Parents. . . are sometimes a bit of a disappointment to their children. They don't fulfil the promise of their early years.

He gave me a look of great contempt; as I supposed, for venturing, even by implication, to draw a parallel between a lack of affluence that might, literally, affect my purchase of rare vintages, and a figure of speech intended delicately to convey his own dire want for the bare necessities of life. He remained silent for several seconds, as if trying to make up his mind whether he could ever bring himself to speak to me again; and then said gruffly: 'I've got to go now.'

There is, after all, no pleasure like that given by a woman who really wants to see you.

When people really hate one another, the tension within them can sometimes make itself felt throughout a room, like atmospheric waves, first hot, then cold, wafted backwards and forwards as if in an invisible process of air conditioning, creating a pervasive physical disturbance.

He fell in love with himself at first sight and it is a passion to which he has always remained faithful. Selflove seems so often unrequited.

Dinner at the Huntercombes' possessed only two dramatic features - the wine was a farce and the food a tragedy.

One passes through the world knowing few, if any, of the important things about even the people with whom one has been from time to time in the closest intimacy.