Our now regular Guest Blogger Terry Zobeck returns for another installment — following “This King Business” and “Death and Company” — detailing the various changes made by Frederic Dannay when he was editing Hammett for paperback. I couldn’t help but look into my copy of A Man Named Thin, which assures us on the front cover that this is the “First book collection of these stories” — no problem there — and that it is “COMPLETE AND UNABRIDGED” — whoa!!! There we must disagree. Here’s Terry with a list of abridgments for:
“The Second Story Angel” was published in the November 15, 1923 issue of Black Mask. Dannay reprinted it in his final selection of Hammett’s short stories, A Man Named Thin. It’s a tale about a struggling writer — hmm, wonder what the inspiration for this was? — searching for a plot for his next story when he is visited by a lovely lady burglar in the night. Rather than turn her over to the police, he pays a bribe to the detective on the scene. In return, he hopes she will tell him her life story, which he will then use for his fiction. The story resolves with an amusing twist; I suspect Hammett meant to be a little more risqué, but had to settle for a simple kiss. It is set in New York City rather than San Francisco; however, Hammett provides no details of the city that would give the story a sense of place, unlike what he often did with his stories set in San Francisco.
Like many of Hammett’s stories that Dannay included in Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine and/or collected in the digest volumes, he took the blue pencil to “The Second Story Angel.” In providing the original text, I’ve used the same format as my earlier posts — page number, line number, whether it is from the top or bottom of the page, and the text corrections. The page numbers refer to the digest first edition A Man Named Thin (1962):
Page no. Line # Top/bottom Text
73 2 top
of various divers popular magazines
74 17 bottom
to a position outside without the next room
74 15 bottom
on the intruder’s part
75 8 top
Should be a new paragraph: Then he drove a fist
75 13 bottom
lay a tool, a very small pinch bar
76 2 & 3 top
of the former to her temples and face and of the latter between her the lips
76 5 bottom
Should be a separate paragraph: She laughed briefly
77 4 top
Should be a separate paragraph: “Suppose you tell me about it.”
78 8 top
whether you make lay charges
80 10 top
Carter found himself saying, speaking: The dialogue that follows should be a separate paragraph
80 12 top
Cassidy shook his head briskly bruskly [yes, that’s how it’s spelled in the original]
80 15 bottom
Dialogue should be a separate paragraph: “I’m makin’ a sap o’ myself
80 14 bottom
give me the th’ dough
80 6 bottom
girl’s hunger;:
81 13 bottom
a lawyer
81 7 bottom
Before: it’s just that it’s a rotten way, should be: but it amounted to the same thing, and I didn’t want any of it. It’s not the morals of it—
81 5 bottom
a job somewhere—in a store
82 7 top
wrong place by mistake; original has: wrong place my mistake; the original appears to be a typo
82 3 bottom
and that brings my the tale up-to-date [there should be no hyphens in “up to date”]
83 3 top
After: potentialities, should be: —already trying to frame the opening paragraph that would come from his typewriter.
83 9 top
Should be a separate paragraph: Carter laughed.
83 18 top
All of the stories noted here should be in single quotes; all of the magazine titles should be in italics.
83 5 bottom
The dialogue should be a separate paragraph: “But I suppose
84 6 bottom
Should be a separate paragraph: They were afraid
85 3 top
After: express her gratitude, should be a new paragraph of the following dialogue: “You’re one white ––”
85 13 top
Mrs. H. J. H.
85 16 bottom
the city, then, or for the newspaper.
85 14 bottom
in his New York rooms,
85 12 bottom
mail frantically feverishly
85 12 bottom
the messenger-boy
85 10 bottom
town,—futile telegrams [the comma is added and the em-dash is deleted]
86 3 top
drawn from the life
86 8 top
serial, dramatic and moving picture rights of this story
86 9 top
she was a crook [“was” should be italicized]
86 13 top
Finally the manuscript tale was completed, found satisfactory, and sent out
86 15 bottom
Gerald GFulton and Harry Mack Mays [subsequently, Dannay reverted to Fulton]
86 10 bottom
When the group four visitors
86 5 bottom
Should be a separate paragraph: He turned to Carter.
86 4 bottom
of the idea for your story, The Second Story Angel [the title of the story should be italicized rather than enclosed in single quotes]
87 6 top
Mack Mays
87 10 top
It was Mack’s Mays voice [there is no apostrophe after Mays—this is an error]
87 16 top
and the his four professional writers guests
87 13 bottom
Mack Mays
87 7 bottom
bought one,; but five –”
97 4 bottom
Mack Mays
So, there you have it, “The Second Story Angel” resurrected to its original text. Next up, we’ll see “Who Killed Dan Odams” and what, if anything, Dannay did to further the homicide.
