The Fourth Protocol Quotes
"The man in gray decided to take the Glen Suite of diamonds at midnight. Provided they were still in the apartment safe and the occupants away."
"Sitting across from the luxury apartment building, dressed in a chauffeur’s uniform at the wheel of the rented Volvo Estate, Jim Rawlings breathed a sigh of relief."
"Rawlings was confident it would be the latter."
"As was necessary, he had to have a front business to account for the money."
"The old man’s style hadn’t changed, he thought. Brief to the point of starkness, clear and concise, devoid of elaborate courtesies, inviting no contradiction."
"Taking paper and pencil, Philby began to rough out the first draft of his reply."
"Simply to shred the file, which he privately regarded as embarrassing and which might one day prove dangerous, was not possible."
"The trouble with Raoul Levy was not that he lacked skill; it was that he was lonely."
"Zablonsky was lost in contemplation of the jewels that sparkled on his blotter."
"Capstick could not have struck a rawer nerve."
"Men like these always did what they wanted to people like him. There was no point in resisting or appealing."
"He had offered her a divorce, but she did not want one."
"You know where I am if anything big blows up."
"Louis Zablonsky knew the men who arrived in a van and knocked on his front door late on Saturday night."
"The British working class is one of the most conservative groups in the world."
"He would probably have gone already but for the personal responsibilities that bore upon him."
"It is a fact that convicted traitors in prison, along with child molesters, have to be kept in seclusion."
"It was all he was able to say. By the time they got to Hampstead, Louis Zablonsky was another of the night’s dead-on-arrival cases."
"She maintained a small studio flat in the West End for her trysts and unashamedly enjoyed her Saturday-night treats."
"Rawlings was a burglar and a thief, but like much of the London underworld he would not have anyone 'trash' his country."
"Time is becoming of the very essence." - Sir Patrick Strickland
"When men in that mood talk, they tend to spill the lot." - Preston
"If he is the guilty party, he would be sorely tempted to abstract a copy and make a move to pass it on." - Preston
"It is just that ... well ... sometimes one can get an impression from interrogating a suspect that ill conveys itself to paper." - Sir Nigel Irvine
"The chances of a man in a city of twelve million going into an ice-cream parlor for a sundae, of that ice-cream parlor’s delivering to twelve customers the next morning, and of one of those customers speaking through a wrong number to the ice-cream eater by midnight are more than a million to one." - Preston
"If not June, that leaves us Peters. And if he won’t cough, we’re back to square one." - Sir Patrick Strickland
"But circumstances were not normal. Karol Wojtyla, the world’s first Polish Pope, was a major menace." - Narrative
"The great and good General Pienaar swears by all that he holds to be holy that he has no knowledge of Jan Marais." - Sir Nigel Irvine
"It is reckless, crazy, adventurist, and dangerous beyond belief." - General Secretary
"The key to the whole operation is the executive officer." - Harold Philby
"Yes, I remember Joe Brandt. He’s been dead these many years."
"They told Joe he had died somewhere in Germany. It broke Joe’s heart."
"I suppose young Frikki would have passed himself off as an Afrikaner in the Army."
"Could the archivists up there run a check while we wait here?"
"Given the right equipment, he can pick up a cockroach scratching its arse in California."
"Everything that is checkable, yes. It is all true up to the point when those two young soldiers dropped from the tailboard of a German truck in Silesia and started running."
"But you cannot turn a left-handed spin bowler into a right-handed man."
"I’ll break him into tiny pieces and stamp them into the bushveld."
"There was no pneumonia," said Preston, "nor did they fall into the hands of Catholic Polish partisans."
"If it succeeds, the benefits to our country will be inestimable; if it fails, the damage to us will be catastrophic."
"Believe me, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Will you please stop shouting and tell me?"
"Two days later they are back. They want my best legend, a story that took more than ten years to put together."
"Look, Starets, I give you my word, this is not my operation."
"I want to walk for a bit. Follow me until I want to get in."
"The first thing Craig knew, he was roughly elbowed aside."
"Strong young men have been screwing girls since time began."
"I’m afraid that word gets around in the camps."
"If that protocol is ever breached, God knows where the world will end up."
"The Fourth Protocol foresaw technological advances in the manufacture of nuclear bombs."
"Just a megaton explosion from a basement bedsitter."
"I think you know what it is. It’s my job to know."
"The day before polling, he would have made a resounding speech to the British nation."
"He was a highly self-disciplined man, and after thinking the matter over for several minutes, he picked up the phone."
"I need Special Branch to make an arrest," said Harcourt-Smith. "I have reason to believe an illegal immigrant suspected of being a Soviet agent may escape surveillance."
"The train was almost empty. Two carriages instead of six would have amply accommodated the sixty passengers on board."
"For an hour and a quarter, Winkler did nothing. He had no reading matter; he just stared out of the window at the dark countryside beyond."
"Another passenger pushed past Winkler as the train stopped. 'Excuse, please, is this Sheffield?' Winkler asked."
"Preston and Burkinshaw ran forward to the boarding platform, where they were joined by Ginger from the carriage in front."
"I need to borrow your bike," said Preston. "Bog off," said the porter. There was no time for identification or argument."
"Superintendent Robin King was not pleased to be woken at three in the morning."
"I do not know who lives in that house, or why our suspect has visited it. I intend to find out, but for the moment I do not want an arrest."
"Sir Nigel leaned forward and placed his hand on Sir Bernard’s forearm. "I really wish you would, Bernard."
"There is nothing like a body by the roadside to slow down drivers, or cause them to stare through the side window as they crawl past."
"Major Valeri Petrofsky was in the seventeenth car."
"From the corner of his eye Preston watched the little hatchback turn left onto the A45."
"Joe climbed behind the wheel of his own car and backed it out of the bank."
"Preston approached the motorcycle patrolman. 'You’d better get back to Thetford, and many, many thanks for all your help.'"
"The bewildered motorist who had seen it all asked the abandoned sergeant, 'Are they making a film for the telly?'"
"‘He’s heading out of town again,’ said Joe, holding station five cars behind the suspect."
"‘Steady,’ Preston warned Joe, ‘he mustn’t see us now.’"
"Preston raised his hat. ‘Good morning, madam.’"
"‘Are you really from MI5?’ asked the man. ‘Yes. We don’t have two heads and green ears, you know.’"