The problem with marriage is that it ends every night after making love, and it must be rebuilt every morning before breakfast.

The world was reduced to the surface of her skin and her inner self was safe from all bitterness.

I never had intimate friends, and the few who came close are in New York. By which I mean they're dead, because that's where I suppose condemned souls go in order not to endure the truth of their past lives.

Because he had not done what she, with her heart in her mouth, had hoped he would do, which was to be a man: deny everything, and swear on his life it was not true, and grow indignant at the false accusation, and shout curses at this ill-begotten society that did not hesitate to trample on one's honor, and remain imperturbable even when forced with crushing proofs of his disloyalty.

"Things have a life of their own," the gypsy proclaimed with a harsh accent. "It's simply a matter of waking up their souls."

opened the door a crack wide enough for the entire world to pass through .

She searched the truth with an anguish almost as great as her terrible fear of finding it .