“He noticed Miss Bettie was wearing a watch, a steel Rolex with diamond chips. "What time is it?" he asked. Miss Bettie glanced at him and laughed. "You do seem to have difficulty remembering, don't you? Well, then, I shall tell you. It's now, Joshua Cane. Always and only now.”

“Your fangs are showing, Miss Lyndon.""Are they?" she asked, reaching up to touch her face. "I shall have to remember to retract them."Charles burst out laughing. "You, Miss Lyndon, are a treasure.""That's what I keep telling everyone," she said with a shrug and a wicked smile, "but no one seems to believe me.”

“He and I always think the same things are funny, and that is such a lot; it's dreadful when two people's senses of humor are antagonistic. I don't believe there's any bridging that gulf!And he is--Oh, well! He is just himself, and I miss him, and miss him, and miss him. The whole world seems empty and aching. I hate the moonlight because it's beautiful and he isn't here to seeit with me. But maybe you've loved somebody, too, and you know? If you have, I don't need to explain; if you haven't, I can't explain.”

“Betty inhales sharply, 'It's just I thought I had lost you forever.'Oh, Betty, don't you know there's no such thing as forever?”

“Don't be bitter. Remember Lot's wife when they kill me, and they surely will. You have to use all of your energy to do what it is you have to do. [To his wife Betty Shabazz]”

“Well, now, Dobber has a pretty fair sort of memory, and he says that Miss Sarah Brown tells The Sky that since he seems to know so much about the Bible, maybe he remembers the second verse of the Song of Solomon, but the chances are Dobber muffs the number of the verse, because I look the matter up in one of these Gideon Bibles, and the verse seems a little too much for Miss Sarah Brown, although of course you never can tell.”