“Ride with an outlaw, die with him," he added. "I admit it's a harsh code. But you rode on the other side long enough to know how it works. I'm sorry you crossed the line, though." Jake's momentary optimism had passed, and he felt tired and despairing. He would have liked a good bed in a whorehouse and a nice night's sleep. "I never seen no line, Gus," he said. "I was just trying to get to Kansas without getting scalped.”

“There was something different about her, Jake had to admit. She had a beautiful face, a beautiful body, but also a distance in her such as he had never met in a woman. Certain mountains were that way, like the Bighorns .The air around them was so clear you could ride toward them for days without seeming to get any closer. And yet, if you kept riding, you would get to the mountains.”

“It's like I told you last night son. The earth is mostly just a boneyard. But pretty in the sunlight, he added”

“Call saw that everyone was looking at him, the hands and cowboys and townspeople alike. The anger had drained out of him, leaving him feeling tired. He didn't remember the fight, particularly, but people were looking at him as if they were stunned. He felt he should make some explanation, though it seemed to him a simple situation."I hate a man that talks rude," he said. "I won't tolerate it.”

“There would be a trial, of course. But I had watched a few trials in Thalia, and I had seen people a lot dumber than Hud get away with a lot worse than what he did.”

“Though loyal and able and brave, Pea had never displayed the slightest ability to learn from his experience, though his experience was considerable. Time and again he would walk up on the wrong side of a horse that was known to kick, and then look surprised when he got kicked.”

“Blue Duck could never avoid a moment of fear, when his father's eyes became the eyes of a snake. He choked off his insult -- he knew that if he spoke, he might, in an instant, find himself fighting Buffalo Hump. He had seen it before, with other warriors. Someone would say one word too many, would fail to see the snake in his father's eyes, and the next moment Buffalo Hump would be pulling his long bloody knife from between the other warrior's ribs. Blue Duck waited. He knew that it was not a day to fight his father.”