I rubbed up the brass buttons on my jacket to make them shine.

There is no doubt that the pantheon of Parmenides is predominantly feminine. In particular the two principal divinities, the inspired revelatrix of the proem and the omnipotent one in the center of the heavens, are goddesses.

They're not going to stand for a couple of actors bossing the place [The Old Vic theatre] around any more. We shall be out, old cockie.

In the lounge, Lorenson was at a desk in the corner looking over his notes, and suppressing a smile at this bit of one-up-manship (or even worse, one-up-womanship) over Brewster.