“Any way, death is so final, isn't it?"Is it?" asked Richard."Sometimes," said the marquis de Carabas. And they went down.”

“What," asked Mr Croup, "do you want?""What," asked the Marquis de Carabas, a little more rhetorically, "does anyone want?""Dead things," suggested Mr Vandemar. "Extra teeth.”

“Do you think it's funny to be so serious when I'm not even out of high school?' she asked.'I don't see how it could be any other way,' said Lee. 'Laughter comes later, like wisdom teeth, and laughter at yourself comes last of all in a mad race with death, and sometimes it isn't in time.”

“The Marquis sighed. "I thought it was just a legend," he said. "Like the alligators in the sewers of New York City."Old Bailey nodded, sagely: "What, the big white buggers? They're down there. I had a friend lost a head to one of them." A moment of silence. Old Naeiley handed the statue back to the Marquis. Then he raised his hand, and snapped it, like a crocodile hand, at the Carabas. "It was OK," gurned Old Bailey with a grin that was most terrible to behold. "He had another.”

“The Marquis of Harsfield Lord Franton, arrived after you left." Lady Endall said with some satisfaction. "He said he wished to be presented to Kim, and was quite dissapointed to find she was not there.""Harsfield? He must be nearly eighty." Mairelon said, frowning. "What does he want with Kim?""No, no, Richard, you're thinking of the fourth Marquis of Harsfield," Lady Wendall said. "He died last year; it is the fifth Marquis who was asking after Kim. He is quite a young gentleman--not much above twenty, I think. He was the grandson of the previous marquis.""Oh. I expect that's all right, then." Mairelon said, but he continued to frown.”

“Some of us are so sharp," he [Mr. Vandemar] said as he leaned in closer to Richard, went up on tiptoes into Richard's face, "we could just cut ourselves.”