Dashiell Hammett's passion for bikes influenced early drafts of his most famous novel,
The Maltese Falcon
In an apartment, somewhere in downtown San Francisco...
He didn't raise his voice. "I've got to know what happened to it. Take them off." She drew herself up tall and began to undress. He put the pistol on the toilet-seat and went down on one knee in front of her. Working thoroughly, he scrutinized each piece of silk and chiffon as it floated down. There was no tire-lever.
"You shouldn't have done that to me, Sam," she said softly.
"I had to know, angel." He brushed her ear lightly with his lips. He picked up the pistol and went into the living room. Gutman smiled at him from the rocking-chair. His fat chins wobbled with counterfeit amiability. Spade rolled a cigarette. The kid on the floor groaned and rolled over onto his side. Spade set fire to his cigarette and kicked him in the head.
"You palmed it." His eyes had a hard, yellow gleam.
The fat man's smile became slightly stretched. "By Gad sir, you are a character and no mistake. Well, I don't mind telling you that indeed I did." His fat pink fingers dabbled in his vest pocket and came out with a slender golden object. "I must have my little joke now and then." He chuckled unpleasantly.
"On the table." Spade exhaled smoke in a long, pale cloud. Gutman placed the object beside his glass with casual deliberation. Spade's blond Satan's face creased in a mirthless grin. He picked up the golden object. He looked at it closely for a moment, then spun on his heel and smashed it down on the table. It hit the fat man's glass and burst it apart in glittering fragments. Spade's face was pale and hard. He spoke rapidly and low.
"Goddam it, what kind of palooka do you take me for? This is my burg and I ain't no dumb cluck like your cheap Romeville gunsel here. If you think I don't know a tire-lever from a lobster-pick... then think again and think fast!"
"Be careful, Sam, please." There was a pleading in the girl's voice. She pointed towards the corridor as the handle of the door began to turn. Spade levelled the gun. Nobody else moved. Slowly the door swung inwards. A tall man stood there. He was swaying slightly and had hold of a black, shining bicycle. His voice came harsh and rasping with a liquid bubbling of pain behind it: "Where's Spade?"
The eyes stared straight ahead, but they weren't seeing anything. One arm snaked out to the doorframe, missed it, and he toppled forward slowly into the room. Spade caught the machine with his spare hand. The man crashed full-length, face-down onto the floor. A pool of blood leaked into the carpet at his chin. The gun-metal grey handle of a brake lever stuck out from the nape of his neck.
"Back, all of you." Spade's voice betrayed no emotion at all. "Against the back wall while I take a look at the dingus." The girl was looking green. "For Christ's sakes, don't get sick on me now, sister."
He leant the machine against the Chesterfield and began to feel every inch for some sign of irregularity or tell-tale bulge in the polished black enamel. He ran his hand down each tube and felt around each baroque lug minutely. He spun each wheel in turn, squeezed each tire round and then ran a stubby thumb up every spoke to the hub. He grasped the bars and ran his palms expertly round the curves. Then he felt under the saddle letting his fingers pry into each corner of the supple leather. The fat man pursed his lips and smiling with only slight uneasiness, asked: "May I enquire, Mr. Spade, as to where all this is leading us? You see, sir, we have not been discussing any bird of prey... This is intelligence which we hold and you do not. For your part all you hold is a firearm and now -- you will forgive my amusement sir -- a black, secondhand bicycle." He snickered.
"Sam!" The girl's voice was an involuntary gasp. "The headbadge!" He swivelled the machine and peered at the gilt and enamel symbol on the head-tube -- it was a black falcon. The punk on the floor groaned. Without removing his eyes from the Falcon Spade kicked him in the head.
His eyes narrowed. He slid the pistol into his coat pocket and with one hand on the machine began to work a broad thumbnail under the badge.
It was then that Cairo hit him with the soda-siphon.
Spade took the blow on the side of his forehead and staggered to the window. The machine crashed to the floor. The Levantine got his hands closed about Spade's throat. A vase from the windowsill shattered on the punk's head. The girl screamed. Spade blinked groggily a couple of times and then focussed slowly on the smaller man trying to throttle him. One big hand came up from his side and bunched up the Levantine's ruby-set green silk necktie. Gradually the long arm straightened and the fingers around his own neck slid off. The long arm lifted slightly and Cairo's glossy patent-leather shoes left the floor.
"I think, Mr. Spade, that would be inadvisable."
Gutman's voice was oily with menace. An ornately engraved silver and mother-of-pearl pistol appeared in his soft pink paw. "Miss O'Shaughnessy, would you be so kind as to relieve the gentleman of that dangerous item in his right-hand coat pocket?" Cairo spluttered and his dark eyes bulged. The girl came in close. Spade took a pace back and swung the choking Levantine at her. She gave a little cry and stumbled. Her high heel came down on the kid's limp hand. The fat man stepped around the dead body and collided with the teetering girl. He backed ponderously and put on foot through the front wheel of the bicycle with a twang of parting spokes. The gun roared deafeningly in the closed confines of the apartment. Glass tinkled and the main light went out. Cairo and the girl both screamed at the same time and there was a sickening sound of tortured metal as bodies fell heavily in the dark.
Spade fumbled a flashlight out of the bureau and snapped it on. With the big blue automatic he covered the ruckus on the floor. Gutman's great bulk had crushed the rear triangle and he wore one wheel round and ankle like a ruff. The girl was nursing her wrist and sobbing. Cairo gasped for breath, hands at this throat, his pearl-gray pants seeping up blood from the carpet. The punk groaned. He had a pedal in his left ear.
"Jesus," said Spade softly.
The noise ceased abrubtly and all eyes followed the beam of the light. A long, jagged tear of black enamel had been scraped from the Falcon's down tube. Underneath, where there should have been naked steel, was the glint of...
[From the publisher's letter, 13th June 1929: "Dear Dashiell, the first chapters of The Falcon are just the goods, but we're not sold on the bicycle line. Might work better to have it a gold statuette, say -- though could it still be a falcon...?"]
© David Eccles
Cycling Plus