Mandy

“Don’t make a noise, or I’ll send the devil a henchman!”
― Robert E. Howard, The Complete Chronicles of Conan

“He was such a weak, miserable, unsatisfying target. He still thought he was one of the good guys. I tried to reach him a little.

"If you could bring in a thousand-percent profit a day, LaFrance, I wouldn't throw pocket change on the duck there in front of you. If I was on fire, I wouldn't buy water from you. I came prowling for you, LaFrance. If the thing you loved most in the world was that face you wear, I would have changed it permanently, little by little. If your most precious possession was a beautiful wife, she'd be right down there below in the master stateroom waiting for you leave so I could get back to her. If you juggled for a living, friend, you'd now have broken wrists and broken elbows."

"What the hell is the matter with you?"

"Get off the boat. Go ashore. Tush Bannon was one of the best friends I ever had. All you give a damn about is money, so that's where I hit you."

"Best ... friend?" he whispered.

And I watched the gray appear. That gray like a wet stone. Gray for fright. Gray for guilt. Gray for despair. His mouth worked. "You ... rooned me, all right. Ever'thing I worked all my life for is gone. You finished me off, McGee."

"Wait a minute," Meyer said. "Maybe I've got an idea."

LaFrance came to point like a good bird dog. "Yes? Yes? What?"

Meyer smiled at him benignly. "The answer was staring us right in the face all the time. It's so simple! What you do is kill yourself!"

LaFrance stared at him, tried to comprehend the joke, tried to even smile, but the smile fell away. Meyer's smile stayed put.”
― John D. MacDonald, Pale Gray for Guilt

“I sat on my heels and squinted up at her. Dark red hair and disapproval, outlined against a blue December sky. "Win a few, lose a few, honey," I said.

"What are you" she asked.

I stood up and put my hands on her upper arms, near the shoulders and plucked her up off the sawhorse and held her. Maybe I was smiling at her. I wouldn't know. What I was saying seemed to come from a strange direction, as if I were standing several feet behind myself. I said some nonsense about smelling these things out, about sensing the quickest way to open people up, and so you do it, because if you don't, then maybe you miss one little piece of something you should know, and then you go join the long long line of the dead ones, because you were careless.

"And," I heard myself say, "Tush killed himself but not with that damned engine block. He killed himself with something he said, or something he did, and he didn't know he was killing himself. Maybe he didn't listen very good, or catch on soon enough. I listen very good. I catch on. And when I add up this tab and name the price, I'm going to look at some nice gray skin, honey. Gray and pale, oily and guilty as hell, and some eyes shifting around looking for some way out of it. But every damned door will be nailed shut.”
― John D. MacDonald, Pale Gray for Guilt

“I could dance with disaster and grin to the end.”
― Glen Cook, Bleak Seasons