“You stick your finger in the water and you pull it out, and that is how much of a hole you leave when you're gone.”

“If you want the law to leave you alone, keep your hair trimmed and your boots shined.”

“When you go to a country, you must learn how to say two things: how to ask for food, and to tell a woman that you love her. Of these the second is more important, for if you tell a woman you love her, she will certainly feed you.”

“She handed him the blankets and the ground sheet and he shook them out, then put them down under the trees. Angie got down on her knees and spread the ground sheet over the leaves, then the blankets.'You never forget do you? I mean about seeing things first.''Hope I never.'He was oddly uncomfortable, hesitant. 'Good way to lose your hair, not noticing things.'He sat down and pulled off his boots. The cottonwoods whispered more softly. The squirrel gave one short inquiring chatter, then was silent.The lone coyote spoke to the sky and the stream rustled busily about the stones. A bit of mud fell into the stream with a faint plop.It was night and there was no sound. Or anyway, not very much." (p 154)”

“I don't believe you know anything about a man like me or a country like this. It takes rough men, Miss Fair, to tame a rough country; rough men, but good men. Your father is in that class. As for you, I don't think you'd measure up, and you'll do well to leave it. You're a hothouse flower, very soft, very appealing and very useless...In the world you are going to, men want pretty useless women. They want toys for their lighte moments, and we have those women out here, too, only we have another name for them. We want women who can make a home, and if need be, handle a rifle.”

“Actually, all education is self-education. A teacher is only a guide, to point out the way, and no school, no matter how excellent, can give you education. What you receive is like the outlines in a child’s coloring book. You must fill in the colors yourself.”

“Destarte! How musical! What does it mean?" "You can't say it except in Mescalero. It means Morning, but that isn't what it means, either. Indian words are more than just that. They also mean the feel and the sound of the name. It means like Crack of Dawn, the first bronze light that makes the buttes stand out against the gray desert. It means the first sound you hear of a brook curling over some rocks-some trout jumping and a beaver crooning. It means the sound a stallion makes when he whistles at some mares just as the first puff of wind kicks up at daybreak. "It means like you get up in the first light and you and her go out of the wickiup, where it smells smoky and private and just you and her, and kind of safe with just the two of you there, and you stand outside and smell the first bite of the wind coming down from the high divide and promising the first snowfall. Well, you just can't say what it means in English. Anyway, that was her name. Destarte.”