When Brigid learns of Cairo's visit, she asks Sam to set up a meeting with him and tells Cairo that she doesn't have the statue, but will in a few days. Sam accepts the offer, and Cairo once again holds Sam at gunpoint while he searches the office. Sam disarms Cairo, who offers the detective $5,000 to find the bird. When Sam denies any knowledge of the statue, Cairo pulls a gun and demands to search the office. The announcement of Thursby's death draws an inquiry from a mysterious little man named Joel Cairo, who tells Sam that he is trying to recover a statue of a black falcon. Despite his doubts that she has told him the whole truth, Sam accepts her as his client. The following morning, Wonderly summons Sam to her new address, where she confesses that her real name is Brigid O'Shaughnessy and that the story she related the day before was completely false. Dundy and Detective Tom Polhaus, two policemen, who suspect him of murdering Thursby out of revenge for Miles's death. Then Thursby is found with four bullet holes in his back and Sam is visited by Lt. He calls Wonderly and learns that she has checked out of her hotel. Later that night, Sam learns that Miles has been shot. Sam's partner, Miles Archer, agrees to be present when Wonderly meets Floyd Thursby, her sister's seducer, and then follow him to his hotel in hopes of finding the missing girl. At the Spade and Archer detective agency in San Francisco, Samuel Spade is interviewed by the beautiful Miss Wonderly, who wishes to hire him to find her runaway sister.

Maltese falcon detective