by Cain, Paul
Kells’ role as a gambler in Fast One determines how he operates as an existential anti-hero. He, and his companion Cain protagonists take their chances simply because that is how they live,
how they feel alive. Near the beginning of the novel, Kells refuses a five percent piece of a gang leader’s action, just as he will refuse all offers that require his allegiance to any group, on either side of the law:
Kells had straightened up. He was examining the nail of his left index finger. “I came out here five months ago with two grand and I’ve given it a pretty good ride. I’ve got a nice little joint at the Lancaster, with a built-in bar; and a pretty fair harem, and I’ve got several thousand friends in the bank. It’s a lot more fun guessing the name of a pony than guessing what the name of the next stranger I’m supposed to have shot will be. I’m having a lot of fun. I don’t want any part of anything.”
Risk-taking is an elemental part of Kells’ identity, and part of the reason he and similar Cain protagonists are probably the first significant anti-heroes in American detective fiction, possibly in American popular entertainment. Cain’s anti-heroes are not driven by money, ideology, or even the professional self-respect of Hammett’s protagonists – and certainly not by morality. Kells and his fictive brethren are all amoral. But their amorality is so much cleaner and more appealing than all the greedy grasping of the criminal types that surround them.
Cain’s anti-heroes also appeal because this existential attitude frees them from so many societal constraints. Cain’s anti-heroes are all on the go, as if to slow down might drown them. They are breathless like Goddard’s hoodlum anti-hero, but also beyond fear like Sergeant Riggs, the lethal weapon.
We recognize Kells in so many of today’s anti-hero’s, from Samurai swordsmen and government snipers to criminal hit men, Western gamblers, space jockey alien hunters, and of course, all the deadly rogue cops of popular entertainment. Cain captured, for the first time, an amoral attitude that is now so pervasive it is almost invisible.
Although Cain uses recurrent devices, and protagonist types, he also presents more diversity in characters, and narration than most critics have observed. Cain tells tales in the first person and the third person. His trouble-shooters, stunt men, and criminal types are offset by the more refined Druse, the retired judge, of Pigeon Blood. Cain is comfortable depicting any segment of American society; his fearlessly disengaged protagonists can emerge from any class, but will always live on the edge of disaster and temptation, racing from one thrilling episode to the next with a kind of amoral grace.
Cain’s existential hero, the Fast One, possesses a unique purity of purpose that separates him from all the lesser characters of the novel or story in which he appears. After more than eighty years of experimentation in American popular entertainments, Cain’s invention remains an enduringly attractive model for today’s American action hero.
Keith Alan Deutsch
Story Sources
“Black” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 15 #3, May 1932. © 1932 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Parlor Trick” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 15 #5, July 1932. © 1932 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Red 71” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 15 #10, December 1932. © 1932 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“One, Two, Three” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 16 #3, May 1933. © 1933 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Murder Done In Blue” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 16 #4, June 1933. © 1933 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Pigeon Blood” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 16 #9, November 1933. © 1933 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1960 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Hunch” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 17 #1, March 1934. © 1934 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1951 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Trouble-Chaser” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 17 #2, April 1934. © 1934 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1951 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Chinaman’s Chance” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 18 #7, September, 1935. © 1935 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1952 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“555” originally appeared in Detective Fiction Weekly, 14 December 1935. Copyright © 1935 by The Red Star News Company. Copyright renewed 1963 and assigned to Argosy Communication, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted by arrangement with Argosy Communications, Inc.
“Death Song” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 18, #11, January, 1936. © 1936 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1953 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Pineapple” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 19, #1, March 1936. © 1936 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1953 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Sockdolager” originally appeared in Star Detective, Volume 1 #1, April, 1936. © 1936 by Red Star News, The Frank A. Munsey Company. © 1953 renewed by Popular Publications, Inc. successor-in-interest to the Frank A Munsey Company. Reprinted in Tales from The Black Mask Morgue Series by permission of Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“Dutch Treat” originally appeared in Black Mask, Volume 19 #10, December, 1936. © 1936 by Pro-Distributors, Inc.; copyright renewed 1953 by Popular Publications, Inc. Reprinted by permission Keith Alan Deutsch proprietor and conservator of the respective copyrights, and successor-in-interest to Popular Publications, Inc.
“The Tasting Machine” originally appeared in two parts, Gourmet Magazine, November 1949 and December 1949.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this book or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Publi
shing History
A Limited Edition of this collection of Paul Cain’s fiction, conceived and edited by Keith Alan Deutsch for Black Mask Press, was published by Centipede Press in February 2012, and copyright 2011 by Keith Alan Deutsch. This new, 2013 edition owes much to the time spent discussing Paul Cain and his fiction with Max Allan Collins and with Lynn F. Myers, Jr., during the years in which the earlier anthology was assembled.
Copyrights
Permissions, acknowledgements, and copyright information appear below in Story Sources, which constitute an extension of this copyright page.
Copyright © 2013 Keith Alan Deutsch
First Edition 2013
Cover design by Andrea Worthington
ISBN 978-1-4804-5688-4
Published in association with Keith Alan Deutsch, Series Editor.
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