But something terrible had happened - she had become old. The decades of her marriage had curdled her gaiety into scorn, transformed her charming imp… - Michael Nava

[Asuras] "There are means people and there are ends people. The means people create distinctions among means and call it morality. The ends people understand that in this world, in this system we're born into, anything that gets you what you want is a good thing."

[Alicia, with Miguel] "As long as the poor are regarded as expendable parts of the machinery of the economy, they will continue to be ground into the dust." "The Lord said the poor will always be with us," she murmured. "One reason I am not a Christian," he replied. "Your Jesus should have spent less time teaching the poor to accept their lot and more time teaching the rich to share."

He felt like Hercules at the Augean stables commissioned to clean out the accumulated filth of centuries.