Gossip says she hanged herself from the turret on the tower, but when you have a house like Hill House with a tower and a turret, gossip would hardly allow you to hang yourself anywhere else.

I suppose, I hoped, by setting a particularly brutal ancient rite in the present and in my own village to shock the story's readers with a graphic dramatization of the pointless violence and general inhumanity in their own lives.

Today my winged horse is coming and I am carrying you off to the moon and on the moon we will eat rose petals.

Journeys end in lovers meeting; I have spent an all but sleepless night, I have told lies and made a fool of myself, and the very air tastes like wine. I have been frightened half out of my foolish wits, but I have somehow earned this joy; I have been waiting for it for so long.

I wonder if I could eat a child if I had the chance.' 'I doubt if I could cook one,' said Constance.

The number of people who expected Mrs. Hutchinson to win a Bendix washer would amaze you.

I can't help it when people are frightened," says Merricat. "I always want to frighten them more.