- Sylvia Russell: Fenella is not meant for marriage - she's too sensitive, too highly strung, hysterical almost. When she fell in love with you I hoped she'd alter. But if anything, marriage has intensified her abnormality.
- Sylvia Russell: I know if I'd been a man id have wanted authority.
- Arthur Russell: Carries a lot of anxieties and responsibilities...
- Sylvia Russell: [chuckles] PoorArthur. You're not exactly a swashbuckler, are you dear?
- Arthur Russell: No, I suppose Im not.
- Austin Penrose: You know it's grand to find something so unchanged.
- Sylvia Russell: But you believe in change. In progress and in success.
- Austin Penrose: Clever woman, your wife Arthur. Unmasks me in a sentence.
- Arthur Russell: Nothing escapes Sylvia.
- Austin Penrose: Yes, I will admit I'm ambitious, Mrs Russell. When I went to New York I said to myself - the sky's the limit.
- Sylvia Russell: New York must be very stimulating.
- Austin Penrose: Over-stimulating. The city devoted to the creation of needs and wants and desires. A city to goad on the successes and kill off the failures.
- Austin Penrose: Arthur's done very well for himself, if you ask me. Lovely daughter, brilliant son, you. What more can a man want?
- Sylvia Russell: Power.
- Austin Penrose: Power's an unknown quantity, Mrs. Russell. Like atomic energy, a destroying explosive, or a creative force, at a high joule. No, on balance, I wouldn't say power was a desirable factor in life.
- Sylvia Russell: Well, no-one fully realizes the value of a thing if they've never had it.
- Austin Penrose: I haven't got power. Authority, yes. A certain amount of authority, but not power.
- Sylvia Russell: Authority is power. I envy you that. I'd have enjoyed power.