She curled her lip. She had discovered cynicism. — Keith Roberts

She stopped dead; and the look in her eyes showed plainly she’d just received the import of a crude lesson in economics.

A death was more than an ending; it was like pulling a thread from a richly patterned cloth.

The years had a way of piling themselves one atop the next, unnoticed and uncounted; that was how young men turned into old ones.