You once told me, when you visited my house, how Anne conducts herself with men: she says, Yes, yes, yes, yes, no.’ Wyatt nods; he recognises those words; he looks sorry he spoke them. ‘Now you may ha...
To gentle pressure, King Henry capitulated; the White Rose, aged twenty-four, was taken out into God’s light and air, in order to have his head cut off. But there is always another White Rose; the Pla...
The way I tell it, he says to Fitzwilliam, you would think that the blow on the head had improved him. That he actually set out to get it. That every monarch needs a blow on the head, from time to tim...
The trouble with England, he thinks, is that it's so poor in gesture. We shall have to develop a hand signal for ‘Back off, our prince is fucking this man's daughter.’ He is surprised that the Italian...
The door was flung open. Maurice Duplay filled it; energetic master, shirt- sleeves rolled up. He threw out his arms, the good Jacobin Duplay, and formed a sentence totally original, something which h...
Tell me, why do you think I do this? The king sounds curious. Out of lust? Is that what you think?Kill a cardinal? Divide your country? Split the church? 'Seems extravagant,' Chapuys murmurs.
Sometimes I sensed within myself–somestimes I felt it strongly– a will, a pull towards frivolity. I wanted to separate myself from the common fate of girls who are called Carmel, and identify myself w...
Of course I have had to rearrange the text a bit— bugger about with it, as Hébert would say.
My migraine aura was now so severe that the world on the left had ceased to exist, except as an intermittent yellow flash.
It’s all right for you, you and Danton. I have to go and stutter for two hours at the Jacobins and probably be knocked down again by maddened violin makers and trampled by all sorts of tradesmen.Whils...
It's just that you are practiced at persuading, and sometimes it's quite difficult, sir to distinguish being persuaded by you from being knocked down in street and stamped on.Pg.406
If you want to do his soul good, why do you continually obstruct him? It hardly makes him a better man. Do you never think that, if you had bowed to the king’s wishes years ago, if you had entered a c...
How many men can say, as I must, 'I am a man whose only friend is the King of England'? I have everything, you would think. And yet take Henry away, and I have nothing.
His sister Kat, her husband, Morgan Williams, have been plucked from this life as fast as his daughters were taken, one day walking and talking and next day cold as stones, tumbled into their Thames-s...
He, Cromwell, watches. They are not the same couple from day to day: sometimes doting, sometimes chilly and distanced. The billing and cooing, on the whole, is the more painful to watch.516
He thinks, I remembered you, Thomas More, but you didn't remember me. You never even saw me coming.
Good morning, she said. Are you drunk?She noticed what a split second it took for him to flare into aggression. Do I look it?No. Where is Citizen Danton?I’ve done away with him. I’ve been busy dismemb...
God knows, Charpentier said, I like the present scheme of things very little, but I dread to think what will happen if the conduct of reform falls into hands like yours.Reform? Camille said. I’m not t...
God knows what risks we take, God knows all that Danton has done. God and Camille. God will keep his mouth shut.
At the front, people die for their mistakes. Why should politicians be more gently treated? They made the war. They deserve a dozen deaths, each of them. What can we try them for, except for treason,...