Wolves don't hunt singly, but always in pairs. The lone wolf was a myth.

The bowed head, the buried face. She is silent, she will never speak, never forgive, never reach a hand, never leave this frozen present tense. All waits, suspended. Suspended the autumn trees, the autumn sky, anonymous people. A blackbird, poor fool, sings out of season from the willows by the lake. A flight of pigeons over the houses; fragments of freedom, hazard, an anagram made flesh. And somewhere the stinging smell of burning leaves.

The word is the most imprecise of signs. Only a science-obsessed age could fail to comprehend that this is its great virtue, not its defect.

To despise all effort is the greatest effort of all.

Alive. Alive in the way that death is alive.

That was the tragedy. Not that one man had the courage to be evil. But that millions had not the courage to be good.

People who teach you cram old ideas, old views, old ways, into you. Like covering plants with layer after layer of old earth; it's no wonder the poor things so rarely come up fresh and green.