Tim Mason > Quotes

“To look into another man’s heart is difficult enough. To read the heart of a monster—if he has one—may not be possible.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“The romantic comedies of Shakespeare were performed by torchlight in the college gardens, and unscripted love affairs were consummated in the neighboring woods.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“The commissioner was silent for a moment. “It was Dickens did this to you,” he said at last. “Gave you ideas above your station, didn’t he.” “Dickens? Not him, sir. I’d say the greater influence on my current thinking would be Mr. Karl Marx.” “Karl Marx? Indeed.” “Indeed, sir. Herr Marx urged me personally to stop waiting beneath your bloody table for the bleeding crumbs to fall.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“I come from the lower orders, that is understood by all. Not the lowest; you’d have to go back to my grandfather for the lowest. He was a night-soil remover, did you know that, Sam? One shilling per stinking cesspit. Did you know that they set me to working with him when I was a boy? One summer I chucked it, ran to the countryside, hid in a hay mow. Farmer found me in the morning, took pity, let me stay. Let me work with him and his dogs, tending his sheep. It was bliss. I never loved anything like I loved them dogs. Then my father showed up and dragged me home. Why? He didn’t want me. “Never mind. You could say my father’s rise to running his own public house was nothing short of a miracle, really. And then I went and edged up a rung from him, didn’t I, when I became a constable. Promoted to detective. Then chief of detectives. Still and all, I got about as high as I could possibly go, given what I come from. And that ain’t particular high. Just ask Sir Richard Mayne, commissioner of the Metropolitan, if you’re unsure of that.” Llewellyn sighed deeply and shook his head. “You seem impatient, Mr. Llewellyn. Am I keeping you?” Field poured the last of the whiskey into his glass. “Now, forget my old man. Forget the night-soil remover. Start over. Say I come from a monkey. And so did you. And Commissioner Mayne—him, too.” He looked around the tavern. “And so did every bleeding body on the whole earth come from monkeys, and those monkeys come from God knows what—fish? Worms? Who benefits, Sam? Who gets hurt? Who likes it, and who don’t?” Llewellyn shrugged. “I’ll tell you who don’t like it: the merchants who run the bleeding empire don’t like it, not one bit. It puts every man on the same level as them, see? The rich, the poor, the light-skinned, and the dark. The bishops don’t like it, nor the lords, because if Mr. Darwin has his way, where’s the control? Who’s in charge, who’s on top and who’s not? Bad for business, Mr. Darwin’s notions are. But for blokes like me and you? Well, even a policeman can dream, can’t he? It’s not flattering, perhaps, having an orangutan as your forefather, but there’s a kind of hope in it, don’t you see? Last I checked, there weren’t no quality monkeys, nor were there lower-class ones.” “And?” “Crash, boom, Mr. Darwin brings it all down. Rule Britannia and the lot. Brings it down harder and more thorough than Mr. Marx ever dreamt in his darkest revolutionary dream.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“Charles Field sat naked in the tin bath at the center of Mrs. Field’s kitchen, scrubbing himself with a coarse brush. Jane Field, fair-haired, shapely, and some fifteen years younger than her husband, poured another kettle of steaming water into the tub. The inspector followed her with his”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“Damn me, it’s his prick I’ve got hold of and the bloody thing is stiff! Well, of course it is, the bastard was about to cut me up!”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“Well, it’s their motto, isn’t it? Or something like it?” “What motto? Whose motto?” “You know.” “I assure you, my dear, I have no idea.” “The communists.” “Communists? Mrs. Field, what’s this about a motto?”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“What do we learn from the obstacles?” Master’s eyes were more than ever lumps of coal, thought Tom. “We learn that the obstacles are the path. That the road is the journey.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“We are passing the Schloß Marienburg.” Field stooped and peered up at a massive walled castle. Below, the greenish-gray river was spanned by an arched stone bridge. “This is Würzberg, Inspector. Here”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“I wonder, Mr. Field, if you can imagine what it is to live every moment of every day in the knowledge that you are considered less than. Substandard. Lacking.”
― Tim Mason, The Nightingale Affair

“Thomas Huxley commented that Wilberforce’s brain had at last come into contact with reality, and the result had been fatal.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“She was twenty-nine years old, bug-eyed, warty, and, credible rumor had it, had never been kissed.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair

“Life is short and uncertain,.... make the time.”
― Tim Mason, The Darwin Affair