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224 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1956
Pity was always a luxury. It's all right if the tragedy's a comfortable distance away. If you can watch it from the seat in a cinema. It's different when you find it on your doorstep- on every doorstep.
"Nature was wiping a cloth across the slate of human history, leaving it empty for the pathetic scrawls of those few who here and there over the face of the globe, would survive."
Olivia said: 'We should like you to come with us, my dear. We are going to a safe place up in the hills. It wouldn't be safe for you to stay here.'
The girl said: 'My mother -- I heard her screaming, and then she stopped.'
'She's dead,' Olivia said. 'Your father, too. There's nothing to stay here for.'
'You killed them,' the girl said. She looked at John. 'He killed them.'
Olivia said: 'Yes. They had food and we didn't. People fight over food now. We won, and they lost.'