Deadwood Quotes

“In the beginning the stories were long and colored, but as he grew old and his eyes clouded, the stories were told in only a few words, and she came to understand that all the colors had fallen away from him, leaving only the moments. A woman who performed tricks in the air, an animal pulling a boat under water, dead children who spoke in bones. A man who loved bottles.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“He thought sometimes of leaving to look for Agnes Lake, but his thoughts of her were like dreams, and in his dreams Deadwood was where she was, and he was afraid he would lose her if he left.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“It was quiet while they both fit their cigars this way and that in their mouths and thought about the nature of peeders. After a while the bartender said, “I expect that’s what keeps a whorehouse in business.” Charley said, “What keeps it in business is those that would otherwise go without. There’s miners come in every week, don’t even take off their pants.” “I heard of that, they just talk.” “It’s to have somebody know they’re here.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“He did not understand what went on in a Chinese heart, that something like this could happen. The Indians made more sense.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“... It took him one minute to write. Bill stood over him, watching. "I don't know how you do that," he said. "Like the words are already inside the pen."

"It's just what's in your brain," Charley said. "The way the words come to you naturally is the best way to put them down."

Bill said, "The things in my head don't come in words.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“He looked at a story about a new gun they had out in California that spit seventy rounds in four seconds. They called it the "Peace Conservator." They were always doing some damn thing in California that nobody had thought out the consequences.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“It seemed like the time to mention Abilene, where Bill shot Mike Williams. Mike was the only man Bill ever killed by accident, to Charley's knowledge. He was a policeman--they'd had an election and the winners hired their nephews as policemen, after Bill had made the place safe to be a policeman--and it was the luck of things that when Phil Coe came after Bill in the street, Mike Williams came around a corner and Bill shot him through the head, thinking it was one of Phil Coe's brothers. Then he shot Phil.

The newspaper wouldn't let it heal. It brought Mike Williams back from the dead every week, like a blood relative. The editor called him a fine specimen of Kansas manhood, and declared a "Crusade to
Rid Abilene and the State of Kansas of Wild Bill and All His Ilk." Those were the exact words, because for a while after that Bill called him "Ilk."

It wasn't the newspaper that got Bill and Charley out of Kansas, though. It was a petition. It was left with the clerk at the hotel where they stayed, three hundred and sixteen signatures asking Bill to leave, not a word of gratitude for what he'd done. He sat down in the lobby with the petition in his lap, running his fingers through his hair. He read every name--there were six sheets of them--and when he finished a sheet, he'd hand it to Charley and he'd read it too.

It was the worst back-shooting Charley had ever seen; they even let the women sign. Bill shrugged and smiled, but some of the names hurt him. He thought he'd had friends in Kansas, and looking at the names he saw they were all afraid of him.

What ran Wild Bill out of Abilene was hurt feelings.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“The boy shot Wild Bill's horse at dusk, while Bill was off in the bushes to relieve himself”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“Charley wondered how it happened that men of the cloth always seemed to misunderstand the ways of the Lord. If you wanted protection you had to ask for money or love, and He would give you protection instead. Prayer was a study in misdirection...”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood

“All in all, he felt more milked than loved.”
― Pete Dexter, Deadwood