The Cove Quotes
"As if so pure no breath need carry it into the world."
"Not just in these mountains but probably in the whole world."
"As if even in death retaining the weightlessness of flight."
"Clothes dried quicker in the sunlight and they smelled and felt cleaner."
"Superstitions are just coincidence or ignorance."
"A place folks ought to be scared of, not some gloamy cove."
"Sometimes a man's courage is best shown by what he doesn't do."
"Even if it was gold, the chain and medallion wouldn’t up-scale a quarter eagle, and why not hide the flute?"
"He brightens up my life. That’s what Marcie said about Robbie, and that was what Walter did."
"Laurel had learned the true of that as a child. The parakeets had flown over the cove like a dense green cloud, but they’d never paused in their passing, never circled or landed."
"It was like their bodies had knit together and lifted the whole cove skyward into the sun’s full light."
"Laurel lifted another handful of beans into her lap and wondered where Walter had found his green feather."
"I’ve had no better, taxed and sealed included, and I’ve tested plenty of both."
"That’s right," Slidell said, "especially since I told these boys Hank’s got a crackerjack fife player down here, all the way from New York at that."
"The following winter her father placed the barrel between the largest hog’s eyes and squeezed the shotgun’s trigger."
"I am not a student, Miss Yount. I am a soldier."
""I best go suckle him, because it’ll be a sight easier now than on a bumpy wagon."
"Laurel wondered if Walter understood that about her, that she was as used to silence as he was."
"It was as lonely a sound as she’d ever heard."
"Laurel smiled at her own silliness. It was like years ago when she’d open the wish book and place her finger on this or that, making believe it was something she could actually have."
"It gave you some hope, Laurel supposed, and that was something, but it didn’t change the day to day very much."
"No matter how little, she could always taste it."
"Trusting everyone but her, Laurel couldn’t help thinking."
"Already it was Thursday evening. One more day and one more night and he’d be gone."
"You’d think a man like Weatherbee wouldn’t abide such silly notions."
""That’s the damndest thing I ever heard," Boyce finally said. "It makes me want to turn this dulcimer into a ball swatter."
"There’s been times you’d not believe you could have even this much."
"The last of the voyagers came up the gangplank, passed first the woman and then a steward who checked off names."
"Perhaps they wish an image of what they aspire to be instead of what they are."
"Men are glad to believe that which they wish for."
"You could have just forgot a time when he saw you use it."
"I mean, if I happened to see him, would it be better not to say anything?"
"Being around children does make a part of me still feel young, even with my gray hair."
"Something that pretty needs to be in the world, don't you think?"
"It's best to keep what we have discussed among ourselves."
"The better angels of our nature, corporal as well as spiritual."
"A modest demeanor reflected the truth, that he was merely a soldier doing his duty."
"What he felt was gratitude that he’d had the opportunity to mold such fine boys into men."
"It seemed the earth had paused, unsure if it wanted to turn back toward summer or move on into winter."
"I want to look at something I can’t see the end of. That’s how it is, isn’t it, endless?"
"As lonely a life as I’ve had in this place I’d not wish it otherwise, because had it been different I wouldn’t have met you."
"He remembered how Boyce hardly acknowledged him three months earlier at the Turkey Trot, but by God Boyce and Ansel both were following him now."
"The world no longer spun around Chauncey. It had shuddered to a stop and locked itself into place."
"He was still in the woods when he dismounted and leashed Traveler to a dogwood sapling."
"The hell with them, Chauncey thought, and with the Claytons and the Sheltons and that German professor and that hag librarian and Meachum and Estep and that damn escaped Hun too."
"He leaned his head into his palms and closed his eyes, did not open them until a voice asked for his ticket."