- The amount of comfort. All love and
friendship is based in the end on that. When the quantum of solace stands at zero, you've got to get away to save yourself. From Ian Fleming's short
story of the same name in the Bond collection For Your
Eyes Only.
The Governor paused and looked reflectively over at Bond. He
said: "You're not married, but I think it's the same with all relationships between a man and a woman. They can survive anything so long as some kind of basic humanity exists between the two
people. When all kindness has
gone, when one person obviously and sincerely doesn't care if the other is alive or dead, then it's just no good. That particular insult to the
ego - worse, to the instinct of self-preservation - can never be forgiven. I'
ve noticed this in hundreds of marriages. I've seen flagrant infidelitiespatched up, I've seen crimes and even murder forgiven by the other party, let alone bankruptcy and every other form of social crime. Incurable disease, blindness, disaster - all these can be overcome. But
never the
death of common humanity in one of the partners. I've thought about this and I've invented a rather high-sounding title for this basic factor in
human relations. I have called it the Law of the Quantum of Solace."