OOC: Application
Character name: Samuel Spade
Genre (TV/books/etc): books
Fandom: The Maltese Falcon (and three additional short stories) by Dashiell Hammett
Canon point: Just after the last story, "They Can Only Hang You Once." (Spade is 38, here, and I'm presuming the stories are chronological for Spade in the order Hammett wrote them.) It's circa 1932 for him.
Why this Character and Canon point?: I've always had an interest in classic noir and detective fiction, and Spade is my favorite of the bunch (sorry, Marlowe). He's a character constructed really vividly out of just a few details and his actions, which I admire, and he's kind of irresistible. As for the canon point, I wanted to include the stories because I enjoy them, and also because I wanted him to be a few years out from the Maltese Falcon case. He's as over Archer's murder and Brigid's betrayal, as much as he ever will be, and he's used to working his cases alone by this point (except for his secretary, of course).
Programmed Possession: His office. A classic office of the period, with an outer waiting area with chairs, a phone, and his secretary's desk. Another door, marked "Private," leads into his interior office, with a desk, file cabinets, a plant, etc. The windows all have venetian blinds, and the exterior office has "Sam Spade: Detective" on the frosted glass. See attached pictures.
Abilities/Weaknesses: Pretty much 100% vanilla human. He is very intelligent, but not super-humanly so; ditto observant.
Psychology/Personality: Spade is a mystery, and purposely so. For most of his novel-length debut, he lets both the cops and the crooks think he's in business for the money, and plans to profit from helping the crooks get their loot and get away with murder. In reality, however, he blows the case wide open and solves it for the relentless if not entirely competent police duo on the trail. It's never clear, however, even at the end, what his own moral views are, except that they're probably not as shady as he lets people think.
Spade is certainly a cynic, quite jaded even before his partner is murdered. He's also more than a bit of a womanizer, though if he gets emotionally involved, he certainly doesn't show it, nor do such feelings (if they exist) get in the way of his logical judgment regarding women he's formerly or presently involved with. That said, he does have a sense of humor, and has real affection for his secretary, and even a half-playful, half combative relationship with detective Dundy and his partner Polhaus, who work the beat Sam operates in.
At the end of the day, Spade is cool, detached, professional, and very very good at what he does. Whether he's acting for justice,money, or simply because he's talented is an open question.
History: Hammett purposely leaves Spade incredibly enigmatic; he pops out of nowhere, at the beginning of the novel, and we get almost no hint as to what Spade's life outside detecting was or is like. (We get tiny references, such as his familiarity with English revolvers and an offhand comment about families with skeletons in the closet that may or may not just be a bait to Dundy, but nothing more.)
What is known is that, at some point, Miles Archer and Samuel Spade went into business together as private eyes in San Fransisco. Archer was about ten years Spade's senior, but it seems Spade was always the better detective. They'd quickly earned a reputation for effectiveness and discretion, which made them popular with clients but less than popular with the police; between their wits and their attorney Sid Wise, they managed keep their licenses and stay out of trouble with the law (though not for lack of trying on the DA's part). At some point, they hired a secretary, Effie Perine, a bit younger than Spade. She and Spade have an on-again-off-again sexual relationship in addition to their always-on friendship. Archer, it seems, was as much of a philanderer (if not moreso) than Spade, though it's never clear if anything happened between him and Effie.
At some point soon before the start of The Maltese Falcon, Spade became involved in an affair with Archer's wife, Iva. Iva, however, turned out to be very clingy and kept pressuring Spade to commit to marrying her if she divorced her husband. Spade, having no intention of doing any such thing, was looking for a way to end the relationship without her telling Miles everything and making work awkward.
Before this could happen, however, they were hired by a woman calling herself Wonderly to track a man named Thursby. Archer, looking to make time with the very pretty client, volunteers. Archer is found dead that night; Thursby is killed shortly after. The police suspect Spade of one or both murders. Either he killed Thursby in revenge for shooting Archer, or he killed Archer to get with his wife. (Incidentally, Iva also thinks Spade might have killed Miles, which may say something about the state of that relationship.)
He finds out "Miss Wonderly" was actually named Brigid O'Shaughnessy, and that the reasons she'd given him for looking for Thursby were phony. Spade gets drawn into a complicated mess of double crosses and lies involving Brigid, her old accomplice Joel Cairo, and their former/present employer Casper Gutman. All of them are seeking the Maltese Falcon, an artifact worth a great deal of money. Spade, while sleeping with Brigid and dodging the cops, manages to piece together the series of events that have occurred. He manages to gain possession of the Falcon, and after a long night of bluffing and cleverness, sets the cops after Cairo and Gutman, who've fled. Brigid, who stays with Spade thinking he'll protect her, is rudely surprised when he says he knows that she was the one who killed Miles. Despite the fact that he may or may not love her, and may or may not believe she loves him, he's not going to take the fall for her. Though she pleads with him, he turns her over to the police. The bird turns out to be worthless, though whether it's a replica of a real object or the real object was always a myth is unclear.
Time passes, and Spade doesn't take a new partner, instead retaining Effie and changing the business' name from "Spade and Archer" to "Samuel Spade, Detective." He continues working in San Fransisco, running into Dundy and Polhaus on another couple occasions, and being hired by everyone from respectable lawyers to shady underworld tycoons. It's clear he's maintained a reputation for being less moral than he is, as he's even asked obliquely to kill a man by a client, though he refuses.
Directly before his arrival in Taxon, Spade was investigating an old man on behalf of the man's nephew; the client suspected his uncle was being unduly influenced in his choice of heirs, as his will had not yet been made public. The man in question turned out to be a fraud, and committed a double homicide while Spade was in the house. Spade promptly puts the pieces together, the man confesses, and Dundy is on hand to take the man away. Spade leaves, satisfied, only to find himself abruptly in Taxon on the way home.