- Nicholas Pratt: The house was the first thing he persuaded her to buy. First summer there, we were all sitting on the terrace, and she complained about the dreadful waste of figs that fell from the tree onto the ground and rotted, while there were other people starving in the world. And David did this amazing thing. He told Eleanor to get down on all fours and eat every fig off the ground.
- Bridget Watson Scott: In front of you?
- Nicholas Pratt: Yes. She didn't protest though. She ate every single one.
- Bridget Watson Scott: Kinky.
- Anne Moore: Will you do one thing for me? Don't suck up to them. Don't let them bully you. Don't try to fit in.
- Sir Victor Eisen: Well isn't that three things?
- Anne Moore: They're all connected.
- Young Patrick Melrose: You lied to me! You hurt me!
- David Melrose: Don't whimper. It's very unnatractive.
- David Melrose: Can't sleep? No, me neither. Must be all the excitement. Al these people.
- [tucks Patrick into bed]
- David Melrose: Here, that better? I'll leave you now. But know one thing. If you ever tell your mother or anyone else about today, I will snap you in two.
- Anne Moore: Why do you think it's superior to be amoral?
- Nicholas Pratt: It not a question of being superior, it's a question of not being a bore. Or a prig.
- David Melrose: What one aims for is ennui.
- Eleanor Melrose: I have to get back to my writing.
- Young Patrick Melrose: What are you writing?
- Eleanor Melrose: A cheque for charity. For Save The Children. Because it's important when one has so much, to give something back.
- Nicholas Pratt: You look like a medieval witch.
- Bridget Watson Scott: And you look like an old fart. A stuffy conventional old fart!
- Anne Moore: As for his obsession with screwing his sister...
- Nicholas Pratt: Ah, well you know what they say: "Vice is nice, but incest is best." Now I'm sure I would have liked the chap. He did exactly what he wanted to do, with no nonsense about ethics.
- Anne Moore: Why do you think it's superior to be amoral?
- Nicholas Pratt: It's not a question of being superior; it's a question of not being a bore or a prig.
- David Melrose: What one aims for is ennui.