“But Gedalah had something in mind. He sent four men to collect a dozen pumpkins, and he had them set in the pylons that supported the overhead power line that ran the train, one pumpkin to each pylon. “What are they for?” Mendel asked. “Nothing,” Gedaleh said. “They’re there to make the Germans wonder why they’re there. We’ve wasted maybe two minutes; they’re methodical, they’ll waste a lot more.”

“…We also have friends among the railroad men, and they tell us that so far the Germans of the garrison haven’t dared touch the pumpkins. They’ve blocked the line and have brought in a team of mine detectors from Cracow. They’re more worried about the pumpkins than about the car you stole.”

“Two hours. One hundred and twenty minutes. Anything might bedone in that time. Anything. Nothing. Oh, he had had hundreds ofhours, and what had he done with them? Wasted them, spilt theprecious minutes as though his reservoir were inexhaustible.”

“I never had a connection like that to anyone, where every day you think about what you’ll tell them and you wonder what they’re doing, and you know they’re wondering what you’re doing.”

“No more men. I swear it. They’re nothing but trouble. Them, and their damned penises.”

“Each year, the Great Pumpkin rises out of the pumpkin patch that he thinks is the most sincere. He's gotta pick this one. He's got to. I don't see how a pumpkin patch can be more sincere than this one. You can look around and there's not a sign of hypocrisy. Nothing but sincerity as far as the eye can see.”