Vivian: Hello. Police Headquarters, please. Hello, this is Mrs...
Marlowe: (He grabs the phone and stops her call.) Hello. What do you want, please?
Police: I don't want a thing.
Marlow: What?
Police: You called me.
Marlowe: I called you? Say, who is this?
Police: This is Sergeant Riley at headquarters.
Marlowe: Sergeant Riley? Well, there isn't any Sergeant Riley here.
Police: I know that! Now look brother...
Marlowe: Wait a minute. You'd better talk to my mother.
Police: I don't want to talk to your mother. Why should I want to talk to your mother...
Vivian: Hello. Who is this?
Police: This is the police.
Vivian: The police! Well, this is no police station.
Police: I know that!
Vivian: Well if you know it, then why don't ya...Look, this is not a police station.
Police: This is silly...
Vivian: What was that you said?...My father should hear this.
Police: I don't want to talk to your father...
Marlowe: Hello. Who is this?
Police: This is the police talking.
Marlowe: Yeah, but she just told you that...
Police: She just rang the police!
Marlowe: Oh, you're the police. (Oh, he's the police.) Oh, well that's different. What can I do for you?
Police: You can...
Marlowe: I can do what? Where? Oh, no. I wouldn't like that, neither would my daughter. (Hangs up the phone.) I hope the sergeant never traces that call.
Vivian: You like to play games, don't you?
Marlowe: Hmm, hmm.
Vivian: Why did you stop me phoning?

Carmen Sternwood: You're not very tall are you?
Philip Marlowe: Well, I, uh, I try to be.

Eddie Mars: Is that any of your business?
Philip Marlowe: I could make it my business.
Eddie Mars: I could make your business mine.
Philip Marlowe: Oh, you wouldn't like it. The pay's too small.

Norris: Are you attempting to tell me my duties sir?
Marlowe: No just having fun trying to guess what they are.

General Sternwood: Do you like orchids?
Philip Marlowe: Not particularly.
General Sternwood: Ugh. Nasty things. Their flesh is too much like the flesh of men, and their perfume has the rotten sweetness of corruption.

Philip Marlowe: Oh, Eddie, you don't have anybody watching me, do you? Tailing me in a gray Plymouth coupe, maybe?
Eddie Mars: No, why should I?
Philip Marlowe: Well, I can't imagine, unless you're worried about where I am all the time.
Eddie Mars: I don't like you that well.

Vivian: So you do get up, I was beginning to think you worked in bed like Marcel Proust.
Marlowe: Who's he?
Vivian: You wouldn't know him, a french writer.
Marlowe: Come into my boudoir.

Vivian: Speaking of horses, I like to play them myself. But I like to see them workout a little first, see if they're front runners or comefrom behind, find out what their whole card is, what makes them run.
Marlowe: Find out mine?
Vivian: I think so.
Marlowe: Go ahead.
Vivian: I'd say you don't like to be rated. You like to get out in front, open up a little lead, take a little breather in the backstretch, and then come home free.

Marlowe: You don't like to be rated yourself.
Vivian: I haven't met anyone yet that can do it. Any suggestions?
Marlowe: Well, I can't tell till I've seen you over a distance of ground. You've got a touch of class, but I don't know how, how far you can go.
Vivian: A lot depends on who's in the saddle.

Vivian: You go too far, Marlowe.
Marlowe: Those are harsh words to throw at a man, especially when he's walking out of your bedroom.

Marlowe: You know what he'll do when he comes back? Beat my teeth out, then kick me in the stomach for mumbling.

Philip Marlowe: What's wrong with you?
Vivian: Nothing you can't fix.

Norris: How do you like your brandy, sir?
Philip Marlowe: In a glass.

Philip Marlowe: She tried to sit in my lap while I was standing up.

Philip Marlowe: I don't mind if you don't like my manners. I don't like them myself. They're pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings.

Philip Marlowe: My, my, my. Such a lot of guns around town and so few brains!

Vivian: Why did you have to go on?
Marlowe: Too many people told me to stop.

Marlowe: You ought to wean her, she's old enough."

Marlowe: Hmm.
Sternwood: What does that mean?
Marlowe: It means - hmm.

Sternwood: You knew him too?
Marlowe: Yes, in the old days, when he used to run rum out of Mexico and I was on the other side. We used to swap shots between drinks, or drinks between shots, whichever you like.
 

Sternwood: They're alike only in having the same corrupt blood. Vivian is spoilt, exacting, smart and ruthless. Carmen is still a little child who likes to pull the wings off flies. I assume they have all the usual vices, besides those they've invented for themselves. If I seem a bit sinister as a parent, Mr. Marlowe, it's because my hold on life is too slight to include any Victorian hypocrisy. I need hardly add that any man who has lived as I have and who indulges for the first time in parenthood at my age deserves all he gets.

Sternwood: I enjoyed your drink as much as you did, sir.

Vivian (taunting): So you're a private detective. I didn't know they existed, except in books - or else they were greasy little men snooping around hotel corridors. My, you're a mess, aren't you?
Marlowe: I'm not very tall either. Next time, I'll come on stilts, wear a white tie and carry a tennis racket.

Vivian: What will your first step be?
Marlowe: The usual one.
Vivian: I didn't know there was a usual one.
Marlowe: (with a lisp) Oh sure there is. It comes complete with diagrams on page forty-seven of 'How to Be a Detective in Ten Easy Lessons' correspondence school textbook.

Carmen: You're cute.
Marlowe: And you're higher than a kite.

Vivian: What did she tell you?
Marlowe: Not half as much as you just did. (He grabs her fists that are poised to strike.) Take it easy. I don't slap so good around this time of the evening

Carmen: Can I have my picture now?
Marlowe: No.
Carmen: Can I have my gun back?
Marlowe: Later.
Carmen: You're cute. I like you.
Marlowe: What you see's nothing. I've got a Balinese dancing girl tattooed across my chest.

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