Overhead was a sky blacker than jewlers' velvet, and a billion stars screamed down.

A woman who would steal your love when your love was really all you had to give was not much of a woman.

His mother called such people ignorant and superstitious, but his father only shook his head slowly and puffed his pipe and said that sometimes old stories had a grain or two of truth in them and it was best not to take chances. It was why, he said, he crossed himself whenever a black cat crossed his path.

I work until beer o'clock.

They were close to the end of the beginning . . .

Give a man or woman back his self-respect, and in most cases-not all, but most-you also give back that person's ability to think with at least some clarity.

Beating heroin is child's play compared to beating your childhood.