Tom Destry Jr. Quotes in Destry Rides Again (1939)

Frenchy: Get out before I kill you!

Tom Destry Jr.: You mean you haven't been tryin'?

Tom Destry Jr.: Oh, I think I'll stick around. Y'know, I had a friend once used to collect postage stamps. He always said the one good thing about a postage stamp: it always sticks to one thing 'til it gets there, y'know? I'm sorta like that too.

Tom Destry Jr.: Well, you will fool 'em, Wash. We'll fool 'em together.

Washington Dimsdale: The only way to do that is fill 'em full of lead.

Tom Destry Jr.: No, no, no, what for? You shoot it out with 'em and for some reason or other, I don't know why, they get to look like heroes. But you put 'em behind bars and they look little and cheap, the way they oughta look.

Tom Destry Jr.: He reminds me of a little kid I used to know. He done in both his pa and ma with a crowbar.

Washington Dimsdale: No!

Tom Destry Jr.: Yes, he did. Now the judge said to him, "Do you got anything to say for yourself?". And the kid said, "Well I just hope that Your Honor has some regard for the feelings of a poor orphan."

Tom Destry Jr.: Don't let me interfere with your dinner, ma'am.

Frenchy: It's breakfast.

Janice Tyndall: Please don't mind my brother, Mr. Destry. He's always threatening to blow people's heads off.

Tom Destry Jr.: I had - I had a friend once. His name was Stubbs. He was always going around threatening to blow people's heads off. One day a fella came along and took him up on it.

Jack Tyndall: Well?

Tom Destry Jr.: Well, folks say that now Stubbs' forehead is holding up the prettiest tombstone in Greenlawn Cemetery.

Tom Destry Jr.: I'll bet you've got kind of a lovely face under all that paint, huh? Why don't you wipe it off someday and have a good look - and figure out how you can live up to it.

Washington Dimsdale: Oh, Tom! Look here! Look at this post! Soaked through and through with the blood of Sawtooth McGhee. Yeah, he objected to a petticoat a neighbor's wife was wearing... and they fit to a draw. Both are buried in the same grave.

Tom Destry Jr.: Sawtooth and the petticoat?

Washington Dimsdale: No! Sawtooth and the neighbor! And four innocent bystanders!

[Destry & Dimsdale have stopped the gunfight at the Claggett farm. One of Kent's men points a gun at Dimsdale. Destry hits him on the neck with his gloves]

Tom Destry Jr.: Big bee - about that big - right on the back of your neck. I got him, though.

Bugs Watson: Thanks.

Jack Tyndall: I ain't one of your weak-livered citizens that busts out cryin' every time you snap your fingers and I ain't gonna pay Kent's fancy prices. Now whaddaya aim to do about it?

Tom Destry Jr.: Nothin' at present.

Jack Tyndall: That's what I thought. Well, I'll get somethin' done about it if I have to take the law in my own hands!

Tom Destry Jr.: Nobody's gonna set themselves up above the law around here, ya understand? I got somethin' to say to you. I think maybe I could illustrate it a little better if I told you a story: I used to have a friend that was an opera singer. Then he went into the cement business - and one day he fell into the cement. And now he's the cornerstone of the post office in St. Louis, Missouri. He shoulda stuck to his own trade. You better stick to yours.

Kent: I collect Deputy Sheriff's guns. Whenever I meet a new deputy, I ask him for his gun and I ask him real nice.

Tom Destry Jr.: I'm sorry, Mr. Kent. I'm afraid this here's one gun your collection's going to be minus.

Kent: You mean I'm going to have to take it?

Tom Destry Jr.: If you can. Now, hold on! Hold on. Don't get excited here. I'm just tryin' to tell you that I ain't got any guns. You see if I woulda had a gun then, why, one of us might have been hurt and it might be me. I wouldn't want that to happen... would I?

Washington Dimsdale: How are you going to face anybody after what you took from Kent and Frenchy?

Tom Destry Jr.: Whadja expect me to do?

Washington Dimsdale: I expected you to be like your pa, comin' out blasting behind your shootin' irons! And what happened? You didn't have any? Why?

Tom Destry Jr.: I don't believe in 'em.

Washington Dimsdale: You did the last time I heard about ya. What in thunder has come over ya since then?

Tom Destry Jr.: Wash, my pa had these

[guns]

Tom Destry Jr.: on that day in Tombstone when he got shot in the back. Didn't seem to do him much good, did they? That's one reason I don't believe in 'em.

Washington Dimsdale: What in tarnation do you believe in?

Tom Destry Jr.: Law and order.

Washington Dimsdale: Without guns?

Tom Destry Jr.: Without 'em!

Boris: Observe my brain in action. Now where would I go if I were a dead body? Would I stay in the open? No - no privacy.

Tom Destry Jr.: Mm-hmm. Wouldn't go in the river if you can't swim.

Washington Dimsdale: Why didn't I stay in the gutter where I was well off?

Boris: Would I go under the ground? No - there's no future in it.

[last lines]

Janice Tyndall: I'm sorry, Tom, but it sounded like murder at least.

Tom Destry Jr.: Oh, well. That's probably just the Russian way of expressin' somethin'. You know, speakin' of marriage, Janice...

Janice Tyndall: Yes, Tom?

Tom Destry Jr.: I had a friend once...