The Third Man

by Graham Greene

Holly Martins, an American author of western fiction, arrives in post–Second World War Vienna seeking his childhood friend, Harry Lime, who has offered him a job. Martins is told that Lime was killed by a car while crossing the street. At Lime's funeral, Martins meets two British Royal Military Police: Sergeant Paine, a fan of Martins's books, and Major Calloway. Afterward, Martins is asked by Mr. Crabbin to lecture at a book club a few days later. He then meets a friend of Lime's, "Baron" Kurtz, who tells Martins that he and another friend, a Romanian called Popescu, carried Lime to the side of the street after the accident. Before he died, Lime asked them to take care of Martins as well as Lime's girlfriend, actress Anna Schmidt.

As Martins investigates Lime's death, he discovers accounts differ on whether two or three men carried away the body. The porter at Lime's flat offers to give Martins more information, but someone kills him before Martins can talk to him. Martins confronts Major Calloway and demands that Lime's death be investigated. Calloway reveals that Lime was stealing penicillin from military hospitals, diluting it, then selling it on the black market, injuring or killing many people. Martins, once convinced by hard evidence, agrees to leave.

Martins visits Anna that evening and notices Lime watching from a darkened doorway. Lime flees and vanishes. Martins summons Calloway, who deduces that Lime has escaped through the sewers. The British police exhume Lime's coffin and discover that the body is the orderly who stole the penicillin for Lime. Anna is to be sent to the Soviet sector, and is questioned again by Calloway.

Martins meets Lime and they ride Vienna's Ferris wheel, the Wiener Riesenrad. Lime obliquely threatens Martins before leaving quickly. Calloway then asks Martins to help capture Lime. Martins agrees to help on one condition, demanding Anna's safe conduct out of Vienna. Anna is about to leave on the train when she spots Martins, who has come to observe her departure. She forces the plan out of him but wants no part of it. Exasperated, Martins decides to leave Vienna, but on the way to the airport, Calloway stops at a hospital to show Martins children crippled or dying of meningitis who were treated with Lime's diluted penicillin. Martins agrees to help the police again.

Lime arrives at a small cafe to meet Martins, but Anna warns Lime that the police are closing in. He tries again to escape using the sewer tunnels, but the police are there. Lime shoots and kills Paine, but Calloway shoots and wounds Lime. Badly injured, Lime drags himself up a ladder to a street grating; however, he cannot lift it. Martins finds Lime at the grate, hears Calloway shouting to shoot Lime on sight, Lime and Martins exchange a look, and then Martins shoots and kills Lime using Paine's revolver. Martins attends Lime's second funeral. At the risk of missing his flight out of Vienna, he waits on the street to speak with Anna, but she walks right past him without even glancing in his direction.