Buffalo Girls Quotes

“Of course, she had come back from England intending to do just what Bartle suggested: accept her room at Dora’s, and stay. All the time in England, and on the long voyage home, she had thought of nothing but how comfortable she would be in her room at Dora’s. She had looked forward to being back and having her room as much as she had ever looked forward to anything. Now she had it; and it only demonstrated how foolish it was to look forward to things. Once you finally got what you were looking forward to getting, something would always have changed so that it didn’t seem as nice or as important as it had seemed when you were merely imagining it. Life was too slippery, and people too changeable.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“Calamity liked Ogden, though the way she expressed her liking might have seemed disparaging to some. “He’s a whopping piece of dough,” Calamity said. “But he ain’t set yet. You can roll him into any kind of biscuit you want—only do it quick. You can never tell when a boy like that will set.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“Now, however, things were really in a fine mess; both old lovers were married, and not to one another. The confusion, the anger, the tears the situation would produce made Doosie wonder if the whole business—romance—could possibly be worth it. She herself had long since reached negative conclusions on the matter of the worth of romance, but the only person she could find who shared her view was Calamity. They had discussed the subject several times and agreed that no pleasure men brought was worth the havoc they wreaked through selfish and contrary behavior.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“Dora scaled down and then closed the whorehouse before Ogden quite grasped the fact that his wife had been running a whorehouse. When he did realize it he behaved exactly as he had when he found out her age; he was surprised, and then he quite forgot it. He himself had been too scared of women to visit whorehouses but attached no blame to Dora for having run one. Once Dora took him to her bed it became obvious to him why whorehouses made money.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“LATER, ONCE THEY HAD MARRIED, DORA FELT ALMOST GUILTY for the speed with which she had captured Ogden. She had made some rapid conquests in her day, but none so rapid or so complete as Ogden. Sitting awkward and frightened in her parlor that morning, drinking what turned out to be almost a gallon bucket’s worth of tea, Ogden became hers. Perhaps it hadn’t even taken that long. Perhaps he had become hers when she looked at him beneath the dripping umbrella on his wagon seat. Making him hers was so easy that it felt a little unseemly; but she had no impulse to spare him or even to slow her conquest. Ogden was awkward, even wooden, but at least he was all of a piece, and simple in a way that few men were. Blue was the love of her life, but Blue was too complicated; once, the complications had excited her, engaged her; now they just wearied her”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“He seemed to be one of those men who were interested only in women. It was a failing No Ears could sympathize with because he had once been the same way. Getting wives had interested him more than war. He knew, though, that getting wives was even more dangerous than war; he suspected that Bartle’s marriage to the English girl might prove more dangerous than war. The English girl reminded him too much of his last wife, whose name was Sun-in-Your-Face. She had first been called Quick Ferret, but had been renamed once it was obvious that she was of such beauty that to look at her made one blind in the mind.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“As for Sitting Bull, he was so indifferent to everything except his own fame that he rarely even came on deck, preferring to sit in the boat’s saloon and squeeze white women when they asked for autographs. Most of the white women on the boat had already been squeezed several times, and had more Sitting Bull autographs than they could use.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“It seemed for a few weeks that they had come at last to the place they had supposed they would get in their first few months of love, when he was a brash young cowboy and she a pretty buffalo girl. It was what they had talked of in Kansas; finally, in Montana, it happened, or seemed to. But then he had begun to feel like cowboying again, and had ridden off one morning as if their time together had been nothing—as if it were common.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“Bartle Bone, on the other hand, gloried in leave-taking. He cheerfully accepted kisses and hugs all around, several from Dora, several more from Skeedle, and many from Trix—much of his time in Miles City had been spent accepting leave-taking favors from Trix. Bartle even kissed Doosie, more than once. It fit his notion of male destiny for women to weep when men left. The one thing that attracted him to soldiering was the sight of all the wives and whores around an army camp lined up sobbing as the cavalry clattered away, or the foot soldiers marched. A few such scenes made up for all the cardplaying, burial details, and lice-collecting that constituted normal army life. Better to march off with Custer and die on the Greasy Grass than to do laundry forever in Fort Leavenworth.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“Skeedle, who had always been secretly fond of Jim, hugged him and tried to get him to show some of the usual sentiments of departure, but Jim was a poor subject. He had no objection to Skeedle and, in fact, liked her, but in his mind he had already left and the weeping and hugging just seemed tiresome.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“I don’t want to go, Blue,” she said. “I wish people would just leave me alone. I just want to stay here with my friends and be buried near Bill Hickok when I die.” Blue, of course, immediately changed his tack. He was looking a little more like his frisky self, and when he was frisky he would argue with a stump; whichever side of an argument the stump took, Blue would take the other.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“It wasn’t a mile from here that I killed the big bear,” Jim remarked. “I think that was probably the biggest bear that was ever grown.” “You would think it, since you shot it,” Bartle said. “It was a large bear but not the biggest that was ever grown—in Canada bears get twice that size.” “How would you know?” Jim asked. “You’ve never been to Canada.” “I’ve never been to the moon, either,” Bartle said. “That don’t mean I doubt it exists. Everybody knows bears grow bigger in Canada.” “Name one person that knows it,” Jim demanded. “Lonesome Charley knows it,” Bartle replied immediately—on the rare occasions when Jim could be taunted into asking a question, he liked to have an answer close at hand. “Lonesome Charley is no judge of bears,” Jim said. “He’s only got one eye. Of course a bear will look bigger if you’ve only got one eye to look out of.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“It wasn’t a mile from here that I killed the big bear,” Jim remarked. “I think that was probably the biggest bear that was ever grown.” “You would think it, since you shot it,” Bartle said. “It was a large bear but not the biggest that was ever grown—in Canada bears get twice that size.” “How would you know?” Jim asked. “You’ve never been to Canada.” “I’ve never been to the moon, either,” Bartle said. “That don’t mean I doubt it exists. Everybody knows bears grow bigger in Canada.” “Name one person that knows it,” Jim demanded. “Lonesome Charley knows it,” Bartle replied immediately—on the rare occasions when Jim could be taunted”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“she began to fear his going almost at the moment of his arrival. Where was the time for joy in such a life?”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“You’re going to be mighty annoyed when Dora marries Billy,” Calamity said. “You’ll lope into town one day and find she’s gone to China or somewhere.” “Why, Dora wouldn’t marry that rooster,” Blue said. “What makes you think she won’t?” Calamity asked. “Well, what if she didn’t like China?” Blue said. “She’d be stuck.” “You’re married—are you stuck?” “I’m bogged, but I ain’t quite stuck yet,” Blue said with his winning grin. He looked up and saw Dora watching them from the head of the stairs. “There she is now—she still looks like my girl,” he said.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“I prefer to stay in camp and trim my toenails on days when the snow’s blowing. I got my directions mixed once in one of them blows and was in the middle of Canada before I noticed my mistake. I had a hell of a time getting the cattle back, too,” he added.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls

“His suspicion was that white people simply had no serious interest in truth. What they managed to see was usually enough truth for them, even if it was only half of what was there to see.”
― Larry McMurtry, Buffalo Girls