"They had had a long ramble, for these guests knew the way to their host's heart; they had seen everything, including the bees, including the Baron's mother and uncle, who were swindling each other and drinking Jamaica rum out of minute silver goblets." Chapter 1, page 7

"They hid their humiliating condition - for they tend to look on loneliness as inadmissible and a little disgraceful." Chapter 2, page 22

"She was the sort of person who seemed, at twenty-one, to have fought all her battles and survived to enjoy the quiet of her unendangered ivory tower." Chapter 3, page 37

"The serenity she emanated touched him so warmly and so deeply that he almost loved her, and upon the recognition of his feeling he was seized with loneliness and with a sort of homesickness that he felt sure she would understand - a longing, it was, for the places that she would remember...