I pressed down the mental accelerator. The old lemon throbbed fiercely. I got an idea.

I am not always good and noble. I am the hero of this story, but I have my off moments.

Like so many substantial citizens of America, he had married young and kept on marrying, springing from blonde to blonde like the chamois of the Alps leaping from crag to crag.

As a dancer, I out-Fred the nimblest Astaire.

It was one of the most disgusting spectacles I've ever seen-- this white-haired old man, who should have been thinking of the hereafter, standing there lying like an actor.

...smoking is just a habit. 'Tolstoy', she said, mentioning someone I hadn't met, 'says that just as much pleasure can be got from twirling the fingers'. My impulse was to tell her Tolstoy was off his onion, but I choked down the heated words. For all I know, the man might be a bosom pal of hers and she might resent criticism of him, however justified.

Well, why do you want a political career? Have you ever been in the House of Commons and taken a good square look at the inmates? As weird a gaggle of freaks and sub-humans as was ever collected in one spot.