I sighed. ‘It doesn’t matter what we do. Money comes and goes.’ I shook my head. ‘It doesn’t matter and you know it doesn’t.

I do not know what it was about that boy but just looking at him, even I wanted to clout him on the head. It was a head that invited violence.

Luck was something you either earned or invented through strength of character. You had to come by it honestly; you could not trick or bluff your way into it.

You put a wage behind something, it gives the act a sort of respectability.

I will never be a leader of men, and neither do I want to be one, and neither do I want to be led. I thought: I want to lead only myself.

Where is your mother, Charlie asked. Dead. I’m sorry to hear that Thank you. But she was always dead.

It is hard to find a friend,' I said. 'It is the hardest thing in this world,' he agreed.