p.3 I first heard Personville called Poisonville by a red-haired mucker
named Hickey Dewey in the Big Ship in Butte. He also called his shirt a shoit. I didn't think anything of what he had done
to the city's name. Later I heard men who could handle their r's give it the same pronunciation. I still didn't see anything
in it but the meaningless sort of humor that used to make richardsnary the thieves' word for dictionary. A few years later
I went to Personville and learned better.
p.6-7 "Don Willsson's gone to sit on the right hand of God, if God don't
mind looking at bullet holes."
"Who shot him?" I asked.
The gray man scratched the back of his neck and said:
"Somebody with a gun."
I wanted information, not wit.
p.67 The police went away. I had my stuff moved into another room, one into
which bullets couldn't be so easily funneled.
p.67-68 "I hear you've declared war on Poisonville."
"Don't blame me. I've got a client who wants the place ventilated."
"Wanted, not wants," he corrected me as we sat down. "Why don't you chuck
it?"
I made a speech:
"No. I don't like the way Poisonville has treated me. I've got my chance
now, and I'm going to even up..."
"Willsson's willing for you to keep the ten grand. Let it go at that."
"I've got a mean disposition. Attempted assassinations make me mad."
"That won't get you anything but a box..."
p.74 Smoke. Stink. Heat. Noise.
p.83 "I used to think I knew men," she complained, "but, by God! I don't.
They're lunatics, all of them."
p.85 "Plans are all right sometimes," I said. "And sometimes
just stirring things up is all right - if you're tough enough to survive, and keep your eyes open so you'll see what you want
when it comes to the top."
p.91 At forty [years of age] I could get along on gin as a substitute for
sleep, but not comfortably.
p.98 The punch carried MacSwain across the room until a wall stopped him.
The wall creaked under the strain, and a framed photograph... dropped down to the floor with the hit man. [JLJ - Right. Must
have been some kind of powerful punch]
p.183 I had to wade through a lot that didn't mean anything
to find something that did.
