27
" I don't like that sort of
thing. I never have. If you expect me to feel sympathy, regret, urge an
unhappy childhood, blame bad environment; if you expect me in fact to
weep over him, this young murderer of yours, I do not feel inclined so
to do. I do not like evil beings who do evil things."
"I am delighted to hear it," said Professor Wanstead. "What I suffer in
the course of my profession from people weeping and gnashing their
teeth, and blaming everything on some happening in the past, you
would hardly believe. If people knew the bad environments that people
have had, the unkindness, the difficulties of their lives and the fact that
nevertheless they can come through scathed, I don't think they would
so often take the opposite point of view. The misfits are to be pitied,
yes, they are to be pitied if I may say so for the genes with which they
are born and over which they have no control themselves. "
― Agatha Christie , Nemesis
32
" Surely,” said Miss Marple, aghast at an idea that had come into her mind, “there can’t be a bond of ruthlessness between us?” Was she, Jane Marple—could she ever be—ruthless? “D’you know,” said Miss Marple to herself, “it’s extraordinary, I never thought about it before. I believe, you know, I could be ruthless…. "
― Agatha Christie , Nemesis