Cards On The Table Quotes

You never know beforehand what people are capable of, you have to wait, give it time, it's time that rules, time is our gambling partner on the other side of the table and it holds all the cards of the deck in its hand, we have to guess the winning cards of life, our lives.

There’s just something terrifying about admitting you like someone. In a way, it’s actually easier when there’s no chance of anything happening. But there’s this threshold where things suddenly become possible. And then your cards are on the table. And there you are, wanting, right out in the open.

So many events and moments that seemed insignificant add up. I remember how for the last Valentine´s Day, N gave flowers but no card. In restaurants, he looked off into the middle distance while my hand would creep across the table to hold his. He would always let go first. I realize I can´t remember his last spontaneous gesture of affection.

Cards on the table, Ava. No fucking about, no more drunken confessions and no more holding out on me, Do you understand?

But give me more credit than that. Someone else may have dealt the hand, but I picked it up off the table, I played every card, and I had my reasons.

You know you're smarter than all of them, right?" Hale said flatly. "In fact, if you wanted to PROVE it..." He glanced at the blackjack tables. Simon shook his head. "I don't count cards, Hale." "Don't?" Hale smiled. "Or won't? You know, technically, it's not illegal." "But it's frowned upon." Sweat beaded at Simon's brow. He sounded like someone had just suggested he swim after eating... run with scissors... "It is SERIOUSLY frowned upon.

He played the part of the devil too successfully. But he was not the devil. Au fond, he was a stupid man. And so - he died." "Because he was stupid?" "It is the sin that is never forgiven and always punished, madame.

-You're simple, straightforward and honest, a little bit on the primitive side, I should think. To interest you a woman would have to... -To lay her cards out on the table.

I couldn't meet his gaze. I stared at the table just behind him--the mess of cards on it, the lantern giving off its quiet glow. "When you gave me your shirt to wear that night, I could feel you. I could feel your essence." The world went still. We were standing only inches from each other, not touching. Outside, I could hear the faint murmur of the wind blowing through the trees. "What did it feel like?" he asked in a low voice. "Like...coming home," I admitted.

Persephone said, “What an unpleasant young man.” Calla let the curtains drift shut. She remarked, “I got his license plate number.” “I hope he never finds what he’s looking for,” Maura said. Retrieving her two cards from the table, Persephone said, a little regretfully, “He’s trying awfully hard. I rather think he’ll find something.” Maura whirled toward Blue. “Blue, if you ever see that man again, you just walk the other way.” “No,” Calla corrected. “Kick him in the nuts. Then run the other way.

The dinner was a huge production, with kids stashed in the den to eat off card tables like a collection of understudies who dreamed of one day breaking into the dining room.

He steps back, still looking. In the painting, Willem's torso is directed toward the viewer, but his face is turned to the right so that he is almost in profile, and he is leaning towards something or someone and smiling. And because he knows Willem's smiles, he knows that Willem has been captured looking at something he loves, he knows Willem in that instant is happy. Willem's face and neck dominate the canvas and although the background is suggested rather than shown, he knows that Willem is at their table. He knows it from the way that JB has drawn the light and shadows on Willem's face. He has the sense that if he says Willem's name that the face in the painting will turn toward him and answer; he has the sense that if he stretches his hand out and strokes the canvas he will feel beneath his fingertips Willem's hair, his fringe of eyelashes. But he doesn't do this, of course, just looks up at last and sees JB smiling at him, sadly. "The title card's been mounted already," JB says, and he goes slowly to the wall behind the painting and sees its title - "Willem Listening to Jude Tell a Story, Greene Street"-and he feels his beneath abandon him; it feels as if his heart is made of something oozing and cold, like ground meat, and it is being squeezed inside a fist so that chunks of it are falling, plopping to the ground near his feet.

Pressuring Abby was never a good idea, but unless I laid all my cards on the table, I stood a very good chance of losing the only pigeon I’d ever met.

I walked up to Griz and poked him in the chest. "Let me make this perfectly clear to you. Though some might seek to make it appear otherwise, I am not a bride to be bartered away to another kingdom, not a prize of war, not a mouthpiece for your Komizar. I am not a chip in a card game to be mindlessly tossed into the center of the pot, nor one to be kept in the tight fist of a greedy opponent. I am a player seated at the table alongside everyone else, and from this day forward, I will play my own hand as I see fit. Do you understand me? Because the consequences could be ugly if someone thought otherwise.

I have written letters that are failures, but I have written few, I think, that are lies. Trying to reach a person means asking the same question over and over again: Is this the truth, or not? I begin this letter to you, then, in the western tradition. If I understand it, the western tradition is: Put your cards on the table.

One day we'll sit and you'll lay it out on the table, neat like a solitaire deck, but now - why, you can't find all the cards.

it was all your genes that made us geniuses, mom. said peter. we sure didn't get any from dad. i heard that. father said, not looking up from the news that was being displayed on the table while he ate it would've been wasted if you hadn't

Oh, my dear friend, it is impossible not to give oneself away - unless one never opens one's mouth! Speech is the deadliest of revealers.

For God's sake!" Hart sprang to his feet. Everyone at the table stopped and stared at him, including Ian. "Do I have to be made a mockery of in my own house?" Mac leaned back in his chair, his hands behind his head. "Would you prefer we made a mockery of you in the street? In Hyde Park, maybe? In the middle of Pall Mall? The card room in your club?" "Mac, shut it!

My first impulse, when presented with any spanking-new piece of computer hardware, is to imagine how it will look in ten years’ time, gathering dust under a card table in a thrift shop.

Do you believe in the value of truth, my dear, or don’t you?” “Of course I believe in the truth,” said Rhoda, staring. “Yes, you say that, but perhaps you haven’t thought about it. The truth hurts sometimes – and destroys one’s illusions.” “I’d rather have it all the same.” said Rhoda. “So would I. But I don’t know that we’re wise.

There is the natural liar...Always says the thing that sounds best.

I have always disapproved of murder.

I'm going to be frank, Max..." "Of course. All cards on the table." But he gave me a poker smile.

In a world of monotonous horror there could be no salvation in wild dreaming. Horror he had adjusted to. But monotony was the greater obstacle, and he realized it now, understood it at long last. And understanding it seemed to give him a sort of quiet peace, a sense of having spread all the cards on his mental table, examined them, and settled conclusively on the desired hand.

Zed and Sky had stayed behind and were chatting with Will, Sky sitting on Zed's knee as if nothing was going to get them apart again in a hurry. Victor and Uriel were playing cards at the kitchen table. Trace looked cute in an apron, chopping vegetables with a surgeon's precision.

The Viscount stepped into the room. "Came to see if you was dead," he said. "Laid Pom odds you weren't." Lethbridge passed his hand across his eyes. "I'm not," he replied in a faint voice. "No. I'm sorry," said the Viscount simply. He wandered over to the table and sat down. "Horry said she killed you, Pom said So she might, I said No. Nonsense." Lethbridge still holding a hand to his aching head tried to pull himself together. "Did you?" he said. His eyes ran over his self invited guest. "I see. Let me assure you once more that I am very much alive." "Well I wish you'd put your wig on," complained the Viscount. "What I want to know is why did Horry hit you on the head with a poker?" Lethbridge gingerly felt his bruised scalp. "With a poker was it? Pray ask her, though I doubt if she will tell you." "You shouldn't keep the front door open," said the Viscount. "What's to stop people coming in and hitting you over the head? It's preposterous." "I wish you'd go home," said Lethbridge wearily. The Viscount surveyed the supper-table with a knowing eye. "Card-party?" he inquired.

They won’t understand,” Persephone said. She laid her deck of tarot cards on the table in front of him. “They didn’t when I came back.” “Am I different?” he asked. “You were different before,” Persephone replied. “But now they won’t be able to stop noticing.

most people spend most of their time on defense, in reactive mode, in playing with the cards they got instead of moving to a different table with different cards. Instead

Best to get it off his chest. Own up like a man. Take his medicine. Cards on table. Beating about bush, none of. Mercy, throw himself on.

I am clean I am true I am playing with my cards on the table.

Approximately eighteen hours after my kiss with Jack Campbell—my kiss with Jack Campbell—I am sitting at a card table with Pooja in the front entrance of the school behind our veritable army of baked goods, overanalyzing the situation to such an absurd degree, it is now less of a kiss and more of an FBI investigation.

On the back part of the step, toward the right, I saw a small iridescent sphere of almost unbearable brilliance. At first I thought it was revolving; then I realised that this movement was an illusion created by the dizzying world it bounded. The Aleph's diameter was probably little more than an inch, but all space was there, actual and undiminished. Each thing (a mirror's face, let us say) was infinite things, since I distinctly saw it from every angle of the universe. I saw the teeming sea; I saw daybreak and nightfall; I saw the multitudes of America; I saw a silvery cobweb in the center of a black pyramid; I saw a splintered labyrinth (it was London); I saw, close up, unending eyes watching themselves in me as in a mirror; I saw all the mirrors on earth and none of them reflected me; I saw in a backyard of Soler Street the same tiles that thirty years before I'd seen in the entrance of a house in Fray Bentos; I saw bunches of grapes, snow, tobacco, lodes of metal, steam; I saw convex equatorial deserts and each one of their grains of sand; I saw a woman in Inverness whom I shall never forget; I saw her tangled hair, her tall figure, I saw the cancer in her breast; I saw a ring of baked mud in a sidewalk, where before there had been a tree; I saw a summer house in Adrogué and a copy of the first English translation of Pliny -- Philemon Holland's -- and all at the same time saw each letter on each page (as a boy, I used to marvel that the letters in a closed book did not get scrambled and lost overnight); I saw a sunset in Querétaro that seemed to reflect the colour of a rose in Bengal; I saw my empty bedroom; I saw in a closet in Alkmaar a terrestrial globe between two mirrors that multiplied it endlessly; I saw horses with flowing manes on a shore of the Caspian Sea at dawn; I saw the delicate bone structure of a hand; I saw the survivors of a battle sending out picture postcards; I saw in a showcase in Mirzapur a pack of Spanish playing cards; I saw the slanting shadows of ferns on a greenhouse floor; I saw tigers, pistons, bison, tides, and armies; I saw all the ants on the planet; I saw a Persian astrolabe; I saw in the drawer of a writing table (and the handwriting made me tremble) unbelievable, obscene, detailed letters, which Beatriz had written to Carlos Argentino; I saw a monument I worshipped in the Chacarita cemetery; I saw the rotted dust and bones that had once deliciously been Beatriz Viterbo; I saw the circulation of my own dark blood; I saw the coupling of love and the modification of death; I saw the Aleph from every point and angle, and in the Aleph I saw the earth and in the earth the Aleph and in the Aleph the earth; I saw my own face and my own bowels; I saw your face; and I felt dizzy and wept, for my eyes had seen that secret and conjectured object whose name is common to all men but which no man has looked upon -- the unimaginable universe. I felt infinite wonder, infinite pity.

Hercule Poirot spread out his hands in his most foreign manner.

He steps back, still looking. In the painting, Willem’s torso is directed toward the viewer, but his face is turned to the right so that he is almost in profile, and he is leaning toward something or someone and smiling. And because he knows Willem’s smiles, he knows Willem has been captured looking at something he loves, he knows Willem in that instant was happy. Willem’s face and neck dominate the canvas, and although the background is suggested rather than shown, he knows that Willem is at their table; he knows it from the way JB has drawn the light and shadows on Willem’s face. He has the sense that if he says Willem’s name, the face in the painting will turn toward him and answer; he has the sense that if he stretches his hand out and strokes the canvas, he will feel beneath his fingertips Willem’s hair, his fringe of eyelashes. But he doesn’t do this, of course, just looks up at last and sees JB smiling at him, sadly. “The title’s card’s been mounted already,” JB says, and he goes slowly to the wall behind the painting and sees its title—Willem Listening to Jude Tell a Story, Greene Street—and he feels his breath abandon him; it feels as if his heart is made of something oozing and cold, like ground meat, and it is being squeezed inside a fist so that chunks of it are falling, plopping to the ground near his feet.

Day and night she had drudged and struggled and thrown her soul into her work, and there was not much of her left over for anything else. Being human, she suffered from this lack and did what she could to make up for it. If she passed the evening bent over a table in the library and later declared that she had spent that time playing cards, it was as though she had managed to do both those things. Through the lies, she lived vicariously. The lies doubled the little of her existence that was left over from work and augmented the little rag end of her personal life.

If I were wise, I shouldn't tell you. But I won't be wise, Harry, not for this time. I'll be just the opposite. So now mind what I say! You will hear it and forget it again. You will laugh over it, and you will weep over it. So look out! I am going to play with you for life and death, little brother, and before we begin the game I'm going to lay my cards on the table.

I figured I’d lay all my cards on the table. You’re not having sex. I’m not having sex. Thought maybe we could work through our problem together.” “I don’t have a problem.” “So why aren’t you having sex, then?” “Why aren’t you?” “Because I’d like to have it with you, and you haven’t given in to me. Yet” He brought the beer to his lips and watched me as he drank. “I can’t believe we’re having this conversation. You know I’m seeing someone.” “I do. That’s why we’re having this conversation. If you weren’t seeing someone, I’d have you up on that kitchen island showing you what I want to do to you, rather than telling you.” “Is that so?” He moved closer. “It is.” “What if I’m not into you in that way?” Chase looked down, his eyes lingering on my nipples. My very erect nipples. “Your body says otherwise.

Before he slept he reflected, as he had often reflected in other moments of triumph at the card table, that the gain to the winner is, in some odd way, always less than the loss to the loser.

How much did you hear?" "Everything that mattered." He nodded, his face unreadable. "It is what it is. All cards are on the table." "Not quite." I sat up. "Oh?" "The real Rogan hasn't asked me." He frowned. "I want the dragon to ask me." "Be careful," he warned. "I know what the Head of House Rogan wants. I heard all of his noble warnings about the future of House Baylor. I saw him told himself in check. I want to know what you want, Connor. What do you want of me? Ask me.

American dream, a spouse, a brace of children, cuddly pets, coffee-table books, rusted skeleton keys, plastic cauliflower bags, business cards of business-card printers, a mound of used airmail envelopes. Old house on moving day, all echoes and loneliness.

Man is an unoriginal animal," said Hercule Poirot

I intend to play. We require a dealer." Michael’s gaze snapped to her as Langford sneered, “I will not play cards with a woman.” She took the seat at one side of the table. “I usually will not play cards with men who rob children of their inheritance, but tonight appears to be one for exceptions.” Cross looked to Michael. “She is incredible.” Possessiveness flared as he took his seat, eyes on his wife. “She is mine.

He dared a glance at Jesper now. The sharpshooter was seated at the table, hunched over his cards. He wore a battered navy waistcoat embroidered with small gold stars, and his rumpled shirt shone white against his dark brown skin.

You never know beforehand what people are capable of, you have to wait, give it time, it's time that rules, time is our gambling partner on the other side of the table and it holds all the cards of the deck in its hands, we have to guess the winning cards of life, our lives

It’s to do with knowing and being known. I remember how it stopped seeming odd that in biblical Greek knowing was used for making love. Whosit knew so-and-so. Carnal knowledge. It’s what lovers trust each other with. Knowledge of each other, not of the flesh but through the flesh, knowledge of self, the real him, the real her, in extremis, the mask slipped from the face. Every other version of oneself is on offer to the public. We share our vivacity, grief, sulks, anger, joy ... we hand it out to anybody who happens to be standing around, to friends and family with a momentary sense of indecency perhaps, to strangers without hesitation. Our lovers share us with the passing trade. But in pairs we insist that we give ourselves to each other. What selves? What’s left? What else is there that hasn’t been dealt out like a pack of cards? Carnal knowledge. Personal, final, uncompromised. Knowing, being known. I revere that. Having that is being rich, you can be generous about what’s shared – she walks, she talks, she laughs, she lends a sympathetic ear, she kicks off her shoes and dances on the tables, she’s everybody’s and it don’t mean a thing, let them eat cake; knowledge is something else, the undealt card, and while it’s held it makes you free-and-easy and nice to know, and when it’s gone everything is pain. Every single thing. Every object that meets the eye, a pencil, a tangerine, a travel poster. As if the physical world has been wired up to pass a current back to the part of your brain where imagination glows like a filament in a lobe no bigger than a torch bulb. Pain.

If you don't like how the table is set, turn over the table.

You do not comprehend. It is not the victim who concerns me so much. It is the effect on the character of the slayer." "What about war?" "In war you do not exercise the right of private judgement. That is what is so dangerous. Once a man is imbued with the idea that he knows who ought to be allowed to live and who ought not - then he is halfway to becoming the most dangerous killer there is - the arrogant killer who kills not for profit - but for an idea. He has usurped the functions of le bon Dieu.

Any time women come together with a collective intention, it's a powerful thing. Whether it's sitting down making a quilt, in a kitchen preparing a meal, in a club reading the same book, or around the table playing cards, or planning a birthday party, when women come together with a collective intention, magic happens.

There’s a wound in you, and the tables, the dice, the cards—they feel like medicine. They soothe you, put you right for a time. But they’re poison, Jesper. Every time you play, you take another sip. You have to find some other way to heal that part of yourself.” She laid her hand on his chest. “Stop treating your pain like it’s something you imagined. If you see the wound is real, then you can heal it.

I deliberately ignored the sight of lean brown body cutting through the aqua water, glistening powerful arms dipping slow and steady in perfect rhythm with the strong kick of his long tanned legs. I was going to have to work on my ignoring technique. - Tim trying to ignore Jack in the swimming pool.

Chase picked up the card. “I’m happy to share from my personal experience, if you like.” Temple grinned at his hand. “And I.” It was all too much. “I do not need advice. She enjoyed it immensely.” “I hear they don’t all enjoy it right off the bat,” Cross said. “That is true,” Chase said, all expertise. “It’s fine if she didn’t, old man,” Temple offered. “You can try again.” “She enjoyed it.” Bourne’s voice was low and tight, and he thought he might kill the next person who spoke. “Well, one thing is for certain,” Temple said, casually, and Bourne ignored the pang of disappointment that the enormous man was very likely the only one at the table he could not kill.

Every one's got their own ways of working. I know that. I give my inspectors a free hand always. Every one's got to find out for themselves what method suits them best.

The cards you have in your hand don't determine the winner but the ones you put on the table do.

I think love is the wild card of existence. Don’t rule it out. Old as we are, it may still get thrown on the table.

All right. Give me some coin. I want to play that man at cards.’ Laurent rose, leaning his weight against the table. Damen reached for the purse, then paused. ‘Aren’t you supposed to earn gifts with service?’ Laurent said, ‘Is there something you want?’ His voice was sinuous with promise; his gaze was steady as a cat’s.

If they’d caused you pain, I’d never have been able to live with myself,” he said as he backed up a step. “You might want to find another place to sit. Those idiots could cook up a plan for revenge.” “I can’t leave.” Green Eyes took a huge breath. “This is the only place where I get to see you.” He looked like a man who’d just bet his entire fortune and laid his cards on the table.

The truth is, once you understand that there are people who do not want you to exist, that is a difficult card to remove from the table. There is no liberation, no undoing that knowledge. It is the unyielding door, the one that simply cannot be pushed back against any longer. For many, there are reminders of this every day, every hour. It makes "Alright," the emotional bar and the song itself, the best there is. It makes existence itself a celebration.

Poker isn't all about the cards. Poker's mostly about attention. You got a woman whose legs are like yours, tits are like yours, hair is like yours and ass is like yours, all she's gotta do for me is sit there and half the men at the table won't be concentrating on their cards. They'll be thinking about your legs, tits, hair and ass, how much they want 'em and just what they'd do to get 'em." "I appreciate the compliment, Ty, but I don't think I'm all that." "You got a dick?" I felt my mouth twitch. Then I answered, "No." "Trust me

I can admire the perfect murderer--I can also admire a tiger-- that splendid tawny-striped beast. But I will admire him from outside his cage. I will not go inside. That is to say, not unless it is my duty to do so. For you see, Mr. Shaitana, the tiger might spring. . . .

Lily opened her hand and looked at her three willstones. Rowan had been right. She was changed forever. Lily sat up and saw a glass of water on the bedside table. A tiny card was propped up against it. It said, THIRSTY? in bold uppercase letters. Lily realized that she'd never seen Rowan's handwriting before. She stared at it, sipping her water, memorizing every swoop and curve. She swung her legs out of bed and noticed that she'd somehow struggled out of his robe while she slept. Rowan had left a stack of clothes on the floor next to her, with its own accompanying card that read NAKED? Lily laughed quietly to herself...

Excuse me, Monsieur Poirot. If you'd like to ask any questions, I'm sure the doctor wouldn't mind. Of course not. Of course not. Great admirer of yours, Monsieur Poirot. Little gray cells -- order and method. I know all about it.

There's a wound in you, and the tables, the dice, the cards -- they feel like medicine. They soothe you, put you right for a time. But they're poison, Jesper. Every time you play, you take another sip. You have to find some other way to heal that part of yourself." She laid her hand on his chest. "Stop treating your pain like it's something you imagined."

Passed away” seemed like an appropriate way of putting it. Over the next few days, I had this recurring image of Trapp sitting at the bridge table. He reaches into the bidding box, removes a pass card, and places it on the table. Then he slowly vanishes.

Before that summer, I had many times heard long-winded Baptist preachers take ten minutes to pray over card tables of potato salad and fried chicken at church picnics, but the way those sweating, red-faced men sat around on stacked pallets of lumber gulping oysters taught me most of what I knew about simple gladness.

There were place cards at the head table, which was one long, rectangular thing that would have everyone facing the reception room. I sat at the one marked Chritine Russell. Randy say to my left, with Denise to his right. To my right read Chris Pin. Who...? "You've got to be kidding me," I said aloud. Why didn't I just shoot myself and get it over with? "Justina, we meet again." Bones appeared and took his seat next to me as I vaulted out of my chair. "Wouldn't want to be rude, but I believe your table is over there.

He looked across the small table at Alec Lightwood, who was ignoring the glitter and glamour of Paris in order to write postcards to his family back home, and smile. Each time he finished a postcard, Alec wrote Wish you were here at the end. And each time, Magnus snatched the card and wrote, with a flourish, Except not really.

What grief is not taken away by time? What passion will survive an unequal battle with it? I knew a man in the bloom of his still youthful powers, filled with true nobility and virtue, I knew him when he was in love, tenderly, passionately, furiously, boldly, modestly, and before me, almost before my eyes, the object of his passion - tender, beautiful as an angel - was struck down by insatiable death. I never saw such terrible fits of inner suffering, such furious scorching anguish, such devouring despair as shook the unfortunate lover. I never thought a man could create such a hell for himself, in which there would be no shadow, no image, nothing in the least resembling hope... They tried to keep an eye on him; they hid all instruments he might have used to take his own life. Two weeks later he suddenly mastered himself: he began to laugh, to joke; freedom was granted him, and the first thing he did was buy a pistol. One day his family was terribly frightened by the sudden sound of a shot. They ran into the room and saw him lying with his brains blown out. A doctor who happened to be there, whose skill was on everyone's lips, saw signs of life in him, found that the wound was not quite mortal, and the man, to everyone's amazement, was healed. The watch on him was increased still more. Even at the table they did not give him a knife to and tried to take away from him anything that he might strike himself with; but a short while later he found a new occasion and threw himself under the wheels of a passing carriage. His arms and legs were crushed; but again they saved him. A year later I saw him in a crowded room; he sat at the card table gaily saying 'Petite ouverte,' keeping one card turned down, and behind him, leaning on the back of his chair, stood his young wife, who was sorting through his chips.

No" she jerked back, stared up at him. Her eyes were like thunderclouds. He'd never seen them like that. Shock and fear filled them. Her face was paper white. Her body shuddering. "Don't you leave me!" She gripped his shirt and tried to shake him, tears falling from her eyes. "Don't you leave Noah." His head lowered. He touched her lips with his and knew this woman held the best part of him. The memories of the husband he had been, the man he had been. He couldn't destroy that. He refuse to. He pushed her to Jordan slowly, loath to let her go. To release her. Knowing that releasing her was the only way to save the memories she held. "Don't you leave!" She screamed the order, eyes blazing, her lips trembling as tears fell and hysteria threatened to overwhelm her. "If you leave me, Noah Blake, if you don't come back when this is over, don't bother coming back at all. He touched her cheek. Ran his thumb over her lips. "You are the best part of me," he whispered. "Always remember that, Sabella. The best part of me." Before she could grab him, hold him to her, he pulled away, grabbed one of the rifles Mike had set on the table across the room. And left.

He's putting a lot of cards down on the table," Trey said thoughtfully, taking a step forward. "And Matthias is never one to share something for free if he could charge for it." "And you're not normally one to think for himself," Matthias said pleasantly. "I suppose we're all growing as people.

An ancient-looking card table sat in the middle of the room, covered in maps and books. Man, give the Brannicks any space, and they’ll turn it into a War Room. Aislinn took her customary position on one side of the table. “Okay,” she said. “Tell us everything that’s happened.” Cal, Archer, Jenna, and I managed to achieve something truly impressive: the four-way glance. “It’s really complicated,” Jenna said at last. “We used a sixteenth-century warlock trapped in a mirror to tell you where we were,” Dad said dryly. “I think it’s safe to say we’re well-versed in ‘complicated’ by this point.” Archer gave a little laugh. “I like your dad,” he whispered in my ear. “You would,” I muttered back.

But I don't doubt it will be essentially the same type of crime. The details may be different, but the essentials underlying them will be the same. It's odd, but a criminal gives himself away every time by that. Man is an unoriginal animal," said Hercule Poirot. "Women," said Mrs. Oliver, " are capable of infinite variation. I should never commit the same type of murder twice running." "Don't you ever write the same plot twice running?" asked Battle.

There’s a wound in you, and the tables, the dice, the cards—they feel like medicine. They soothe you, put you right for a time. But they’re poison. Every time you play, you take another sip. You have to find some other way to heal that part of yourself. [...] Stop treating your pain like it’s something you imagined. If you see the wound is real, then you can heal it.

He has neither what I call the outward vision (seeing details all around you what is called an observant person) nor the inner vision--concentration, the focusing of the mind on one object. He has a purposefully limited vision. He sees only what blends and harmonises with the bent of his mind.

There is a charm to letters and cards that emails and smses can’t ever replicate, you cannot inhale them, drawing the fragrance of the place they have been mailed from, the feel of paper in your hand bearing the weight of the words contained within. You cannot rub your fingers over the paper and visualise the sender, seated at a table, writing, perhaps with a smile on their lips or a frown splitting the brow. You can’t see the pressure of the pen on the reverse of the page and imagine the mood the person might have been in when he or she was writing it. Smiley face icons cannot hope to replace words thought out carefully in order to put a smile on the other person’s face, the pressure of the pen, the sharpness or the laxity of the handwriting telling stories about the frame of mind of the writer, the smudges on the sheets of paper telling their own stories, blotches where tears might have fallen, hastily scratched out words where another would have been more appropriate, stories that the writer of the letter might not have intended to communicate. I have letters wrapped up in a soft muslin cloth, letters that are unsigned, tied up with a ribbon which I had once used to hold my soft, brown hair in place, and which had been gently untied by the writer of those letters. Occasionally, I unwrap them and breathe them in, knowing that the molecules from the hand that wrote them might still be scattered on the surface of the paper, a hand that is long dead.

There is no one way. The is no one path. There is you, your cards, and your gift. That’s it. Read a lot. Watch other readers. Practice on your friends (and tell them that you’re practicing). You can figure out your style with some research and time. No worries. Remember, this is supposed to be fun. In tarot readings (and in all other things), please stop comparing yourself to other people. Compare yourself to yourself.

They migrated to the usual room on the second floor. Heywood Broun was there by the door, setting up bottles of gin, scotch and beer. Alexander Woollcott sat ensconced behind the round table (not THE Round Table). He shuffled the cards and stacked up poker chips. Dorothy stopped in the doorway and watched what they were doing. 'You boys sure know how to treat a woman,' she said. 'Liquor in the front and poker in the rear.

Marriage is one of our most defining moments because so much is wrapped up in it. If building a career is like spending twelve hours at the blackjack table—seeing the cards as you make your decisions, playing each hand with current winnings in mind, having a new opportunity to take a chance or play it safe with every card dealt—then choosing a mate is like walking over to the roulette wheel and putting all your chips on red 32.

They started inviting me into the Messina Club at Tenth and Tasker, which is a members-only joint where you get the best sausage and peppers you ever ate. You’d play cards there; just hang out without the public citizens being at the next table. It’s still there, and it still has the best sausage and peppers in all of South Philly. A

My humble...I don't drink...' 'A shame! What about a game of dice, then? Or do have some other favourite game? Dominoes? Cards? 'I don't play games,' the already weary barman responded. 'Altogether bad,' the host concluded. 'As you will, but there's something noce nice hidden in men who avoid wine, games, the society of charming women, table talk. Such people are either gravely ill or secretly hate everybody around them. True, there may be exceptions. Among persons sitting down with me at the banqueting table, there have been on occasion some extraordinary scoundrels! Chapter 18

I liked kissing, I liked the press of mouths together, and the way you could tell what kind of man you had on your hands by how skilled or terrible he was at such a simple act. I liked that kissing was intimate and involved without having to have all your cards on the table, but more than any of that, I like that kissing spoke to exactly how into you the guy laying it on you was. If it was a peck on the cheek or a brush on the lips it meant there was no spark, if there was a closed lip press and no tease of the tongue it meant that he found you attractive and kissable but probably wasn't going to put forth the effort to be worthy of you. If there was a nibble of teeth and swirl of the tongue there was promise and potential than there was whatever Zeb was doing to me. It felt like conquering a victory. A battle fought and won. If felt like he was trying to make it so I would never be able to kiss anyone else in my life without having to compare it to this moment

Venerable are letters, infinitely brave, forlorn, and lost. Life would split asunder without them. "Come to tea, come to dinner, what's the truth of the story? have you heard the news? life in the capital is gay; the Russian dancers...." These are our stays and props. These lace our days together and make of life a perfect globe. And yet, and yet... when we go to dinner, when pressing finger-tips we hope to meet somewhere soon, a doubt insinuates itself; is this the way to spend our days? the rare, limited, so soon dealt out to us - drinking tea? dining out? And the notes accumulate. And the telephones ring. And everywhere we go wires and tubes surround us to carry the voices that try to penetrate before the last card is dealt. "Try to penetrate" for as we lift the cup, shake the hand, express the hope, something whispers, Is this all? Can I never know, share, be certain? Am I doomed all my days to write letters, send voices, which fall upon the tea-table, fade upon the passage, making appointments, while life dwindles, to come and dine? Yet letters are venerable; and the telephone valiant, for the journey is a lonely one, and if bound together by notes and telephones we went in company, perhaps- who know? - we might talk by the way.

She turned to look at Althea with eyes the color if brandy in firelight. "Can't you feel it?" she asked her in a whisper. "Look around you. We are on the cusp. We are a coin spinning in the toss, a card fluttering in the flip, a rune chip floating in stirred water. Possibilities swarm like bees. In this day, in a moment, in a breath, the future of the world will shift course by a notch, One way or another, the coin will land ringing, the card will settle to the table, the chip will bob to the surface, The face that shows uppermost will set our days, and children to come will say, "That is just the way it has always been.

Anything,” I stressed, my face still blank. “Go get yourself a new chair. Or a table. Or ink, whatever the fuck it is you need. My treat. Go order food for the whole building. Buy the stray cat down the road a bed to piss on. I’ll give you ten minutes with my credit card if you give me ten minutes in this room with her. Alone.” “Is your boyfriend always so aggressive?” He arched an eyebrow in Emilia’s direction, throwing her a questioning look that asked: Do you want me to leave you alone with this asshole, or do you want me throw him outside and call NYPD? She laughed her syrupy Southern belle laugh that always seemed to stab straight to the pit of my fucking stomach. “He’s not my boyfriend.” Shakespeare’s eyebrow shot up. “You should tell him that. Doesn’t seem like he got the memo.

Finding her voice at last, she asked, “What dreams are you having, sir?” “I dreamt I was in a spring field and a woman stands in the shadows just at the edge of the nearby forest. I haven’t yet seen her face, only her long beautiful hair. I always wake too soon.” He reached up to touch the hawk touchstone around his throat as he described his dream, rubbing it absently between his fingers. Lily lowered her lashes to hide her astonishment. “When you see someone in a dream but cannot see their face, it means you haven’t met them yet,” she explained. “Then perhaps I’ll dream of her again tonight and this time I’ll see her face.” He smiled, reaching across the table to take her left hand and lift it to his lips. “My name is Ian Kelly, and it would give me the greatest pleasure to know yours.” “Lily Evans. Around here I go by Raven.” She raised a shoulder, indicating the gypsy tent. “Lily--indeed, a most beautiful name. Now tell me,” he stared pointedly at her hand, “I see no ring that another has claimed you as his, so my confidence is strengthened. Look at your cards again, milady, and tell me if you see me in your future…

No" she jerked back, stared up at him. Her eyes were like thunderclouds. He'd never seen them like that. Shock and fear filled them. Her face was paper white. Her body shuddering. "Don't you leave me!" She gripped his shirt and tried to shake him, tears falling from her eyes. "Don't you leave Noah." His head lowered. He touched her lips with his and knew this woman held the best part of him. The memories of the husband he had been, the man he had been. He couldn't destroy that. He refuse to. He pushed her to Jordan slowly, loath to let her go. To release her. Knowing that releasing her was the only way to save the memories she held. "Don't you leave me!" She screamed the order, eyes blazing, her lips trembling as tears fell and hysteria threatened to overwhelm her. "If you leave me, Noah Blake, if you don't come back when this is over, don't bother coming back at all. He touched her cheek. Ran his thumb over her lips. "You are the best part of me," he whispered. "Always remember that, Sabella. The very best part of me." Before she could grab him, hold him to her, he pulled away, grabbed one of the rifles Mike had set on the table across the room. And left.” ― Lora Leigh, Wild Card

Sitting at the table, watching the cards being dealt, I heard a man say that the difference between an amateur and a pro is that the pro doesn't have an emotional reaction to losing anymore. It's just the other side of winning. I guess I'm a farmer now, because I'm used to loss like this, to death of all kinds, and to rot. It's just the other side of life. It is your first big horse and all he meant to you, and it is also his bones and skin breaking down in the compost pile, almost ready to be spread on the fields.

I once read that if the folds in the cerebral cortex were smoothed out it would cover a card table. That seemed quite unbelievable but it did make me wonder just how big the cortex would be if you ironed it out. I thought it might just about cover a family-sized pizza: not bad, but no card-table. I was astonished to realize that nobody seems to know the answer. A quick search yielded the following estimates for the smoothed out dimensions of the cerebral cortex of the human brain. An article in Bioscience in November 1987 by Julie Ann Miller claimed the cortex was a "quarter-metre square." That is napkin-sized, about ten inches by ten inches. Scientific American magazine in September 1992 upped the ante considerably with an estimated of 1 1/2 square metres; thats a square of brain forty inches on each side, getting close to the card-table estimate. A psychologist at the University of Toronto figured it would cover the floor of his living room (I haven't seen his living room), but the prize winning estimate so far is from the British magazine New Scientist's poster of the brain published in 1993 which claimed that the cerebral cortex, if flattened out, would cover a tennis court. How can there be such disagreement? How can so many experts not know how big the cortex is? I don't know, but I'm on the hunt for an expert who will say the cortex, when fully spread out, will cover a football field. A Canadian football field.

After the first few weeks of building up intense hope about the dog, it had slowly dawned on him that intense hope was not the answer and never had been. In a world of monotonous horror there could be no salvation in wild dreaming. Horror he had adjusted to. But monotony was the greater obstacle, and he realized it now, understood it at long last. And understanding it seemed to give him a sort of quiet peace, a sense of having spread all the cards on his mental table, examined them, and settled conclusively on the desired hand. Burying the dog had not been the agony he had supposed it would be. In a way, it was almost like burying threadbare hopes and false excitements. From that day on he learned to accept the dungeon he existed in, neither seeking to escape with sudden derring-do nor beating his pate bloody on its walls. And, thus resigned, he returned to work.

A pale, bored woman in white ankle-socks and a white tasselled beret was sitting on a bentwood chair at the corner entrance to the verandah of the writer's club, where there was an opening in the creeper-grown trellis. In front of her on a plain kitchen table lay a large book like a ledger, in which for no known reason the woman wrote the names of the people entering the restaurant. She stopped Koroviev and Behemoth. 'Your membership cards?' she said, staring in surprise at Koroviev's pince-nez, at Behemoth's Primus and grazed elbow. 'A thousand apologies, madam, but what membership cards?' asked Koroviev in astonishment. 'Are you writers?' asked the woman in return. 'Indubitably,' replied Koroviev with dignity. 'Where are your membership cards?' the woman repeated. 'Dear lady...' Koroviev began tenderly. 'I'm not a dear lady,' interrupted the woman. 'Oh, what a shame,' said Koroviev in a disappointed voice and went on: 'Well, if you don't want to be a dear lady, which would have been delightful, you have every right not to be. But look here - if you wanted to make sure that Dostoyevsky was a writer, would you really ask him for his membership card? Why, you only have to take any five pages of one of his novels and you won't need a membership card to convince you that the man's a writer. I don't suppose he ever had a membership card, anyway! What do you think?' said Koroviev, turning to Behemoth. 'I'll bet he never had one,' replied the cat, putting the Primus on the table and wiping the sweat from its brow with its paw. 'You're not Dostoyevsky,' said the woman to Koroviev. 'How do you know?' 'Dostoyevsky's dead,' said the woman, though not very confidently. 'I protest!' exclaimed Behemoth warmly. 'Dostoyevsky is immortal!' 'Your membership cards, please,' said the woman.

The answer to that question is…I won’t. You belong with me. Which leads me to the discussion I wanted to have with you.” “Where I belong is for me to decide, and though I may listen to what you have to say, that doesn’t mean I will agree with you.” “Fair enough.” Ren pushed his empty plate to the side. “We have some unfinished business to take care of.” “If you mean the other tasks we have to do, I’m already aware of that.” “I’m not talking about that. I’m talking about us.” “What about us?” I put my hands under the table and wiped my clammy palms on my napkin. “I think there are a few things we’ve left unsaid, and I think it’s time we said them.” “I’m not withholding anything from you, if that’s what you mean.” “You are.” “No. I’m not.” “Are you refusing to acknowledge what has happened between us?” “I’m not refusing anything. Don’t try to put words in my mouth.” “I’m not. I’m simply trying to convince a stubborn woman to admit that she has feelings for me.” “If I did have feelings for you, you’d be the first one to know.” “Are you saying that you don’t feel anything for me?” “That’s not what I’m saying.” “Then what are you saying?” “I’m saying…nothing!” I spluttered. Ren smiled and narrowed his eyes at me. If he kept up this line of questioning, he was bound to catch me in a lie. I’m not a very good liar. He sat back in his chair. “Fine. I’ll let you off the hook for now, but we will talk about this later. Tigers are relentless once they set their minds to something. You don’t be able to evade me forever.” Casually, I replied, “Don’t get your hopes up, Mr. Wonderful. Every hero has his Kryptonite, and you don’t intimidate me.” I twisted my napkin in my lap while he tracked my every move with his probing eyes. I felt stripped down, as if he could see into the very heart of me. When the waitress came back, Ren smiled at her as she offered a smaller menu, probably featuring desserts. She leaned over him while I tapped my strappy shoe in frustration. He listened attentively to her. Then, the two of them laughed again. He spoke quietly, gesturing to me, and she looked my way, giggled, and then cleared all the plates quickly. He pulled out a wallet and handed her a credit card. She put her hand on his arm to ask him another question, and I couldn’t help myself. I kicked him under the table. He didn’t even blink or look at me. He just reached his arm across the table, took my hand in his, and rubbed the back of it absentmindedly with his thumb as he answered her question. It was like my kick was a love tap to him. It only made him happier. When she left, I narrowed my eyes at him and asked, “How did you get that card, and what were you saying to her about me?” “Mr. Kadam gave me the card, and I told her that we would be having our dessert…later.” I laughed facetiously. “You mean you will be having dessert later by yourself this evening because I am done eating with you.” He leaned across the candlelit table and said, “Who said anything about eating, Kelsey?” He must be joking! But he looked completely serious. Great! There go the nervous butterflies again. “Stop looking at me like that.” “Like what?” “Like you’re hunting me. I’m not an antelope.” He laughed. “Ah, but the chase would be exquisite, and you would be a most succulent catch.” “Stop it.” “Am I making you nervous?” “You could say that.” I stood up abruptly as he was signing the receipt and made my way toward the door. He was next to me in an instant. He leaned over. “I’m not letting you escape, remember? Now, behave like a good date and let me walk you home. It’s the least you could do since you wouldn’t talk with me.

The bunk was a long, rectangular building. Inside, the walls were whitewashed and the floor unpainted. In three walls there were small, square windows, and in the fourth a solid door with a wooden latch. Against the walls were eight bunks, five of them made up with blankets and the other three showing their burlap ticking. Over each bunk there was nailed an apple-box with the opening forward so that it made two shelves for the personal belongings of the occupant of the bunk. And these shelves were loaded with little articles, soap and talcum-powder, razors and those Western magazines ranch-men love to read and scoff at and secretly believe. And there were medicines on the shelves, and little vials, combs; and, from nails on the box-sides, a few neck-ties. Near one wall there was a black cast-iron stove, its stove-pipe going straight up through the ceiling. In the middle of the room stood a big square table littered with playing-cards, and around it were grouped boxes for the players to sit on.

and nominally a cigar manufacturer. He never came to the club except on nights like this, when Mr. and Mrs. Ammermann would entertain a few of their—her—friends at a smaller table. Mildred, towering above Losch, the club steward, and pointing, daintily for her, with one finger as she held a small stack of place-cards in her left hand, apparently was one woman who had not heard about the business of the night before. It was axiomatic in Gibbsville that you could tell Mill Ammermann anything and be sure it wouldn’t be repeated; because Mill probably was thinking of the mashie-niblick approach over the trees to the second green. Julian derived some courage from her smile. He always had liked Mill anyway. He was fragmentarily glad over again that Mill did not live in New York, for in New York she would have been marked Lesbian on sight.

As a matter of fact I don’t care two pins about accuracy. Who is accurate? Nobody nowadays. If a reporter writes that a beautiful girl of twenty-two dies by turning on the gas after looking out over the sea and kissing her favourite Labrador, Bob, goodbye, does anybody make a fuss because the girl was twenty-six, the room faced inland, and the dog was a Sealyham terrier called Bonnie? If a journalist can do that sort of thing I don’t see that it matters if I mix up police ranks and say a revolver when I mean an automatic and a dictograph when I mean a phonograph, and use a poison that just allows you to gasp one dying sentence and no more. What really matters is plenty of bodies! If the thing’s getting a little dull, some more blood cheers it up. Somebody is going to tell something – and then they’re killed first! That always goes down well. It comes in all my books – camouflaged different ways of course. And people like untraceable poisons, and idiotic police inspectors and girls tied up in cellars with sewer gas or water pouring in (such a troublesome way of killing anyone really) and a hero who can dispose of anything from three to seven villains singlehanded.

Wait." Walter went to the basket, taking what was a gray sleeve, drawing it out fro the middle of the heap. "Oh," He said. He held the shapeless wool sweater to his chest. Joyce had knit for months the year Daniel died, and here was the result, her handiwork, the garment that would fit a giant. It was nothing more than twelve skeins of yarn and thousands of loops, but it had the power to bring back in a flash the green-tiled walls of the hospital, the sound of an ambulance trying to cut through city traffic in the distance, the breathing of the dying boy, his father staring at the ceiling, the full greasy bucket of fried chicken on he bed table. "I'll take this one," Walter said, balling up the sweater as best he could, stuffing it into a shopping bag that was half full of the books he was taking home, that he was borrowing. "Oh, honey," Joyce said. "You don't want that old scrap." "You made it. I remember your making it." Keep it light, he said to himself, that's a boy. "There's a use for it. Don't you think so, Aunt Jeannie? No offense, Mom, but I could invade the Huns with it or strap the sleeves to my car tires in a blizzard, for traction, or protect our nation with it out in space, a shield against nuclear attack." Jeannie tittered in her usual way in spite of herself. "You always did have that sense of humor," she said as she went upstairs. When she was out of range, Joyce went to Walter's bag and retrieved the sweater. She laid it on the card table, the long arms hanging down, and she fingered the stitches. "Will you look at the mass of it," she exclaimed. "I don't even recall making it." ""'Memory -- that strange deceiver,'" Walter quoted.

Everyone's here except for St. Clair." Meredith cranes her neck around the cafeteria. "He's usually running late." "Always," Josh corrects. "Always running late." I clear my throat. "I think I met him last night. In the hallway." "Good hair and an English accent?" Meredith asks. "Um.Yeah.I guess." I try to keep my voice casual. Josh smirks. "Everyone's in luuurve with St. Clair." "Oh,shut up," Meredith says. "I'm not." Rashmi looks at me for the first time, calculating whether or not I might fall in love with her own boyfriend. He lets go of her hand and gives an exaggerated sigh. "Well,I am. I'm asking him to prom. This is our year, I just know it." "This school has a prom?" I ask. "God no," Rashmi says. "Yeah,Josh. You and St. Clair would look really cute in matching tuxes." "Tails." The English accent makes Meredith and me jump in our seats. Hallway boy. Beautiful boy. His hair is damp from the rain. "I insist the tuxes have tails, or I'm giving your corsage to Steve Carver instead." "St. Clair!" Josh springs from his seat, and they give each other the classic two-thumps-on-the-back guy hug. "No kiss? I'm crushed,mate." "Thought it might miff the ol' ball and chain. She doesn't know about us yet." "Whatever," Rashi says,but she's smiling now. It's a good look for her. She should utilize the corners of her mouth more often. Beautiful Hallway Boy (Am I supposed to call him Etienne or St. Clair?) drops his bag and slides into the remaining seat between Rashmi and me. "Anna." He's surprised to see me,and I'm startled,too. He remembers me. "Nice umbrella.Could've used that this morning." He shakes a hand through his hair, and a drop lands on my bare arm. Words fail me. Unfortunately, my stomach speaks for itself. His eyes pop at the rumble,and I'm alarmed by how big and brown they are. As if he needed any further weapons against the female race. Josh must be right. Every girl in school must be in love with him. "Sounds terrible.You ought to feed that thing. Unless..." He pretends to examine me, then comes in close with a whisper. "Unless you're one of those girls who never eats. Can't tolerate that, I'm afraid. Have to give you a lifetime table ban." I'm determined to speak rationally in his presence. "I'm not sure how to order." "Easy," Josh says. "Stand in line. Tell them what you want.Accept delicious goodies. And then give them your meal card and two pints of blood." "I heard they raised it to three pints this year," Rashmi says. "Bone marrow," Beautiful Hallway Boy says. "Or your left earlobe." "I meant the menu,thank you very much." I gesture to the chalkboard above one of the chefs. An exquisite cursive hand has written out the morning's menu in pink and yellow and white.In French. "Not exactly my first language." "You don't speak French?" Meredith asks. "I've taken Spanish for three years. It's not like I ever thought I'd be moving to Paris." "It's okay," Meredith says quickly. "A lot of people here don't speak French." "But most of them do," Josh adds. "But most of them not very well." Rashmi looks pointedly at him. "You'll learn the lanaguage of food first. The language of love." Josh rubs his belly like a shiny Buddha. "Oeuf. Egg. Pomme. Apple. Lapin. Rabbit." "Not funny." Rashmi punches him in the arm. "No wonder Isis bites you. Jerk." I glance at the chalkboard again. It's still in French. "And, um, until then?" "Right." Beautiful Hallway Boy pushes back his chair. "Come along, then. I haven't eaten either." I can't help but notice several girls gaping at him as we wind our way through the crowd.

Jane, I don’t care what capacity you let me have in your life. I just want to be there. And if that means I have to keep my distance, I’ll do that.” I sighed. If ever there was a time for me to lay all my cards on the table, this was it. Naked, wounded, and vulnerable. “So, here’s my basic problem with us, the reason I can’t seem to relax into a relationship with you, the reason I find problems where none exist and I push you away. I—I can’t figure out why you’re with me!” I exclaimed, clapping my hand over my mouth. I hadn’t meant for that part to come out. I had meant to say, “You lie and hide things from me.” Gabriel pried my fingers away from my lips. My hands trembled as stuff I’d been feeling for months tumbled from my tongue. “I know that makes me neurotic and sad, but I can’t figure out why you want to be with me. Every other woman in your life is exotic and beautiful and has all this history. And I’m just some drunk girl you followed home from a bar, some pathetic human you felt your usual need to protect, and you got stuck with a lifetime tie to her because she was dumb enough to get shot. I can’t stand the idea that you feel obligated to me. I know I’m insecure and pushy and spastic, desperately inappropriate at times and just plain odd at others. And I can’t help but wonder why you would want that when there are obviously so many other options. I can’t help but feel that I’m keeping you from someone better.” I let out a loud, long breath. It felt as if some tremendous weight on my chest had wiggled loose and then dropped away. No more running. No more floating along and waiting. My cards were on the table. If Gabriel and I couldn’t have a future after this, it wasn’t because I held back from him. Now I could only hope it didn’t blow up in my face in some horrible way. I wasn’t sure my face could handle much more. Gabriel sighed and cupped my chin, forcing me to look him in the eye. “I didn’t follow you that night because I wanted to protect you. I followed you that night because you were one of the most interesting people I’d met in decades. You had this light about you, this sweetness, this biting humor. After I’d only known you for an hour, you made me laugh harder than I had since before I was turned. You made me feel normal, at peace, for the first time in years. And I didn’t want to lose that yet. Even if it was just watching over you from a mile away, I didn’t want to leave your presence. I followed you because I didn’t want to let you go. Even then, I saw you were one of the most extraordinary, fascinating, maddening people I would ever know. Even then, I think I knew that I would love you. If you don’t love me, that’s one thing. But if you do, just stop arguing with me about it. It’s annoying. ” “Fair enough,” I conceded. “Why the hell couldn’t you have told me this a year ago?” “I’ve wanted to. You weren’t ready to hear it.

It’s our long absence from the city that makes us so popular,” Jordan joked, tossing chips into the center of the table. Ian scarcely heard him. His mind was on Elizabeth, who had been at the mercy of her loathsome uncle for two years. The man had bartered his own flesh and blood-and Ian was the purchaser. It wasn’t true, of course, but he had an uneasy feeling Elizabeth would see it that way as soon as she discovered what had been done without her knowledge or consent. In Scotland she’d drawn a gun on him. In London he wouldn’t blame her if she fired it. He was toying with the idea of trying to court her for a few days before he told her they were already betrothed, and simultaneously wondering if she was going to hate the idea of marrying him. Belhaven might be a repulsive toad, but Ian had grievously and repeatedly wronged her. “I don’t mean to criticize your strategy, my friend”-Jordan’s drawl drew Ian’s wandering attention-“but you have just wagered $1,000 on what appears to be a pair of absolutely nothing.” Ian glanced down at the hand he’d just turned over and actually felt a flush of embarrassment steal up his neck. “I have something on my mind,” he explained. “Whatever it is, it is assuredly not cards. Either that or you’ve lost your famous touch.” “I wouldn’t be surprised,” Ian said absently, stretching out his long legs and crossing them at the ankles. “Do you want to play another hand?” “I don’t think I can afford it,” Ian joked wearily.

Scene I. A little dark Parlour in Boston: Guards standing at the door. Hazlerod, Crusty Crowbar, Simple Sapling, Hateall, and Hector Mushroom. Simple. I know not what to think of these sad times, The people arm'd,—and all resolv'd to die Ere they'll submit.—— Crusty Crowbar. I too am almost sick of the parade Of honours purchas'd at the price of peace. Simple. Fond as I am of greatness and her charms, Elate with prospects of my rising name, Push'd into place,—a place I ne'er expected, My bounding heart leapt in my feeble breast. And ecstasies entranc'd my slender brain.— But yet, ere this I hop'd more solid gains, As my low purse demands a quick supply.— Poor Sylvia weeps,—and urges my return To rural peace and humble happiness, As my ambition beggars all her babes. Crusty. When first I listed in the desp'rate cause, And blindly swore obedience to his will, So wise, so just, so good I thought Rapatio, That if salvation rested on his word I'd pin my faith, and risk my hopes thereon. Hazlerod. Any why not now?—What staggers thy belief? Crusty. Himself—his perfidy appears— It is too plain he has betray'd his country; And we're the wretched tools by him mark'd out To seal its ruins—tear up the ancient forms, And every vestige treacherously destroy, Nor leave a trait of freedom in the land. Nor did I think hard fate wou'd call me up From drudging o'er my acres, Treading the glade, and sweating at the plough, To dangle at the tables of the great; At bowls and cards to spend my frozen years; To sell my friends, my country, and my conscience; Profane the sacred sabbaths of my God; Scorn'd by the very men who want my aid To spread distress o'er this devoted people. Hazlerod. Pho—what misgivings—why these idle qualms, This shrinking backwards at the bugbear conscience; In early life I heard the phantom nam'd, And the grave sages prate of moral sense Presiding in the bosom of the just; Or planting thongs about the guilty heart. Bound by these shackles, long my lab'ring mind, Obscurely trod the lower walks of life, In hopes by honesty my bread to gain; But neither commerce, or my conjuring rods, Nor yet mechanics, or new fangled drills, Or all the iron-monger's curious arts, Gave me a competence of shining ore, Or gratify'd my itching palm for more; Till I dismiss'd the bold intruding guest, And banish'd conscience from my wounded breast. Crusty. Happy expedient!—Could I gain the art, Then balmy sleep might sooth my waking lids, And rest once more refresh my weary soul.

Inarguably, a successful restaurant demands that you live on the premises for the first few years, working seventeen-hour days, with total involvement in every aspect of a complicated, cruel and very fickle trade. You must be fluent in not only Spanish but the Kabbala-like intricacies of health codes, tax law, fire department regulations, environmental protection laws, building code, occupational safety and health regs, fair hiring practices, zoning, insurance, the vagaries and back-alley back-scratching of liquor licenses, the netherworld of trash removal, linen, grease disposal. And with every dime you've got tied up in your new place, suddenly the drains in your prep kitchen are backing up with raw sewage, pushing hundreds of gallons of impacted crap into your dining room; your coke-addled chef just called that Asian waitress who's working her way through law school a chink, which ensures your presence in court for the next six months; your bartender is giving away the bar to under-age girls from Wantagh, any one of whom could then crash Daddy's Buick into a busload of divinity students, putting your liquor license in peril, to say the least; the Ansel System could go off, shutting down your kitchen in the middle of a ten-thousand-dollar night; there's the ongoing struggle with rodents and cockroaches, any one of which could crawl across the Tina Brown four-top in the middle of the dessert course; you just bought 10,000 dollars-worth of shrimp when the market was low, but the walk-in freezer just went on the fritz and naturally it's a holiday weekend, so good luck getting a service call in time; the dishwasher just walked out after arguing with the busboy, and they need glasses now on table seven; immigration is at the door for a surprise inspection of your kitchen's Green Cards; the produce guy wants a certified check or he's taking back the delivery; you didn't order enough napkins for the weekend — and is that the New York Times reviewer waiting for your hostess to stop flirting and notice her?