It was his subconscious which told him this – that infuriating part of a person’s brain which never responds to interrogation, merely gives little meaningful nudges and then sits humming quietly to itself, saying nothing.

More from The Long Dark Tea-Time of the Soul

• Dennis Hutch had stepped up into the top seat when its founder had died of a lethal overdose of brick wall, taken while under the influence of a Ferrari and a bottle of tequila.
• I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.
• It can hardly be a coincidence that no language on Earth has ever produced the phrase, “as pretty as an airport.” Airports are ugly. Some are very ugly. Some attain a degree of ugliness that can only be the result of a special effort.
• It was a battered yellow Citroen 2CV which had had one careful owner but also three suicidally reckless ones.
• “My name is Kate Schechter. Two ‘c’s, two ‘h’s, two ‘e’s, and also a ‘t’, an ‘r’, and an ‘s’. Provided they’re all there the bank won’t be fussy about the order they come in.”
• The impossible often has a kind of integrity to it which the merely improbable lacks.