- Slade: [musing poetically] I'm going home.
- [quoting poetry]
- Slade: 'Sleep after toil, port after stormy seas, ease after war, death after life does greatly please.'
- Joseph Rearden: [laconically] I don't know about you, Slade; I'm not ready for death. The rest I'll drink to.
- Sir George Wheeler: Our deaths would mean little or nothing to anyone, anywhere - only to ourselves.
- Jervis: How'd you scrape your knuckles?
- Joseph Rearden: Shadowboxing a lamppost.
- [after a pause]
- Joseph Rearden: I got a little pissed last night.
- Mrs. Smith: [speaking of the gravely injured Mackintosh] There is a letter. He always writes one. It's to be given to the Prime Minister in case of his death.
- Joseph Rearden: Well, who's got it?
- Mrs. Smith: His solicitor.
- Joseph Rearden: Well, get it! Tell him it's an emergency!
- Mrs. Smith: An act of Parliament couldn't open that envelope before he dies.
- Joseph Rearden: Fly to London. Smother Mackintosh with his pillow.
- Mrs. Smith: No, I wouldn't do that. He's my father.
- Sir George Wheeler: [to Reardon] I like to study the workings of the criminal mind at close quarters whenever I have the opportunity, so please speak out.
- Mackintosh: Once a parcel enters the great maw of the General Post Office, not even God Himself can extract it!
- Buster: [offering Reardon a cigarette from his mouth in the prison yard] Here you are.
- Buster: [Reardon hesitates] Take it. I've only got syph.
- Joseph Rearden: What're you in for?
- Buster: Mopery.
- Buster: [Reardon turns around] Exposing yourself to a blind woman.
- Gerda: If there's anything else you need, just press this button here.
- Joseph Rearden: [smiling] Yeah!
- Joseph Rearden: [after a pause] I'd like a poke.
- Gerda: A poke, Mr. Reardon?
- Joseph Rearden: Yeah, a poke. You know what i mean. How about it, Stretch?
- Gerda: [smiling] I'm afraid I stopped being a woman several years ago.
- Joseph Rearden: Get someone else.
- Gerda: No, that's not possible.
- Joseph Rearden: Why not?
- Gerda: Security obviously.
- Joseph Rearden: I don't have to talk to her.
- Gerda: Well, even if she didn't speak, she would see you.
- Joseph Rearden: Put a bag over her head.
- Gerda: But you would see her.
- Joseph Rearden: Put a bag over my head. I've been in prison for 15 months!