Three quotes from “The Best American Mystery Stories 1998”, edited by Sue Grafton and Otto Penzler:

1. Sometimes a man quits trusting his strengths and starts trusting his weaknesses. His weaknesses are more apt to be dependable. (From "Swear not by the moon" by Scott Bartels.)

2. The Diogenes was perhaps the strangest club in a city of strange clubs. Its members were the most private men in the City, and the charter and by-laws of the club colluded to keep them that way, since no one was allowed to speak within the club's walls.... (From "The adventure of the giant rat of Sumatra" by John T. Lescroart.)

3. They've come for you at last. Outside your cell door, gathered like a storm. Each man holds a pendant sock and in the sock is a heavy steel combination lock which he has removed from the locker in his own cell. (From "Con doctor" by Jay McInerney.)