The Man Who Died Twice (Thursday Murder Club, #2)

by Richard Osman

“I’d outlive a dog through pure spite,” says Ron. “We’d just sit in opposite corners of the room, staring each other out, and see who went first. Not me. It’s like when we were negotiating with British Leyland in ’seventy-eight. The moment one of their lot went to the loo first, I knew we had ’em.” Ron knocks back more wine. “Never go to the loo first. Tie a knot in it if you have to.”

“You must die before your children, of course, because you have taught them to live without you. But not your dog. You teach your dog only to live with you.”

I imagine if you could hear all the morning tears in this place it would sound like birdsong.

You silly old man, he thinks as he turns the key in the ignition, you made the biggest mistake of them all. You forgot to live, you just hid away, safe and sound.

The twinkle you soon realize is actually the beam of a lighthouse, warning you off the rocks.

Revenge is not a straight line, it’s a circle. It’s a grenade that goes off while you’re still in the room, and you can’t help but be caught in the blast.

They say a man who desires revenge should dig two graves, and this is surely right.

“It is fine to say ‘what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.’ It is admirable. But it no longer applies when you’re eighty. When you are eighty, whatever doesn’t kill you just ushers you through the next door, and the next door and the next, and all of these doors lock behind you. No bouncing back. The gravitational pull of youth disappears, and you just float up and up.”

Elizabeth taps her head. “My palace has many rooms. Some are dustier than others.”

People love to sleep, and yet they are so frightened of death. Bogdan has never understood it.

“Some people in life, Sue, are weather forecasters, whereas other people are the weather itself.”

Keep being scared, keep being lonely. And spend the next twenty years coming to see me, and I will keep telling you the same thing. Put your boots on and climb the next mountain. See what’s up there. Friends, promotions, babies. It’s your mountain.”

“You are simply a little lost, Donna. And if one is never lost in life, then clearly one has never traveled anywhere interesting.”

But you know the mafia.” “Don’t I just,” says Lomax. “They don’t even take their shoes off when they come in.”

Her husband, her love. Gone to dementia, then gone forever. The man who died twice.