Billy Summers

by Stephen King

Billy’s whistle isn’t part of the act, which he doesn’t think of as an act but as his dumb self, the one he shows to guys like Nick and Frank and Paulie. It’s like a seatbelt. You don’t use it because you expect to be in a crash, but you never know who you might meet coming over a hill on your side of the road. This is also true on the road of life, where people veer all over the place and drive the wrong way on the turnpike.

He has no problem with bad people paying to have other bad people killed. He basically sees himself as a garbageman with a gun.

Lady Justice is based on Iustice, a Roman goddess more or less invented by the emperor Augustus.

This isn’t a house, it’s the architectural equivalent of red golf pants.

in situ,

but you can’t help how you feel. Feelings are like breathing, they come in and go out.

The Bible has a story to puncture every equivocation and denial. The Bible—New Testament as well as Old—does not forgive.

According to William Wordsworth, the best writing is about strong emotion recalled in tranquility.

“No man on his deathbed ever said ‘I wish I had spent more time in the office.’

Used to be a resort hotel there, but it burned flat many a moon ago.” He drops his voice. “It was reputed to be haunted.”

“And way across, on the other side, this is crazy, but I thought I saw that hotel you talked about. Then I blinked my eyes—the wind was so strong they were tearing up—and when I looked again, it was gone.” Bucky doesn’t smile. “You’re not the only person who’s seen that. I’m not a superstitious man, but I wouldn’t go anywhere near where the Overlook Hotel used to stand. Bad stuff happened there.”