The Institute (2019) quotes

View Quote According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, roughly 800,000 children are reported missing each year in the United States. Most are found. Thousands are not.

View Quote Preface

View Quote Great events turn on small hinges.

View Quote p. 9

View Quote He was out.

View Quote p. 256

View Quote There was a perfunctory knock at the door, and then Rosalind stuck her head in, looking apologetic. "I'm sorry to disturb you, ma'am, but it's Fred Clark, asking to see you. He seems-" "Refresh me. Who is Fred Clark?" Mrs. Sigsby took off her reading glasses and rubbed the sides of her nose. "One of the janitors." "Find out what he wants and tell me later. If we've got mice chewing the wiring again, it can wait. I'm busy." "He says it's important, and he seems extremely upset." Mrs. Sigsby sighed, closed the folder, and put it in a drawer. "All right, send him in. But this had better be good." It wasn't. It was bad. Very.

View Quote p. 284

View Quote Mrs. Sigsby sat down on the bare mattress and looked at the woman hanging from the shower head. And at the message she had written with the lipstick Mrs. Sigsby now observed lying in front of the toilet. HELL IS WAITING. I'LL BE HERE TO MEET YOU.

View Quote p. 288

View Quote But they always come back, she thought, looking at a sand beach she sometimes visited but where she would never live. They always come back and no matter how sloppy some things have become around here, they don't talk. That's one thing they are never sloppy about. Because if people found out what we're doing, the hundreds of children we've destroyed, we'd be tried and executed by the dozens. Given the needle like Timothy McVeigh.

View Quote p. 295

View Quote "We'll find him," Stackhouse said. Because if we don't, he thought, I'm toast. This whole place might be toast.

View Quote p. 312

View Quote "The Dixon boy hasn't had the tank, has he?" "Of course not." Donkey Kong looked vaguely offended at the very idea. "He's not a pink. Farthest thing from one. To risk damaging a BDNF as high as his would be insane. Or to risk damaging his abilities. Which would be unlikely but not impossible. Sigsby would have my head." "She won't and he goes in it today," Stackhouse said. "Dunk that little mother****er until he thinks he's dead, and then dunk him some more." "Are you serious? He's valuable property! One of the highest TP-positives we've had in years!" "I don't care if he can walk on water and shoot electricity out of his asshole when he farts. Have the Greek do it as soon as he comes back on duty. He loves putting them in the tank. Tell Zeke not to kill him, I do understand his value, but I want him to have an experience he'll remember for as long as he can remember. Then take him to Back Half." "But Mrs. Sigsby-" "Mrs. Sigsby agrees completely." Both men swung around. She was standing in the door between the office and her private quarters. Stackhouse's first thought was that she looked as if she had seen a ghost, but that wasn't quite right. She looked as if she were a ghost. "Do it just the way he told you, Dan. If it damages his BDNF, so be it. He needs to pay."

View Quote p. 341

View Quote For a moment Luke stayed where he was, thinking that if he remained perfectly still and perfectly silent, the man would decide he'd been mistaken and go away. But that was childish thinking, and he was no longer a child. Not even close. So he crept out and tried to stand, but his legs were stiff and his head was light. He would have fallen over if the white guy hadn't grabbed him. "Holy shit, kid, who tore your ear off?"

View Quote p. 344

View Quote Luke had to use all his willpower to keep from drinking the whole sixteen-ounce bottle of water at a single go. He left a quarter of it, set it down, then snatched it up again and screwed on the cap. He thought if the train took a sudden yaw and it spilled, he would go insane. He gobbled the sausage biscuit in five snatching bites and chased it with another big swallow of water. He licked the grease from his palm, then took the water and the Hostess pie and crept back into his nest. For the first time since riding down the river in the S.S. Pokey and looking up at the stars, he felt that his life might be worth living. And although he did not exactly believe in God, having found the evidence against just slightly stronger than the evidence for, he prayed anyway, but not for himself. He prayed for the highly hypothetical higher power to bless the man who had called him outlaw and thrown that brown bag into the boxcar.

View Quote p. 348

View Quote "Julia, I really think this is a mistake. It ought to be me." She faced him. "Say it again, and I'll haul off on you." She walked to the van. Denny Williams unrolled the side door for her. Mrs. Sigsby started to get in, then turned to Stackhouse. "And make sure Avery Dixon is well dunked and in Back Half by the time I return." "Donkey Kong doesn't like the idea." She gave him a terrifying smile. "Does it look like I care?"

View Quote p. 362

View Quote "That's right, you tell Sheriff John. You-all need to be on your guard. They're apt to come locked and loaded. There's a town in Maine, Jerusalem's Lot, and you could ask the people who lived there about the men in the black cars. If you could find any people, that is. They all disappeared forty or more years ago. George Allman talks about that town all the time." "Got it." She went to the door, serape swishing, then turned. "You don't believe me, and I ain't a bit surprised. Why would I be? I been the town weirdo for years before you came, and if the Lord doesn't take me, I'll be the town weirdo years after you're gone." "Annie, I never-" "Hush." She stared at him fiercely from beneath her sombrero. "It's all right. But pay attention, now. I'm telling you... but he told me. That boy. So that's two of us, all right? And you remember what I said. They come in black cars."

View Quote p. 364