Depth of Winter (Walt Longmire, #14)

by Craig Johnson

Poor Mexico, so far from God and so near the United States. —Porfirio Díaz

He shook his head at the antiquity of my sidearm. “Why the .45?” “Because they don’t make a .46.”

“Beware the man with only one weapon, for he surely knows how to use it.”

He shook his head at me. “We have an old saying in Mexico, bondad a un asesino construye ataúdes.” I waited as he stared back at me, the dead eyes completely hidden by the heavy sunglasses. “Kindness to a killer builds coffins.”

I did remember him saying that a good mule is ten times better than a horse but that a bad one was a hundred times worse.

“Well, he let me get a call in to the FBI, and they’re on their way.” “When?” “Well, they weren’t exactly clear on that.” He leaned back. “With what?” “We didn’t get to that part either.”

Henry Standing Bear says that the greatest thing you can do to respect the dead is to remember them, to keep them in your mind so that they do not slip away into that cold, dark infinity that awaits all of us.

It was like a huge, dead beast, leonine in color with ridges resembling desiccated ribs that rose without grace—a carrion land.

You find that kernel of madness at an early age, and if you’re lucky you start building up a callus around it, a tough layer of humanity that holds it at bay, because it’s just too dangerous to allow to escape. Your family can’t ever see it, your friends can’t ever see it, no one must ever see it—but it’s there, waiting to burn the protective covering away that has taken a lifetime to build and burst open like a volcanic canker of maniacal emotion.

There is a lie in all fiction, a fabrication that says that when the critical moment of your life arrives you will be rested, clean, composed, and prepared, but you won’t be. I guarantee it. You will be exhausted, scattered, dirty, and wounded. But with this comes one miraculous strength.