Modernism and the Moral Mystery of the Mind: Sam Spade

Returning to the paragon of crime fiction, Sherlock Holmes, we see it’s common for readers to be shut out of the detective's mind. Whatever is there is privileged information, and no matter who is narrating – whether it's a Watson, the detective, or some omniscient narrator, the closer we get to the solution of the case, the more closed off the detective's mind is. For Sherlock Holmes, this is accomplished by having Watson narrate, replete with well-documented and studied instances of Watson's inability to understand what is going on in Holmes' mind.

An interesting result of this is to what extent we can trust the detective to be a moral individual. As discussed in the last post, it isn't much of a stretch for a detective to go the way of his antagonists, especially in the cynical time dubbed modernism. Spade becomes less like Holmes and more like Gatsby: inhabiting a kind of moral no-man's land where they can bend and break the laws and manipulate the information they share with others to suit their own ends: not the law, not the civil or social good, but their own selfish interests.

Holmes we can guarantee is a moral, upstanding fellow because of Watson's own social position and Holmes' interest in mystery and righting wrongs. For Holmes to suddenly turn criminal would be contrary to his character. Even if he has dalliances with criminality, Holmes laughs them off, justifies them for the sake of the case, all while reassuring us of his stalwart nature.

We don't have that same confidence with Sam Spade, in part because the mystery he's investigating is an odd mix of personal and professional (his partner was murdered – there's a sense of professional pride even if nobody cared for Archer) and potentially lucrative: he appears willing to go along and be part of Gutman’s scheme until the end of the novel, only after they discover the falcon was a fake.

We must spend the novel wondering just where Spade falls morally. Of course, come the end, he makes the right decision so everyone will be arrested for their involvement in the crimes: arson, murder, smuggling, etc, and Spade is careful to remain unattached, suggesting his moral dubiousness was for the sake of the case.

Spade is therefore an unsolved mystery in his own right. We receive no resolution as to Iva Archer, and there's always the possibility Spade could have been bought out. As the saying goes, everyone has their price and it's possible Gutman just wasn't willing to pay Spade enough. After all, before Cairo joined Gutman's side, Gutman had offered more to Spade. Without access to Spade's thoughts or a confession on his part, it's possible his scenario about a “fall-guy” was a last minute concoction to get Gutman who had reneged on a previous deal.

So is Spade a man you shouldn't cross, or a man you shouldn't try to buy? Is he moral, or cautious? Does he have a price, or is he too upstanding? If he has principles, then why the affair with Iva Archer? Did Spade do what was right, or did he do what's right merely because it was the safest thing to do?

We like to consider protagonists to be like Holmes: characters of high moral standing who always do right regardless of consequence, and, even better, their right choices yield the best outcome for them. However, as discussed before, Hammett was writing at a particular time in the history of English Literature: modernism. Such a positive ending and depiction of a protagonist doesn't fit with the era and the novel as a whole. There's just too much going on for a Sherlock Holmes style resolution to easily fit. Just as the writing is cynical, we need to approach it cynically: doubting and wondering whether or not we really know just what’s going on in Spade’s mind, if it’s moral clarity or dubious desires. All we can say is Spade, like the enamel lacquer of the Maltese Falcon itself, is hiding whatever is inside.

Powers and Limitations: Polhaus, Dundy, and Bryan

In the course of The Maltese Flacon, Sam Spade periodically has to deal with the official police force; specifically, Detective Tom Polhaus, Police Lieutenant Dundy, and District Attorney Bryan. However, while each character is unique (Polhaus is much more willing to work with Sam than Dundy is; Dundy himself remains quiet and frustrated, and the District Attorney knows he has to save face as a public figure), they appear less often than Brigid, Cairo, Cook, or Gutman, but their roles in the novel are important in ensuring a satisfying outcome by enabling the civil justice Spade cannot.

The generic role of the official force when the protagonist is a private investigator (or really any competing detective) is to follow the wrong track. They provide alternative hypotheses about the case and sometimes even provide relevant information but have a tendency to misinterpret it, but are, never the ones to solve it. Because of this, the detective has a tendency to keep them in the dark about certain things, lest the police interfere in the investigation, especially when it's a private detective versus the official police. In some cases, not only will they compete with the protagonist but they will actively try to impede and harass the detective.

Sometimes, the official detectives' case is tangential to the protagonist’s. The Maltese Falcon is one such case. Once Spade gets caught up in the mystery of the Falcon, solving that mystery becomes part and parcel to discovering who killed Archer and Thursby, and his lack of sympathy makes us almost forget Archer until the very end when Spade reminds Brigid about it. For Spade, finding the Falcon meant finding out who killed his partner. Polhaus and Dundy never seek the Falcon. They don't even learn about it until the end.

Which begs the question: had they known, could they have done anything about the Falcon?

Polhaus, Dundy, and Bryan focus on Thursby's past as a gambler's bodyguard, an aspect of Thursby's background Spade learns from them, but it never directly affects Spade's investigation (that Thursby's Webley had killed Archer, though, Spade does use). Spade, on the other hand, does not reveal any of his investigation, conclusions, or hypotheses to them, As Spade himself says, “Mrs. Spade didn't raise any children dippy enough to make guesses in front of a district attorney.”

Of course, come the novel's end, Spade has discovered the murderers and found (or rather received) the Falcon, effectively doing Polhaus and Dundy's jobs for them while they were looking into Thursby's past. However, Spade can only do their job up to a point. As a private investigator, Spade does not have the power or authority to actually arrest, hold, or try the guilty party, and given Spade's double dealing, it would be difficult to tell whether he's an honest or dishonest man at the end. We may wonder on that point throughout the novel, but the inclusion of Polhaus and Dundy, the official policeman, means Spade has more options than to merely side with or betray Gutman and his gang. Spade has the option to side with law and order.

Polhaus and Dundy take Spade from an extreme and situate him in the middle. Ostensibly, Spade is like Polhaus and Dundy, but the range of his powers are different from theirs. He cannot incarcerate anyone, but can choose his cases. A case the police wouldn't take, he would. Similarly, where the official police are bound by their position, Spade is, like Gutman and his gang, a little freer to move around, engage in some more underhanded dealings, lie a little easier, or even be a little more honest. Spade is obligated only to his license (the revocation of which is threatened) and his conscience and only limited to the investigative powers his license affords him. Spade needs Polhaus, Dundy, and Bryan to ensure the villains' capture and to keep Spade from being one of them.