"But the smile on her face was obviously genuine, altogether pleasant...a lovely smile, in fact...Still a very good-looking woman, my wife...with her fine thin features, her big clear blue eyes, her rich brown hair...But she's forty years old!...No getting around it...Today good-looking...Tomorrow they'll be talking about what a handsome woman she is...Not her fault...But not mine, either!" Chapter 1, pp. 11-12

"She was a young and frisky animal. Lopwitz had taken what he wanted. He had wanted a young and frisky animal with lips as red as blood and skin as white as snow, and that was what he had taken. What had ever happened to the other three Mrs. Eugene Lopwitzes was a question Sherman had never heard brought up. When you had reached Lopwitz's level, it didn't even matter." Chapter 3, pg. 70

"And, Christ, he didn't want much, compared...