Rare James M. Cain story ‘Blackmail’ published for first time
By HILLEL ITALIE
AP National Writer
NEW YORK (AP) — A rare James M. Cain story, “Blackmail” is featured in the new issue of Strand Magazine, a quarterly which has unearthed obscure works by Ernest Hemingway, William Faulkner and many others. Written over the latter part of Cain’s life and left unpublished, “Blackmail” tells of a blind Korean War veteran, a former comrade who now employs him and the woman from the past with some hard-boiled ideas about money, and love. The themes in “Blackmail” of betrayal, violence, rough sexuality — and blackmail — echo such Cain classics as “Double Indemnity” and “The Postman Always Rings Twice.”
