Death and the Dancing Footman Quotes

“Until this moment Chloris and Mandrake had wished above all things for the assurance that Alleyn would take charge. Now that, with a certain crispness and a marked change of manner, he had actually done so, each of them felt an icy touch of apprehension. They had set in motion a process which they were unable to stop. They were not yet nervous for themselves but instinctively they moved a little nearer to each other. They had called in the Yard.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Don't you know about The Others? They're the ones that leave nails and broken glass on the road. They hide things when you're in a hurry. They've only got one arm and one leg each, you know. So they take single gloves and stockings, and they're frightfully keen on keys and unanswered letters.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Stop!" Hersey cried out. "Stop! something appalling is happening to all of us. We're saying things we'll regret for the rest of our lives."

"We're merely speaking the truth" [William Compline]

"It's the sort that shouldn't be spoken. It's a beastly lop-sided exaggerated truth.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Внезапно он понял, что потребность рассказать все именно ей и возникла оттого, что она придавала этой истории так мало значения. Сочувствие только бы усилило мрачность переживания. А равнодушие к его навязчивым страхам заставило впервые задуматься, уж не являются ли они просто ненужным преувеличением чувств.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Ah,” said Dr. Hart, “this is a pet theory of my own. The actual ‘he’ is known to nobody.” “Does the actual ‘he’ even exist?” Jonathan returned. “May it not be argued that ‘he’ has no intrinsic reality since different selfs arise out of a conglomeration of selfs to meet different events?”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“If you're going to ask me to provide myself with three nice little alibis," said Hersey, "you may as well know straight away that I can't do it. I seem to remember reading somewhere that that makes me innocent and I'm sure I hope it's true"

"It's in the best tradition of detective fiction, I understand," said Allyen with a smile.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Beneath it hung a faded photograph in an Oxford frame. It presented a Victorian gentleman wearing an ineffable air of hauteur and a costume which suggested that he had begun to dress up as Mr. Sherlock Holmes but, suddenly losing interest, had gone out fishing instead.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“They were fortified with all the resilience that youth presents to an emotional shock. In the midst of murder and attempted suicide, they had managed, not only to behave with address and good sense, but all to fall in love with each other.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“With corpses stiffening on the premises, sir, all things be possible to a man with a desperate powerful idea egging him on.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“Honestly, Jonathan, I begin to think you are suffering from some terrible form of insanity the idée fixe. People may drown in your ornamental waters or perish in your snow-drifts, and all you can think of is your hell-inspired party.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman

“For some reason that he had never been able to understand, Mandrake was a man in whom his fellow-creatures confided. He was by no means obviously sympathetic and he seldom asked for confidences but, perhaps because of these very omissions, they came his way.”
― Ngaio Marsh, Death and the Dancing Footman