- Sammy: Are you brave?
- Matthew Field: What? Well, sometimes.
- Sammy: Are you honest?
- Matthew Field: Brutally.
- Sammy: But are you romantic?
- Matthew Field: To a fault. Have you had breakfast?
- Sammy: You can't have breakfast at 4 o'clock.
- Matthew Field: I can do what I like.
- Sammy: Saracen, will you marry my mother?
- [Matthew chuckles]
- Sammy: Will you be my good deed?
- Matthew Field: I'm much to busy to do that.
- Sammy: You don't have to do anything. I'll come and do things for you.
- Matthew Field: What on Earth could you possibly do for me?
- [he and Sammy just look at each other]
- Matthew Field: I'll think about it, the next time you come.
- Sammy: Are you going to change?
- Matthew Field: Into what?
- Sammy: Your Saracen costume.
- Matthew Field: It itches.
- Sammy: What are you going to say to her?
- Matthew Field: Good afternoon, Mama Sammy.
- Sammy: Can't you think of anything more exciting than that?
- Nimi Da Silva: Let's walk on. People are staring.
- Matthew Field: Well, what do you expect? Satan walking you home from church.
- Matthew Field: [Sammy looks at a cute girl] Forget it. Bad sign, clog sandals. They're always followed by a father with a shotgun.
- [an angry looking man walks past]
- Matthew Field: See?
- Matthew Field: How would you like it if I arranged to get her out?
- Sammy: She won't come.
- Matthew Field: I can put temptation in her way. What does she like?
- Sammy: You have to keep your room tidy.
- Matthew Field: As bad as that?
- Sammy: How do you write a Saracen story?
- Matthew Field: I start at the beginning and I know how I want it to end.
- Nimi Da Silva: What are you doing?
- Matthew Field: We're having a shootout.
- Nimi Da Silva: I don't approve of shooting or guns.
- Matthew Field: All right. We're playing men who go bang very loudly at one another. Is that all right with you?
- Sammy: [watching Nene and Mama Fola argue in proverbs] Why are they talking like that?
- Nimi Da Silva: Proverbs, to be polite.
- Sammy: It doesn't look very polite.
- Sammy: Matthew, what do you know about sex?
- Matthew Field: Well, uh, men and women are built... differently.
- Sammy: I know all that penis, vagina, rabbit business. I saw a video at Jean Claude's
- Matthew Field: Rabbit?
- Sammy: [referring to a discussion with his friend about sex] He says everyone does it.
- Matthew Field: Yep.
- Sammy: Everyone?
- Matthew Field: Uh-huh.
- Sammy: Even people I know?
- Matthew Field: Yes.
- Sammy: Even people who get married?
- Matthew Field: Especially people who get married.
- [Sammy makes a face]
- Matthew Field: Tough one, I know.
- Nimi Da Silva: I've read your books. Saracen always "banging" and "screwing" and "nailing." That's not sex. That's carpentry.
- Nene: The lessons you don't teach him, life will teach him. And life's lessons are bitter.
- Nimi Da Silva: We're all right Sammy and I. But I'll beat him later if it will make you happy.
- Nene: Why are you not married?
- Nimi Da Silva: If it matters so much to you, you find me a husband.
- Nene: What kind of husband? Foolish antelope?
- Nimi Da Silva: Honest enough to take on Sammy and me. And brave enough to know the truth. And if he's romantic as well, I'll marry him tomorrow.
- Sammy: Don't you wonder what it would be like to live in the twenty-fifth century?
- Nimi Da Silva: Sweet Potato, I wonder what it would be like to live in the twentieth century.
- Sammy: You remember "Come end my eternal loneliness. Let us surf Orion on my cosmic chariot."
- Matthew Field: Definitely one of my earlier efforts.