The Maltese Falcon Quotes
"You're good. You're very good. It's chiefly your eyes, I think, and that throb you get into your voice when you say things like 'Be generous, Mr. Spade.'"
"I don't know anything about women except that way, and then I didn't like Miles."
"I'm not Christ," he said irritably. "I can't work miracles out of thin air."
"She thinks I shot Miles," he said. Only his lips moved.
"You won't need much of anybody's help. You're good. You're very good."
"I'm afraid, Mr. Spade. I'm afraid of trusting you. I don't mean that. I do trust you, but—I trusted Floyd and– I've nobody else, nobody else, Mr. Spade."
"You've been patient. You've tried to help me. It is hopeless, and useless, I suppose."
"I had to keep some to live on," she explained meekly, putting a hand to her breast.
"I'm going out and see what I can do for you. I'll be back as soon as I can with the best news I can manage."
"Most things in San Francisco can be bought, or taken."
"Life could be ended for him at random by a falling beam: he would change his life at random by simply going away."
"He adjusted himself to beams falling, and then no more of them fell, and he adjusted himself to them not falling."
"When you're slapped, you'll take it and like it."
"I had to keep him off. I—I couldn't make myself shoot him."
"I distrust a man that says he's not. And the man that's telling the truth when he says he's not I distrust most of all, because he's an ass and an ass that's going contrary to the laws of nature."
"I do like a man that tells you right out he's looking out for himself. Don't we all?"
"I distrust a closemouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk and says the wrong things."
"Talking's something you can't do judiciously unless you keep in practice."
"I'll kill him the first time he gets in my way. I won't give him an even break. I won't give him a chance. I'll kill him."
"Think it over and think like hell. You've got till five-thirty to do it in. Then you're either in or out, for keeps."
"The cheaper the crook, the gaudier the patter."
"Dear God, he's my own lawyer that's got rich off me and I have to get down on my knees and beg him to tell me things!"
"I'm going out and find her if I have to dig up sewers."
"Nonsense," Bryan insisted: "Suppose someone came to you and engaged you to find Monahan, telling you they had reasons for thinking he was in the city."
"All right. Then there's no hard feelings. But you're wrong."
"Dead gamblers don't have any friends," Spade said.
"Or number four," Spade suggested with a cheerful smile: "he died of old age. You folks aren't serious, are you?"
"You wouldn't want the kind of information I could give you, Bryan. You couldn't use it. It'd poop this gambler's-revenge-scenario for you."
"And my only chance of ever catching them and tying them up and bringing them in is by keeping away from you and the police, because neither of you show any signs of knowing what in hell it's all about."
"I don't know anything positively except that my client wasn't interested in Monahan, had never been interested in Monahan."
"Poor head," and stroked it in silence awhile.
"You're the most contemptible man God ever made when you want to be."
"She's pretty capable of taking care of herself and she knows where to come for help when she thinks she needs it, and when it suits her."
"I've been through it all before and expect to go through it again."
"I feel towards Wilmer just exactly as if he were my own son. I really do."
"He'd rather drop a doubtful case than try it and have it go against him."
"The choice we'll give him and he'll gobble it up."
"I don't see how even this District Attorney of yours can link Thursby and Jacobi and Wilmer together without having to—"
"The indelible youngness of his face gave an indescribably vicious—and inhuman—turn to the white-hot hatred and the cold white malevolence in his face."
"That's the trick, from my side, to make my play strong enough that it ties you up, but yet not make you mad enough to bump me off against your better judgment."
"If you kill me, how are you going to get the bird?"
"There are other means of persuasion besides killing and threatening to kill."
"Now, Wilmer, I'm sorry indeed to lose you, and I want you to know that I couldn't be any fonder of you if you were my own son."
"When you're young you simply don't understand things."
"I'm going to send you over. The chances are you'll get off with life."
"I hope to Christ they don't hang you, precious, by that sweet neck."