The final, quiet moments of the book return to Sten; his experience of his sick son humbles him, just as his aging body humbles him, and Boyle seems to suggest this makes him a better man.

And how can a man teach with autority, which is the life of teaching, how can he be a Doctor in his book as he ought to be, or else had better be silent, whenas all he teaches, all he delivers, is but under the tuition, under the correction of his patriarchal licencer to blot or alter what precisely accords not with the hidebound humor which he calls his judgement.

Linus Caldwell: Well, she just made Danny and Yen, which means in the next 48 hours the three o' your pictures are gonna be in every police station in Europe.

Mr. Hazeldean wrote him such a trimmer that it could not but produce an unconciliatory reply.