Lassiter was bumming a ride on The Caprice Queen when a bunch of river pirates blew the riverboat out of the water and got away with a hundred thousand dollars in gold. He decided to make the dynamiters pay for the inconvenience, and a hundred thousand - the whole bundle - was the figure he decided on. Getting it wouldn't be easy, but in the end, Lassiter always got what he wanted.

Lassiter is totally amoral, totally unpredictable, more like a cougar than a man.
Sometimes he kills, sometimes he purrs, sometimes he does a little of both together. It all depends on his mood.
Lassiter doesn't know the meaning of good or evil—he just knows what he wants. And to get what he wants, he will lie, cheat, steal, and even kill without a morsel of regret.
Sometimes he's a hero, sometimes he's a villain—with Lassiter you can't ever be sure. You can't even be sure whether you're for him or against him. You can only be sure of one thing: if you read about Lassiter once, you'll want to read about him again and again.