178 Quotes by Dorothy Dunnett

What to do when attacked at sea, lessons one to ten. They had spent their first morning at sea being trained, remorselessly, by Francis Crawford for this precise event. ‘I know what to do,’ said Philippa. ‘Offer them the raspberry wine and keep them talking till Mother comes in.

Here you have a hawk of the lure, not of the fist. He will not come to you. If you would have him, you must lay your heart upon your hawking-glove; and feed it to him.

I prize freedom of the mind above freedom of the body.

A smile, bracketing his still mouth, spread like bane over Lymond’s pale face.

Lymond said gently, “Let us bathe in moral philosophy, as in a living river. Double-dealing is my business.

Danny Hislop was not there, nor the artist called Blacklock. Riding between Lymond and the fresh-faced Knight of St John who did not like eagles, Chancellor asked after them. Ludovic d’Harcourt glanced at Lymond without answering. Lymond said, ‘They are undergoing a course of correction. If in the event they are either correct or in the least chastened, I shall be surprised.

Whether romance existed in him or not, sentimentality had no place at all.

Nine-tenths of every attack is bluff. The art is to know when to call it.

She gave up combing her hair, which the salt air had reduced to a kind of scrim of brown hessian, and, lying down, proceeded to keep her fingernails short in the way Kate admired least. Then she overslept.