Atonement

A taste for the miniature was one aspect of an orderly spirit. Another was a passion for secrets:

But his presence imposed order and allowed freedom. Burdens were lifted.

Nothing in her life was sufficiently interesting or shameful to merit hiding;

Marriage was the thing, or rather, a wedding was, with its formal neatness of virtue rewarded, the thrill of its pageantry and banqueting, and dizzy promise of lifelong union.

How guilt refined the methods of self-torture, threading the beads of detail into an eternal loop, a rosary to be fingered for a lifetime.

Addressing Briony’s problems with kind words and caresses would have restored a sense of control.

Even being lied to constantly, though hardly like love, was sustained attention; he must care about her to fabricate so elaborately and over such a long stretch of time. His deceit was a form of tribute to the importance of their marriage.

No one was holding Cecilia back, no one would care particularly if she left. It wasn’t torpor that kept her—she was often restless to the point of irritability. She simply liked to feel that she was prevented from leaving, that she was needed.

From this new and intimate perspective, she learned a simple, obvious thing she had always known, and everyone knew: that a person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn, not easily mended.