How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #10
Spade laughed. "You mean a couple of high-class sleuths like you and Dundy worked on that lily-of-the-valley all night and couldn't crack him?"
"What do you mean—all night?" Polhaus protested. "We worked on him for less than a couple of hours. We saw we wasn't getting nowhere, and let him go." (15.46)
In this scene, the "lily-of-the-valley" that Spade is referring to is Cairo. Hammett resorts to common stereotypes of the homosexual as fragile and delicate by describing Cairo as a flower.
Quote #11
"You're not the man that's afraid of a little bit of trouble. You know how to do things and you know you'll land on your feet in the end, no matter what happens." (18.34)
Gutman commends Spade here for being street-smart enough to know how to handle most anything. And Spade certainly is someone who always manages to land on his feet. At the end of the novel, it seems as if Spade's in for it because the bad guys have fled and he has no one to give to the police for the two murders. But Spade manages to skirt trouble by hitting on the fact that Brigid is the real murderer.
Quote #12
Joel Cairo's dark face was open-mouthed, open-eyed, yellowish, and amazed. He breathed through his mouth, his round effeminate chest rising and falling" (18.40)
Here, we see another stereotyped portrayal of Cairo as the effeminate homosexual. Does Hammett come off as homophobic in his depiction of homosexuality? Why is it necessary or important to have homosexual characters in a novel that is mostly populated by macho tough guys?