What do you want?He considered. Amusement, principally. Don’t you think it’s time my family shared in my misfortunes, as Christians should?
What a hell of a welcome. I’m sorry. But there’s so much still to do outside before the weather closes, and we have to tackle all the dreary minutiæ on weapons and theory where all your knightly warri...
What Mr Blyth has been engaged in was not love, my dear Francis. It was romance, a thing to which Mr Blyth has been very prone; together with melodrama. Whatever made you think that melodrama makes Mr...
What I cannot control is the stupid man, launched upon a war which is against his material interests. And there is no scavenger of the air, or beast of the earth, or ooze of the sea which will offend...
What I am?’ he said. He laughed. ‘Don’t wait. Ask anyone in London, or Malta, or Russia.’ He made his way to the casement and flung it open. The rumour of a crowd, muffled hitherto by the windowpanes,...
We?’ said Chancellor.‘I am lavishly paid,’ Danny said, ‘to think in the first person plural.
We met once when you were a boy, at Midculter.’ He paused. ‘You are not like your brother.’‘No,’ Crawford said. He gave his hand another shake and then loosed it with apparent reluctance. ‘Richard wil...
We don’t go near the bridge,’ said Lymond peacefully.‘Excuse me,’ said Fergie Hoddim. ‘How can you wreck a fine bridge without going near it?’‘By sending something else near it instead,’ Lymond said....
Two mornings later, entering her daughter’s room, Kate was struck by the flatness of the bed, and then by the sight of a folded paper laid dead centre of the untenanted pillow. Unfolded, it proved to...
Tobie. Unless I'm giving off steam, behave normally. I remember what to do. One foot in front of the other, but not both at the same time unless I'm a robin.
To succeed as you want, you have to be precise; you have to have polish; you have to carry polish and precision into everything you do. You have no time to sigh over seigneuries and begrudge other peo...
To pass over grief, they say, the Italian sleeps; the Frenchman sings; the German drinks; the Spaniard laments, and the Englishman goes to plays. What then does the Scot?’ To Jerott’s mind sprang, unb...
To a chorus of resonant barking, the instruments proceeded to adjust themselves into tune. A billy-goat, alarmed, aroused his harem, and distantly a muffled lowing broke out.Philippa said, ‘Oh dear. I...
Though whether the mass murder of strangers for one’s principles ranks higher in virtue than attacking one’s neighbours for the hell of it is a point I’m glad I don’t have to settle.
This is habitual. Mother flutters her wings, and every institution within sight tumbles flat.
There’s some of them’ll be nursing a guid scratch or two on their hinder-ends this night.… Man, it was a rout.’ ‘I imagine,’ said Piero Strozzi, his dark face impassive, ‘that my lord Grey’s army woul...
There is a saying of my adoptive ancestors. Though he performs a miracle, or two miracles, if he refuses the third miracle, it is not as profit to him. I shall dine at the Court of France tonight, and...
There is a Russian proverb,’ Nepeja said. There was a brief silence, while his hearers considered the analogy. ‘Beat your brother and he shall be deader?’ at length Danny said.
There he goes. What do you think he will do?’‘What you want him to do,’ Adam said dryly. ‘Doesn’t he always?’‘No,’ Lymond said.
The world is full,’ said Jerott wearily, ‘of people who might have wanted to meet Francis Crawford, and who are going to be disappointed.