He's willing to pay any price to break this banker, but you can't bankrupt a feller unless you rip his coin loose; you can't _ask_ him to please loosen.

If we make a well of the Avenger we'll force him to shoot maybe a hundred thousand right away, and that may cramp him for a while; but suppose he makes the turn and hits it like we do?
We've made him that much stronger, haven't we?
Gray plans to keep him spending faster than he can get it in, and that's all right--if it works, but if Mallow can bilk him for seventy-five thousand at one fell swipe--Well, I'll bet my best gold tooth that the boss will stand the shock like a man." "I think you've both got Gray all wrong," said McWade.

"He's too smart to be crooked." This was a statement so absurd that Mallow proceeded to riddle it.

It was, upon its face, a contradiction, for none but smart men could be crooked, and the laws of logic proved the converse to be equally true.
Stoner sat in frowning silence while the argument raged, but he broke in finally: "I've always wanted to pull a real salting job, just to show how easy it is to gyp the cagy ones--not an oil-can job like this, but something big.

This looks like the piscological moment." "Lay off, I tell you!" McWade cried.