Jennings: Bill, let’s take a knife off this table and cut our two throats. Will you do that with me?
Porter: What, Colonel?
Jennings: Jimmie here would care, and Raidler, and half a dozen other men in the place—all as helpless as he is, sitting here paralyzed. Tomorrow we’d be buried, and in three days we’d be forgotten, and the graft would be going right on. Bill Porter, who do you think you are? What do they care for you?
Porter: I care for myself, Colonel.
Jennings: How much? My God, man, they’d take you down to the basement, and tie you flat on your stomach, and beat you with paddles till every inch of you was one black and bloody wound. Ain’t that right, Jimmie?
Valentine: Sure it’s right—he knows it.
Jennings: They’d give you the water—stuff a hose in your mouth, and fill you till you fainted and turned black all over! Are you ready for that?
Valentine: Come, sit down, Mr. Porter.
Porter (weakening): Colonel—
Jennings: Bill, you can’t go up against this machine—you’re not built of that kind of stuff. Wait till you get out—then tell somebody if you want to; but there’s nothing you can do now, you’ve got to swallow your grief—this time, like all the other times. Come back here, Bill, and sit down. (leads him to his seat; the door opens, right, and Delacour enters with a quart bottle in his hand) Ah! Our banker friend arrives—just in the nick of time! Here, Bill, this is the remedy—an old remedy, tried and true, for the troubles a man can’t endure.