Susan in NC’s Reviews > The Seven Dials Mystery > Status Update

“”What they call a forceful personality. The kind of man you'd get if a steamroller were turned into a human being.” “Rather tiring?” suggested Bundle sympathetically. “Frightfully tiring, full of all the most depressing virtues like sobriety and punctuality. I don't know which are the worst, powerful personalities or earnest politicians. I do so prefer the cheerful inefficient.””

“ Jimmy gave one quick, nervous glance at the still, white face. Could that be cherubic, pink Gerry Wade? That still peaceful figure. He shivered. As he turned to leave the room, his glance swept the mantelshelf and he stopped in astonishment. The alarm clocks had been ranged along it neatly in a row.”

“ Now, with a pack of housemaids, a butler like an archbishop, several footmen of imposing proportions, a bevy of scuttling kitchen and scullery maids, a terrifying foreign chef with a “temperament”, and a housekeeper of immense proportions who alternately creaked and rustled when she moved, Lady Coote was as one marooned on a desert island.”

“ The room was empty save for his hostess, and her reproachful gaze gave Jimmy the same feeling of discomfort he always experienced on catching the eye of a defunct codfish exposed on a fishmonger's slab.”