me happy, but I kept wondering about next spring, about whether khaki, or suntans or whatever the uniform of the season was, had this aura of promise in it. I felt fairly sure it didn't.”

“When you love something it loves you back in whatever way it has to love.”

“Life is fighting. In life, it's the look ahead that counts. We are all born equally far from the sun. There is a land of the living and a land of the dead and the bridge is love.”

“Is he using terror to keep away boredom? Does he have to try to destroy something? Even as a last resort, himself?”