The Demon in the House Quotes

“There is something about school stories peculiarly repellent to the adult intellect. I hold no brief for my own books, far from it, but they are at least not characterized by paucity of invention, improbability of incident, monotony of plot and entire want of taste.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“That admirable woman thought so humbly of her own potboiling that to hear it stigmatised by a critic of Stoker’s mental powers as rubbishy stuff didn’t depress her in the least. If she could have made it more rubbishy, and so sold more thousands of copies than she did, she would willingly have done so, but the artist in her, on whose existence George Knox and Adrian always insisted, kept her standard up, firmly if spasmodically.”
― Angela Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“But Tony, though he had never heard of the word attrition, had great faith in his own powers of wearing down his mother’s resistance. He had found by long experience that if one asked for a thing often enough, simply ignoring rebuffs and refusals, one could usually get what one wanted.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“wonder if you could manage one more,” she said. “The two elder girls are down here for their holiday. Ruth is going to play tennis with friends, but Sylvia has nothing to do today and she would so love a bathing party.”
Stoker had put a poor opinion of what she called “those two Vicarage girls,” blaming them loudly for not having found husbands at their ages, but Laura liked them both, especially Sylvia, the elder. She could not agree with Stoker that to be games mistress at a large girls’ school at the age of twenty-three was necessarily the prelude to a life of depressing spinsterhood.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“And mind you,” said Dr. Ford, “I’m only doing this to please your mother and Lord Stoke. If you were my child I’d let you fester and gangrene, and serve you right. Did I or did I not tell you not to go near Stokey Hole?”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“Mother,” said Tony, pulling Laura down with urgent hands and whispering, “Donk is a bit homesick for his own baby. He got a bit homesick because of having Sibyl’s baby to hold. Poor old Donk. He’s a decent chap, mother.”
Laura went across to the other bed and bent over it.
“You don’t want to go home, do you?” she asked anxiously.
Once more Master Wesendonck shook his head.
“Would you like to go and see the baby again tomorrow?” she asked.
Master Wesendonck sprang to a sitting position, reached out two skinny arms and gave his hostess a violent hug. Then he detached himself, and lying down, apparently went straight to sleep.
“Good old Donk,” said Tony.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“it’s only like a little pin-prick. I’ll let you see my railway if you are good and don’t cry.
“She doesn’t understand yet,” said Nurse Chiffinch. “When she’s a big girl she’ll love to play with your toys and things, won’t you, chicky-wicky?”
Tony’s face suddenly became perfectly expressionless, and he walked away from Nurse with some dignity.
“Of course she can’t understand,” he confided to Mrs. Knox, “but it’s nice for her to be talked to sensibly. If people say things like chicky-wicky she’ll never learn English properly. I shall talk sensibly to her and train her to be educated.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“No,” said Adrian, “but I met Johns at a lunch not long afterwards and he was still weak from the effects. He said he had never been given so much advice about the publishing trade in his life. I rather gathered that Tony had offered to go into partnership with him and show him how the business ought to be run.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“The monthly nurse, a delightful young woman called Nurse Chiffinch, was seated starchily in a deck chair, crocheting a mauve bed jacket. Such was her tact that she always sat far enough from her employers to make conversation difficult, though near enough to make it impossible for them to talk privately.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“Look here, don’t put my coat near your horrible muddy self,” said Adrian.
“But, sir, one must have something around one’s neck if one is steering, else one catches cold.”
“Well, if you touch my coat I’ll kill you,” said Adrian, who from a glance at his watch knew that Laura would be already wondering which of them was drowned and arranging their funeral. Not that she would care if I were drowned, he reflected almost bitterly, only if it was one of those young mudlarks.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“Run along!” said Tony bitterly, as he and Master Wesendonck strolled up the drive towards the road. “As if we were kids! If I had a bike I’d take you for a ride on the handle bars, but mother won’t get me one. She did nearly get me one last Easter, but it had defective steel and got broken, and I would have been killed if I hadn’t got off. I expect the chaps at school would have had a half holiday if I’d been killed. Let’s sit on the gate and see the motor-bus go past.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“I know. But everyone rides without lights, at least all decent riders do. And if you tied a lantern around a dog’s neck, what do you think would happen, Stokes? It would be quite dazzled and not know which way to go.” “Get its hair burnt off, more likely,” said Stoker.
“But if it was alone in the dark,” continued Tony, disregarding this interruption, “it would find its way anywhere by instinct. I bet if you put me anywhere around about sixty miles from here with the bike, in the middle of the night, I’d find my way home. I have a kind of instinct like a dog.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“Also he liked his mother very much, and sometimes hugged her to strangulation point, till she had to beg for mercy.”
― Angela Margaret Thirkell, The Demon in the House

“Tony went upstairs with an expressionless face, undressed, folded his clothes neatly, washed his face and hands, and got into bed. He was full of resentment against the world. People made one dive when one could really dive quite well if one had a proper diving board. If one killed a wasp people seemed to be annoyed instead of being grateful. People didn't even want one to bark like a dog, he thought, remembering earlier grievances. Girls were simply a nuisance and he was glad he had burst Dora's pig. People who said "nyang, nyang" like that deserved to have their pigs burst.”
― Angela Thirkell, The Demon in the House