In these stories and novellas he wrote for BLACK MASK and other pulp magazines of the 1920s and 1930s, Dashiell Hammett transformed the American detective story into something original -- a medium to explore the jarring textures and revved-up cadences of American life. As a chronicler of this underworld of criminality, he created the Continental Op, the nameless, stoic detective, jaded and fearless, who's cast in the role of protagonist of most of the stories in this volume.