"Detective" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... wish to imply, sir, that you suspect us of having any hand in the matter? I presume you want our help in unravelling the mystery? My own detective powers are not of a high order; but if ...
— The Fortunes of the Farrells • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... fiction nearly always make a great mistake," said Kennedy one evening after a conversation on crime and science. "They almost invariably antagonize the regular detective force. Now in real life ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... at Fort McHenry, where I began my first experience in detective work—Somewhat a history of my early life—Ordered to execute Gordon by ...
— Between the Lines - Secret Service Stories Told Fifty Years After • Henry Bascom Smith
... insane Pessimist Rain falls upon the just and the unjust alike Reached the grandfather stage of life without grandchildren Recognize myself Ruling public and political aristocracy Sad tolerance of age Saint-Saens Shem's diary Ship ahoy! What ship is that? And whence and whither? Simon wheeler, detective Slave that is proud that he is a slave Suetonius, Suetonius and Carlyle lay on the bed beside him Tarkington Telling the truth's the funniest joke in the world Temperament is the man The Derelict The Great Law The international lightning trust The mysterious ...
— Widger's Quotations from Albert Bigelow Paine on Mark Twain • David Widger
... "It don't look like the best detective in the world could help you to find a girl when you don't know her name." He added gently: "But maybe she don't ...
— Ronicky Doone • Max Brand
... the boys I know of," said Tom, eying him with admiration. "None of 'em would ever think of doin' the things you do, and they couldn't do 'em if they did, that's all. And now you're goin' to do the detective act!" ...
— The Boy Broker - Among the Kings of Wall Street • Frank A. Munsey
... secretly meeting Cowperwood, and, besides, Mrs. Cowperwood might not know of her husband's duplicity. He thought also of going to Cowperwood personally and threatening him, but that would be a severe measure, and again, as in the other case, he lacked proof. He hesitated to appeal to a detective agency, and he did not care to take the other members of the family into his confidence. He did go out and scan the neighborhood of 931 North Tenth Street once, looking at the house; but that helped him little. The place was for rent, ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... be applied to them. But it is as true as the stars that if a person brings you an unsavory tale of a friend, she will carry away as ugly a story of you, if she can find the faintest suggestion upon which to found it. The gossip acquires a detective-like faculty for following out a clue, but unfortunately, the clue is oftener purely imaginary than real. A little discrepancy like this does not disturb the professional scandal-monger. So tenacious is the habit of making much of nothing, that, deprived ...
— The Secret of a Happy Home (1896) • Marion Harland
... like to know what a detective would do in a case of this kind," thought Hal. "I suppose he would find some way ...
— The Missing Tin Box - or, The Stolen Railroad Bonds • Arthur M. Winfield
... ordinary affections or emotions or human frailties except temper. Betsy and I are simply eaten up with curiosity to know what sort of past he came out of; but just let us get inside his house, and to our detective senses it will tell its own story. So long as the portal was guarded by a fierce McGurk, we had despaired of ever effecting an entrance; but now, behold! The door has ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... in Halifax, and Colonel S. by some means obtained a sight of the envelope. The post-mark, plainly legible, indicated that the letter had been written at an obscure little village in Missouri. S. hastened back to Baltimore, and secured the cooperation of a detective, not for the purpose of arresting Keith, because he doubted whether he could recover possession of his property by the slippery and uncertain process of law, but for the sake of the detective's strong arm and presence ...
— The Narrative of a Blockade-Runner • John Wilkinson
... experience. The Custom-House is the centre of attack, and critics for the most part agree that the men whose business it is to "hold up" returning citizens perform their ungracious task ungraciously. Theirs is rather the attitude of the detective dealing with suspected criminals than the attitude of the public servant impersonally obeying orders. It is true that even on the New York docks one may encounter civility and kindness. There are people who assure us that they have ...
— Americans and Others • Agnes Repplier
... give them a chance. I don't see why we haven't comprehended how you felt and so have been at work weeks ago. We've been awfully selfish. We've all been so comfortable, we never stopped to think what other people were suffering before our eyes. None of us has understood. I'll hire the finest detective in Chicago, and we'll go to work together. This is nothing compared with things people do find out. We'll go at it, beak and claw, and we'll show you a thing ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... of the needle was like the touch of a spark; soon after came a mystery of general wretchedness, followed by pains in the loins, a rise of temperature and extreme, in Dion's case even intense, weakness. He lay in his bunk trying to play the detective on himself, to stand outside of his body, saying to himself, "This is I, and I am quite unaffected by my bodily condition." For what seemed to him a long time he was fairly successful in his effort; then the body began to show definitely the ...
— In the Wilderness • Robert Hichens
... He conducted the detective, who had finished telephoning, into the library, set out drinks and cigars for him and returned. Nothing further was said until Ellis arrived. The associate editor's face, as he looked from the dead ...
— The Clarion • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... by the promise of large rewards to be distributed by Rajah Kharrak Singh at Agpur. Strict orders were issued against further plundering, and every man who had obtained nothing, or less than he expected, became a detective ready to hunt down his more fortunate comrade and secure the return of the spoils. Partab Singh's councillors and courtiers began to appear out of various hiding-places, and all expressed a most touching anxiety to be honoured with any commands ...
— The Path to Honour • Sydney C. Grier
... according to their accessibility from his own house; and on receiving an invitation to a house in the outer or champagne area (as it might be at Dulwich), he would try to discover, either by inquiry among his friends or by employing a private detective, whether this house fulfilled the necessary condition. If not, of course, then he would write a polite note to say that he would be in the country, or confined to his bed with gout, ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne
... hospitality of some old friend. That he would have played the ruthless invader, if he had got into the city, no reflecting mind ever believed. But then there were people ready enough to believe anything in those days—even to believe that there was truth to be found in the stories told by Mr. Detective Baker. ...
— Siege of Washington, D.C. • F. Colburn Adams
... Essays and a shilling Shakespeare led the van of the belles lettres; the rest were novels: several Miss Braddons—of course, Aurora Floyd, which has penetrated to every isle of the Pacific, a good many cheap detective books, Rob Roy, Auerbach's Auf der Hohe in the German, and a prize temperance story, pillaged (to judge by the stamp) from an Anglo-Indian ...
— The Wrecker • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... have opportunities of seeing the wedding presents; but it is not judicious for visitors at a big function to poke about among the gifts unless accompanied by one of the family or, perhaps, a bridesmaid, because it is generally deemed wise to have a detective present on such an occasion, and he might misinterpret this friendly interest to the discomfort of the prying guests. In arranging the presents a nice thoughtfulness and tact are necessary. Let the smaller offerings have ...
— The Etiquette of Engagement and Marriage • G. R. M. Devereux
... bearer of ill tidings and with them, he knew, all prospect of a business discussion would vanish. The situation interested him, as all things mysterious must, and he could not forget that he was, for the present, part policeman, part detective; but forestry was his real job here and every day that passed meant so many fewer days in which to build the fire towers. And these he considered to be a prime necessity to the security of ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... up-stairs. Bollum was the first to come, and when he saw the stranger, was silent,—thinking whether it might not be best to escape and warn Crinkett and the woman that all might not be safe. But the stranger did not look like a detective; and, as he told himself, why should there be danger? So he waited, and in a few minutes Crinkett entered the room, with ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... peculiarly qualified to expose the roguery of a suspected individual, he was that person. In conducting the present examination he only wanted Derastus Clapp for the terror of his name, rather than his professional skill as a detective. ...
— Make or Break - or, The Rich Man's Daughter • Oliver Optic
... the World's Greatest Detectives. The most famous cases of the great Sleuths of England, America, France, Russia, realistically told, with biographical sketches of each detective. Fully illustrated. ...
— The Brighton Boys in the Radio Service • James R. Driscoll
... to count Shamrock Jolnes, the great New York detective, among my muster of friends. Jolnes is what is called the "inside man" of the city detective force. He is an expert in the use of the typewriter, and it is his duty, whenever there is a "murder mystery" ...
— Sixes and Sevens • O. Henry
... of his breed, the detective bent his back and made a stirrup of his clasped hands, but no sooner had P. Sybarite fitted foot to that same than the man started and, straightening up abruptly, threw ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... recognising in the first one the detective-sergeant who had assisted in clearing up the Marathon mystery. And back of him was Coroner Goldberger, whom I had met in two previous cases; while the third countenance, looking at me with a quizzical smile, was that of Jim Godfrey, the ...
— The Mystery Of The Boule Cabinet - A Detective Story • Burton Egbert Stevenson
... really been watching for him at the Gare du Nord, with a mind to follow and wait for his prey to make some incriminating move, this chance-contrived change of vehicles and destination would throw the detective off the scent and gain the adventurer, ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... Bizzy got a quiet Tip from another Moral Detective, that the Man had stayed out until 2 A.M., at a Banquet given to a Militia Company, so he knew it was Time for him to Act. He lay in Ambush until the Coast was Clear, and then he went across the Dead-Line and caught her on the Piazza. She was ...
— More Fables • George Ade
... for sleep, he realized that there was but one way in which to conserve his rest and that was by engaging to fathom the mystery for him a specialist in the unravelling of mysteries. In times gone by, the Colonel had found a certain national detective- agency an extremely efficient aid to well-known commercial agencies, and to these tried and true subordinates he turned now for explicit and satisfying information ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... intently upon the face of the dead man. There was a half quizzical light in the detective's eyes as he spoke, apparently to ...
— Midnight • Octavus Roy Cohen
... said the Kid, airily. "I'm a kind of a private information bureau and detective agency 'round this track, and my hours are from twelve to twelve, twice a day. I shake hands with the night watchman when he comes on duty and I'm here to give the milkman the high sign in the morning. They tell me things they've seen and heard. ...
— Old Man Curry - Race Track Stories • Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan
... wholesale denunciations of disloyalty and treason against the people of a country was calculated to exasperate and produce the very feelings imputed; and the proposal of the two Houses of Parliament to make the Governor of Massachusetts Bay a detective and informer-general against persons opposed to his administration and the measures of the British Ministry, and the proposition to have them arrested and brought 3,000 miles over the ocean to England, for trial before a special commission, for treason or misprision of treason, ...
— The Loyalists of America and Their Times, Vol. 1 of 2 - From 1620-1816 • Egerton Ryerson
... greatest case my detective agency has had since I left the police force eleven years ago. It's too big for me, and I've come to you to do a stunt as is a stunt. You will plug it for me, won't you—just as you've always done? If I get the credit, it'll mean a fortune to me ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... staggered ashore. Having that sword was as much as proclaiming that I had infernal machines about me somewhere, and even my pockets were not sacred. Having turned out all my insides at sea, I had to turn out my exterior pockets and portmanteau now. It was monstrous. That was not all. I am sure a detective followed me to town. When I got into a hansom at Charing Cross, the sword would go nowhere except between my knees, with the blade shooting up between the reins of the driver, high above the top of the conveyance. I caused great amusement as I drove through the streets ...
— In Troubadour-Land - A Ramble in Provence and Languedoc • S. Baring-Gould
... Sweetwater beach, which lay uphill from the old house in which McAllen and Fredericks lived, and provided a good view of the residence and its street entry. He didn't go near the place himself. Operatives of a Los Angeles detective agency went on constant watch in the bungalow, with orders to photograph the two old men in the other house and any visitors at every appearance, and to record the exact times the pictures were taken. At the end of each day the photographs were ...
— Gone Fishing • James H. Schmitz
... it over," he persisted. "Very well, then, think it over at Fairharbor! For the next three weeks the Farrells will be at Cape May. The coast is clear. Go to Fairharbor as somebody else and be your own detective. Find out if what they tell you is true. Get inside information. Get inside Harbor Castle. Count the eighteen bedrooms and try the beds. Never mind the art gallery, but make sure there is a wine cellar. You can't start too soon, and I ...
— The Log of The "Jolly Polly" • Richard Harding Davis
... settlers without the presence of this watchful corps. The case to which I now refer was one in which the body of an evidently murdered man was found near Lacombe, in Alberta. There was no clue to the murderer, but Superintendent Constantine, himself a keen detective, put Sergeant Hetherington on the trail. Hetherington proved to be a persistent sleuth. All he had to start on was a buckle on the vest of the victim, indicating Kalamazoo as its place of origin. It was a far cry from Michigan, but by process of investigation ...
— Policing the Plains - Being the Real-Life Record of the Famous North-West Mounted Police • R.G. MacBeth
... warn them poor Indians, an' if there's any fightin' we'll sho' help to rid this country of them ornary, low-down, murderin', cut-throats. It's a great head you've got for young shoulders, Charley. You've reasoned it out like a detective and made ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... lit a cigar, and leaned back in a deep arm-hair. And he began to study that cheery letter almost as a detective studies the plan of a house in which a crime has been committed. When his cigar was smoked out, he laid the letter aside, but he still refrained for a while from going to bed. His mind was far away on the Nile. Never had he seen the Nile. ...
— Bella Donna - A Novel • Robert Hichens
... fear? And how could a Martian princess who knows fear lay claim to a throne? No, Mellie, one gets used to it. The enemies of the house of Sira are ever alert. Didn't they murder my father and my mother, and my only brother? My peril in this palace is as great as in the room of a terrestrial detective. Only their fear of ...
— The Martian Cabal • Roman Frederick Starzl
... so many diamonds on that she had a detective follerin' her all round wherever she went. She wuz a blaze of splendor and so wuz lots of 'em, though like the stars, they differed from each ...
— Samantha at Saratoga • Marietta Holley
... sourly. "You might get a raise in salary," he snapped sharply, "if you'd keep your mind on the job. What you can do is call up, say you're the detective bureau, and ask carelessly about Beaton. That'll throw a scare into her. ...
— The Strange Case of Cavendish • Randall Parrish
... in The House of Usher, while The Gold Beetle or Golden Bug is one of the first examples of the cryptogram story; and in The Purloined Letters, The Mystery of Marie Roget, and The Murders in the Rue Morgue he is the pioneer of the modern detective story. ...
— A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature • John W. Cousin
... considerable confidence in Mr. Holmes, sir," said the police agent loftily. "He has his own little methods, which are, if he won't mind my saying so, just a little too theoretical and fantastic, but he has the makings of a detective in him. It is not too much to say that once or twice, as in that business of the Sholto murder and the Agra treasure, he has been more nearly correct than ...
— The Lock And Key Library - Classic Mystery And Detective Stories, Modern English • Various
... are sons of a celebrated American detective, and during vacations and their off time from school they help their father by ...
— The Rover Boys Under Canvas - or The Mystery of the Wrecked Submarine • Arthur M. Winfield
... confess to catholicity of taste, the chosen stories reveal predilection for no one type. They like detective stories, and particularly those of Melville Davisson Post. A follower of the founder of this school of fiction, he has none the less advanced beyond his master and has discovered other ways than those of the Rue Morgue. "Five Thousand Dollars Reward" in its brisk action, ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... head, semicircled by a fringe of brown and gray hair, with big cheek-bones and a heavy chin, . . . a pale face, lustreless gray eyes, a metallic voice, and a languid manner." He was born of humble parents, and began his career as a bartender. He next became a private detective for a street railway corporation, and by successive steps developed into a professional strikebreaker. Pocock V., the last of the line, was blown up in a pump-house by a bomb during a petty revolt ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... with the conviction that had been growing upon Katherine during the last few days. While she had entertained suspicion of there being corruption, she had several times considered the advisability of putting a detective on the case. But this ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... now," said Schrotter in his turn, "to ask the witness Patke if for the last few weeks he has not been a candidate for a post as detective on the political police staff?" Schrotter too had made a variety of inquiries since last Sunday, and ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... office detective." (Mr. Lafferty bore Larcher's look of increased interest with becoming modesty.) "He's been on this case ever since I came back from Chicago, and by a piece of dumb luck, he got next to Davenport's trail for part of the day he was last ...
— The Mystery of Murray Davenport - A Story of New York at the Present Day • Robert Neilson Stephens
... superior paper; clear type; multi-color jackets. A carefully selected list of titles of the World's Best Authors; embracing absorbing love stories, baffling detective and mystery stories, and the most fascinating romantic stories of the West. Many of them have been dramatized and filmed—you will enjoy reading ...
— The International Spy - Being the Secret History of the Russo-Japanese War • Allen Upward
... had been conveyed in the capsule, its operation would have been almost immediate, and so would the detection of the aconitine. As I have said, the contrivance would have been too clumsy for so crafty a mind. A detective would not expect to find the secret design so foolishly exposed any more than a spectator would expect to see the actual trick of a conjurer in ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... they all went. This the two men shared, and the detective scrutinized the glasses and brushes that were on shelves, either side of the wash stand. They were of tidy appearance and presented merely the array ...
— The Come Back • Carolyn Wells
... "Fortunately I know a very cute detective from our own London force who happens just now to be in Cairo. We must go to Scotland Yard for his address, and a code. In fact we had better work it through them. You have done the right thing, Billy; and done it promptly; but we have no ...
— The Mistress of Shenstone • Florence L. Barclay
... days before Benjamin Bentnor's best detective work succeeded in finding his brother-in-law in a hall bedroom at an obscure hotel in Washington, for a strong impulse of duty to be performed had landed Robert there, although he had completely lost sight of his mission. When Ben found him, he was seated on the edge of the bed, his head bowed ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 5, June 1905 • Various
... valuable solid silver service was stolen from the Misses Perkinpine, two very old and simple minded ladies. Fred Sheldon, the hero of this story, undertakes to discover the thieves and have them arrested. After much time spent in detective work, he succeeds in discovering the silver plate and winning the reward. The story is told in Mr. Ellis' most fascinating style. Every boy will be glad to ...
— Adrift on the Pacific • Edward S. Ellis
... have had a detective in my employ ever since my suspicions were aroused. There are two parties in Dodge this very minute with the original contract, properly assigned, and they are looking for cattle to fill it. That's why I'm stopping here and lying low. I ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams
... each of the occasions when he saw her. There was no one he could ask to introduce him; there was no one he could apply to for information concerning her. He could n't very well follow her carriage through the streets—dog her to her lair, like a detective. ...
— The Cardinal's Snuff-Box • Henry Harland
... Joseph Muller, Secret Service detective of the Imperial Austrian police, is one of the great experts in his profession. In personality he differs greatly from other famous detectives. He has neither the impressive authority of Sherlock Holmes, nor the keen brilliancy of Monsieur Lecoq. Muller is a ...
— The Case of The Pool of Blood in the Pastor's Study • Grace Isabel Colbron and Augusta Groner
... and reread the tale until the episodes were known almost by heart, but still The Sign of the Four held powerful sway over his imagination. Thaddeus Sholto lived again to tell his nervous, halting tale to the astute Baker Street detective. Tobey took the two eager sleuths through the episode of the trail which led to the creosote barrels. Holmes appeared and reappeared on his fruitless expeditions as the boy's eyes narrowed with excitement, ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely
... Robinson's black eye? How men have to work, to talk, to smile, to go to bed, and try and sleep, with this dread of being found out on their consciences! Bardolph, who has robbed a church, and Nym, who has taken a purse, go to their usual haunts, and smoke their pipes with their companions. Mr. Detective Bullseye appears, and says, "Oh, Bardolph! I want you about that there pyx business!" Mr. Bardolph knocks the ashes out of his pipe, puts out his hands to the little steel cuffs, and walks away quite meekly. He is found out. He must go. "Good-by, 'Doll Tearsheet! Good-by, Mrs. Quickly, ma'am!" The ...
— The Lock and Key Library • Julian Hawthorne, Ed.
... the air-gun, and gazed upon it as if it had been a telegram in cipher from a detective. Then he tried to conceal it under his coat, but it was ...
— The Captain's Toll-Gate • Frank R. Stockton
... the men arranged as best they could, were (the detective explained) torn by the surgeon's wife from the first volume of a number of manuscript books which her husband had written on one subject,—the very one that was the cause of her excitement. "About the time that he began a certain experiment three years ago," continued the detective, "he ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... me to employ a detective, or to advertise, or—or to make an appeal to the editor of ...
— A Comedy of Masks - A Novel • Ernest Dowson and Arthur Moore
... his face lighted. "But I'll tell you what I did find. I found a drunken hobo at Atlantic City who was the best detective I ever saw." ...
— The Sleuth of St. James's Square • Melville Davisson Post
... the receipt of Lady Carbery's answer; and in that case, so sternly conscientious was she, that, under the notion of saving me from ruin, my address would have been immediately communicated to my guardians, and by them would have been confided to the unrivalled detective talents, in those days, of Townsend, ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey
... can tell you something about them," she said, still watching him intently. "One is the constable from Mallory, and the other is a detective." ...
— The New Tenant • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... natural as though one met them in the street: they walk and talk like men and women, and live among our friends a rattling, lively life; yes, live, and will live till the names of their calling shall be forgotten in their own, and Buckett and Mrs Gamp will be the only words left to us to signify a detective police officer or ...
— The Warden • Anthony Trollope
... bit av killing in me time!" he proudly acknowledged. But as he sat there darning his sock-heel he looked as though he couldn't kill a field mouse. And in his idle hours he reads Nick Carter, a series of paper-bound detective stories, almost worn to tatters, which he is going through for the second or third time. These adventures, I find, he later recounts to Olie, who is slowly but surely succumbing to the poison of the penny-dreadful and the virus of the shilling-shocker! ...
— The Prairie Wife • Arthur Stringer
... hope and love. King is, of course, a verbose bully; he delights in petty triumphs; he rejoices in making himself felt; he is a cynic as well, a greedy and low-minded man; he takes a disgusting pleasure in detective work; he begins by believing the worst of boys; he is vain, shy, irritable; he is cruel, and likes to see his victim writhe. I have known many schoolmasters and I have never known a Mr. King, except perhaps at a private school. But even King has done me good; he has confirmed ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... the other, but on the opposite side of the street, Jimmie Dale followed the detective. There was hardly any use now in going to Kenleigh's, for, if the detective was really bound for there, it made his, Jimmie Dale's, errand useless—the summoning of the Headquarters' man was prima facie evidence that the robbery had already been committed. And ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard
... the same hour on the same day in which the Englishman held the conference with the Parisian detective just related, the Marquis de Rochebriant found himself by appointment in the cabinet d'affaires of his avoue M. Gandrin that gentleman had hitherto not found time to give him a definite opinion as to the case submitted to his ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... old man, "when you're at home you must be one of them detective fellows. I see we aren't no strangers to each other. And if while in these woods old John Norton can teach you any trick of huntin' or of fishin' or of trappin', be sure he will do so for the welcome ...
— The Boy Scouts Book of Campfire Stories • Various
... thought, it had its compensations. In the three days that the Detective Inspector had been on Earth, Forrester had had time to think and to find out some things. Gerda, for instance, was getting married to Alvin Sherdlap. Forrester wondered what kind of love would let a woman choose a name like Gerda Sherdlap, and decided it ...
— Pagan Passions • Gordon Randall Garrett
... was asked of another "anti," wife of a rector: "Had you known that co-workers with you were Dick Kennedy, an illiterate negro; Abie Sirian; Gus Tylee, employee of Tom Dennison and a detective of doubtful reputation; 40 soft drink men; Jess Ross, colored porter for Dennison; Jack Broomfield, a colored sporting man and for twenty years keeper of the most notorious dive in Omaha, and many others of this character, would you have worked with them ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume VI • Various
... shrewd-looking and commonplace; but a very close observer of human nature might have said, "He may be commonplace, but do not feel too certain; he simply possesses one of those faces which express nothing, from which not the cleverest detective in Scotland ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... finest situations in his novels. It was on this road that he had conceived "The Tilbury Mystery." Between the station and the house he had woven the plot which had made "Gregory Standish" the most popular detective story of the year. For John Lexman was a maker ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace
... "The private detective system—and by that I mean to have each girl in our class responsible for one or two freshmen, and know where they are every minute of the day. In that way, all of us would really be ...
— The Girl Scouts' Good Turn • Edith Lavell
... an elderly and saintly dignitary, who stops by accident with his charming and quaint sister at a roadside inn just after there has been a hold-up and robbery. The Bishop has always had a secret love for detective stories and here is a chance to apply some of his choicest solutions. His sister, thrilled with the excitement of it all, eagerly joins in. The Bishop, now playing policeman, gobbles up clews and discovers the stolen jewels. Deftly removing them from a mug on the wall he leaves in their stead, ...
— Why the Chimes Rang: A Play in One Act • Elizabeth Apthorp McFadden
... later; and if the man who was to forge was not in the proper mood of inspiration for the business, some other fabricated writer was put forward on the ground that he was quite equivalent in merit to the author that was desiderated, as when a thief or other vagabond is wanted by a London Detective, he is certain to turn up in due time, and if not the actual delinquent, at any rate somebody else as bad, who serves ...
— Tacitus and Bracciolini - The Annals Forged in the XVth Century • John Wilson Ross
... to look after female prisoners who might be placed in the station-houses. This bill was recommended by our best charitable and religious societies, but failed to receive the sanction of the governor, although he very promptly signed a bill to increase the number of the detective force." ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume III (of III) • Various
... was excitement then, you may be sure. One man hurried to notify the door-keeper and the private detective employed oh all such occasions, while others hastily searched the booth—of course in vain. Diana seemed distracted and the news ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces in Society • Edith Van Dyne
... "hab nab at a venture." He constructed elaborate plots, rich in secrets and surprises. He emulated the manner of Wilkie Collins, or even of Gaboriau, while he combined with some of the elements of the detective novel, or roman policier, careful study of character. Except Great Expectations, none of his later tales rivals in merit his early picaresque stories of the road, such as Pickwick and Nicholas Nickleby. "Youth will be served;" no sedulous ...
— The Puzzle of Dickens's Last Plot • Andrew Lang
... Lumsden with characteristic alacrity undertook this intricate and dangerous duty. His tracks covered, so to speak, by the unsuspicious bearing of a blunt soldier in command of a corps of rugged trans-border warriors, the unaccustomed role of a skilled detective was carried out with promptness and success. In the course of a very few days some of the Guides had obtained conclusive proof regarding three matters: that the Maharani was at the head of the movement, that her chief agent was the Sikh general Khan Singh, and ...
— The Story of the Guides • G. J. Younghusband
... a week after this that Detective Hefflefinger, of Inspector Byrnes's staff, came over to Philadelphia after a burglar, of whose whereabouts he had been misinformed by telegraph. He brought the warrant, requisition, and other necessary papers ...
— Short Stories for English Courses • Various (Rosa M. R. Mikels ed.)
... had been ugly. She endued it with grace and beauty. She invented a mystery of crime surrounded by everyday circumstances, yet avoiding the "detective novel" mechanism. A new story, 'Aurora Floyd,' repeated the immense success of 'Lady Audley.' Novel after novel followed, full of momentous incidents, of surprises leading to new surprises. All the time Miss Braddon was observing much, correcting ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol. 5 • Various
... irresistible must remain, I suppose, a matter of individual taste; for myself I found the opening chapter in the title-tale the funniest thing in the collection, and that not forgetting the billiard match in the detective story, a contest that I defy anyone to follow without tears. To attempt analysis of such happily unforced humour would be a dark and dreadful task; but I incline to think that, more than most, the fun of Mr. LEACOCK (to be accurate ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, December 15, 1920 • Various
... proper; hold back the "big" surprise, the startling denouement, until the very end. The most enjoyable feature of Anna Katherine Green's "The Leavenworth Case" was that she kept the reader in the dark until the last chapter as to who was the real murderer. All the many detective novels that have since appeared have been successful exactly in proportion as the solution of the mystery has been withheld from the reader until the end ...
— Writing the Photoplay • J. Berg Esenwein and Arthur Leeds
... out who took the sovereign!" she thought. "Honor certainly did not, so somebody else must have. Who? That's the question. I wish I were an amateur detective, like the clever people one reads about in magazines. They just get a clue, and find it all out so easily, while the police are on quite a wrong tack. The chief thing seems to be to make a beginning, and I don't know in the least ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... such weakness," he muttered angrily. "What has possessed him?—and after all these years! He says his conscience troubles him! He fears he was too cruel and hard-hearted! Humph! it's pleasant for me, I must say. Fancy him putting me on the scent—asking me to turn private detective! I suppose I'll have to humor him, or pretend to. It will be the safest course. Can there be any truth in his theory, I wonder? No, I don't think so. And after such a lapse of time the task would be next to impossible. I will be a fool if I let the ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... what, old fellow," said he, sitting down again, "it is mighty strange. If I didn't know you well, I'd think you guilty. Here comes a detective who says under oath that one night he saw you come out of your lodgings, about eleven o'clock, and walk to the middle of the bridge and throw something into the water. Next morning bar and shot were found. As nearly as he could make out ...
— Darrel of the Blessed Isles • Irving Bacheller
... bank-note toward his friend. "See me play Sherlock Holmes now. I always did think I'd make a good detective." ...
— Flip's "Islands of Providence" • Annie Fellows Johnston
... century and into this, with such well-known names as Parrish, Gifford, Hunt, Wylie, Martin, the Morans, Eakins, and even the more recent Frederic Remington. Such pictures as F. E. Church's "Niagara Falls" (wall A), J. G. Brown's "The Detective Story" (wall B), and Thomas Hovenden's "Breaking Home Ties" (wall D), are typical of what was accepted as the best work ...
— An Art-Lovers guide to the Exposition • Shelden Cheney
... the stone passageway. "I've been thinking that you ought to be just about overcome with happiness. Two mysteries on your hands, one detective type and one scientific type, and now you're walking into the middle of a few million tons of rock. ...
— The Egyptian Cat Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... indecision after which the quarter came reluctantly to the detective. Tootsie went thoughtfully down to the beach. The new method did redound to the stability of the phonograph, but was Skippy really working as rapidly as ...
— Skippy Bedelle - His Sentimental Progress From the Urchin to the Complete - Man of the World • Owen Johnson
... become almost embarrassing. One day she announced she wanted me to marry one of her brothers-in-law. "I got two nice ones and we'll go out some Sunday afternoon and you can have your pick. One's a piano tuner; the other's a detective." I thought offhand the piano tuner sounded a bit more domestic. He was ...
— Working With the Working Woman • Cornelia Stratton Parker
... of organized traffickers. His personal interest is suddenly doubled by the abduction of the young sister of his fiancee, Mary Barton. Burke, assisted by Mary, tracks the evil doers. After a sensational series of fights mixed with thrilling detective work, many women, including the young sister, are saved. The operations of the gangsters, in securing victims from the emigrant ships, the railroad stations and the working classes are shown in a manner ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... are former Service men, every one of them. The reception clerk is an old infantry man, the waiters have all been non-coms., the chef was a mess-sergeant, the house doctor was a base hospital surgeon, the house-detective was an intelligence man; even ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... The detective was not worried about collision; he was worried about observation. Had the people here seen his boat? If so, had they recognized it in spite of the heavy camouflage? And, even if they only suspected, ...
— Anything You Can Do ... • Gordon Randall Garrett
... and my promise fulfilled. The rest you know. How the detective, who left London before four o'clock that morning, found the rusty knife that had been buried with the hand, and apprehended Parker, who confessed his guilt. The wretched man said, that being out on the fatal night ...
— Miscellanea • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... farewell speech is tinged with shade. At Philadelphia and Harrisburg he spoke of blood-spilling, and used the word "assassination" at the former. He took up the matter like a reasoner. Already the detective brothers, Pinkerton, had an inkling of the doings of the Knights of the Golden Circle, or some such secret society, designing regicide. So, as the Concordance is held as a proof from the variance of the witnesses to scenes, he argued that the story was founded. Otherwise ...
— The Lincoln Story Book • Henry L. Williams
... get rattled," said the host, consolingly. "I'm not a policeman, sheriff, or detective, mate. I'll report this case as Captain Downs and so many souls saved from the schooner Alden. You'd better trot along up to the city and face 'em as a man should. I'll rig you out in some of my clothes. Your old friend, Wass, meant well by rushing you away, but I've always found ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... twenty years of vivacious living. Surely not the least amazing feature of Fielding's genius is this dual capacity for exuberant enjoyment, and incisive judgement. "His wit," said Thackeray, "is wonderfully wise and detective; it flashes upon a rogue and brightens up a ...
— Henry Fielding: A Memoir • G. M. Godden
... holiness or divination into human nature, present goodness so that we seem to be there. It is small wonder that a man who finds he is expected to be a kind of combination of biograph, brother, spiritual detective, and angel all in one, in order to do his work successfully has days of feeling that he has joined the ranks ...
— Crowds - A Moving-Picture of Democracy • Gerald Stanley Lee
... Hal Lomax's body through the 'tween-hulls lock, and turned toward the engine room; I could use some of that wine, just as the ship could have used a trained detective. But the idea of watching helplessly while the engines purred along to remind me I was just a handyman for the rest of my life got mixed up with the difficulty of breathing the stale air, and I started to turn back. My head was throbbing, and for two ...
— Let'em Breathe Space • Lester del Rey
... instruction &c. (teaching) 537; outpouring; intercommunication, communicativeness. informant, authority, teller, intelligencer[obs3], reporter, exponent, mouthpiece; informer, eavesdropper, delator, detective; sleuth; mouchard[obs3], spy, newsmonger; messenger &c. 534; amicus curiae[Lat]. valet de place, cicerone, pilot, guide; guidebook, handbook; vade mecum[Latin]; manual; map, plan, chart, gazetteer; itinerary &c. (journey) 266. hint, suggestion, innuendo, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus
... sooner at the landing stage than I found a code flash summoning Dan Dean and me to Divisional Detective Headquarters. Dan "Snap" Dean was one of my closest friends. He was electron-radio operator of the Planetara. A small, wiry, red-headed chap, with a quick, ready laugh and the kind of wit that made ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... the detective element was abnormally developed. He had shown this on several occasions, ...
— The Boy Scout and Other Stories for Boys • Richard Harding Davis
... recognised power called genius. He or she had produced a Book. Not an ephemeral piece of fiction,—not a "Wells" effort of imagination under hydraulic pressure—not an hysterical outburst of sensual desire and disappointment such as moves the souls of demimondaines and dressmakers,—not even a "detective" sensation—but just a Book—a real Book, likely to live as long as literature itself. It was something in the nature of a marvel, said those who knew what they were talking about, that such a book should have been ...
— Innocent - Her Fancy and His Fact • Marie Corelli
... to inspect progress; evidently the new tenant. Sometimes she comes alone; sometimes with a dark-eyed, handsome lad, probably her son. Who can she be? what is she? what is her name? her history? has she a right to settle in Gloucester Place, Portman Square? The detective police of London is not peculiarly vigilant; but its defects are supplied by the voluntary efforts of unmarried ladies. The new comer was a widow; her husband had been in the army; of good family; but a mauvais sujet; she had been left in straitened circumstances ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... no emotion whatever, and yet I could not help feeling that he was conscious of what was in my mind. Of course this might be pure imagination on my part, and I do not think any detective of fiction fame would have gained the slightest inkling from his face that he was in any way connected ...
— "The Pomp of Yesterday" • Joseph Hocking
... yes, but all traveling jewelry salesmen belong to a league, and if thieves get away with anything belonging to any member, we have the services of a good detective agency to run the criminals down. The professional thieves know this, and, as capture is almost certain in the end, we have little fear of being robbed. These swindlers took my personal property, and nothing belonging to the firm, ...
— The Boy from the Ranch - Or Roy Bradner's City Experiences • Frank V. Webster
... was one, was to be executed. Mr. Felton, president of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad Company, engaged Allan Pinkerton to explore the matter, and the report of this skillful detective indicated a probability of an attack with the purpose of assassination. At that time the cars were drawn by horses across town from the northern to the southern station, and during the passage an assault could be made ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. I. • John T. Morse
... doing detective work, or holding Peace Conferences, she was lonely and craved the companionship of the frisky pups. And while Mego was certain that her character was above reproach, as well as her motives, she realized also that the stag-hound was heedless. And the wise ...
— Baldy of Nome • Esther Birdsall Darling
... faith that one should pay one's pennies first and read next, said a few things under his breath about Germans—crude short things not worth repeating—and jerking his thumb towards the intent Fritzing, winked at a detective who was standing near. The detective did not need the wink. His bland, abstracted eyes were already on Fritzing, and he was making rapid mental notes of the goggles, the muffler, the cap pulled down over the ears. Truly it is a great art, that ...
— The Princess Priscilla's Fortnight • Elizabeth von Arnim
... no great detective, like yer read about,—the kind That solves a whole blame murder case by footmarks left behind; But then, again, on t'other hand, my eyes hain't shut so tight But I can add up two and two and get the answer right; So, when prayer-meet'ns, Friday nights, ...
— Cape Cod Ballads, and Other Verse • Joseph C. Lincoln
... detective?" Ruth's clear laughter rang out on the evening air. "Why, no, you foolish girl; I'm a newspaper woman, and I've earned a rest—that's all. You mustn't read books with ...
— Lavender and Old Lace • Myrtle Reed
... on the water-hole and I deep in the interstices of making a pot of coffee, up rides softly on the grass a mysterious person in the garb of the being he wished to represent. He was dressed somewhere between a Kansas City detective, Buffalo Bill, and the town dog-catcher of Baton Rouge. His chin and eye wasn't molded on fighting lines, so I knew he ...
— Options • O. Henry
... peculiarly majestic air. "Some years ago, soon after the coup d'etat of December, I happened to be calling in Paris on an extremely influential personage in the Government, and I met a very interesting man in his house. This individual was not precisely a detective but was a sort of superintendent of a whole regiment of political detectives—a rather powerful position in its own way. I was prompted by curiosity to seize the opportunity of conversation with him. And as he had not come as a visitor but as a subordinate official bringing a special ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... and Italian frontiers without difficulty; but at the station at Modena a too-zealous detective of the French police, struck with the Alsatian accent of the orderly, immediately decided that they were two Prussian spies, and refused to allow them to proceed, since they could show ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa
... Scathlock and Little John. With a little more rummaging of old account-books we shall be enabled to "comprehend all vagrom men." It is a pity that the Sheriff of Nottingham could not have availed himself of the services of our "detective."] ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... have been recovered without the skilled assistance of the historical offices of the various services and Office of the Secretary of Defense. At times their search for lost documents assumed the dimensions of a detective story. In partnership with Marine Corps historian Ralph Donnelly, for example, the author finally traced the bulk of the World War II racial records of the Marine Corps to an obscure and unmarked file in the classified records section of Marine Corps headquarters. ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... into Paradise, again I cannot tell; but I certainly did hear unspeakable words which it is not lawful for a man to utter, and that not above fourteen years ago but the very last Sunday that ever was. The Wife of Bath heard them too, but she never turned a hair. Luckily I had my detective camera with me, so I snapped her there and then. She put her hand up to her mouth at that very moment and rather spoiled herself, but ...
— The Note-Books of Samuel Butler • Samuel Butler
... The detective at the boarding house table having satisfied himself that nobody had observed him, folded up his magnifying glass and put it ...
— The New Pun Book • Thomas A. Brown and Thomas Joseph Carey
... these fool amateur guys doin' the dare-devil detective act like you read about in ...
— The Definite Object - A Romance of New York • Jeffery Farnol
... desk between the two long windows at the end of the room opposite the fireplace, he was reading a detective story and playing with a bronze paper cutter at the same time, banging it up and down ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... rises superior to a very human desire to look into the details of mystery," said Lowell. "If I were a real detective, or spy, as you characterized me, I would have read that letter at the first opportunity. But I knew that my reading it would cause you grave personal concern. I have faith in you to the extent that I believe you would ...
— Mystery Ranch • Arthur Chapman
... more or less aimlessly, and the chilly hand of King Fear had touched one and all, for, as they came and went, they glanced ever over their shoulders, as if each shadow cloaked a menace, and listened, as it seemed, for some sound which they dreaded to hear. Smith strode up to the detective and showed him a card, upon glancing at which the Scotland Yard man said something in a low voice, and, nodding, touched his hat to ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... The detective paused before replying, and looked the young man over with care. The clean-cut features showed not a sign of dissipation, and the expression was honesty itself. Certainly the young man had not gotten into ...
— The Mansion of Mystery - Being a Certain Case of Importance, Taken from the Note-book of Adam Adams, Investigator and Detective • Chester K. Steele
... like being a detective. I wish you would tell me about some of the cases you have had. Don't make me ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... vast results obtained by Science are won by no mystical faculties, by no mental processes, other than those which are practised by every one of us, in the humblest and meanest affairs of life. A detective policeman discovers a burglar from the marks made by his shoe, by a mental process identical with that by which Cuvier restored the extinct animals of Montmartre from fragments of their bones. Nor does that process of induction and deduction by which a lady, finding a stain of a peculiar kind ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley
... Esq.,' (just as if no poor, hard-working man ever lost an only child!) but most of the newspapers drowned her, I believe. Biddy kept her mighty close for a time, and sheared off her curls, but niver a hound of a detective ...
— Stories of Many Lands • Grace Greenwood
... and the owner of it is a Frenchman who has been a detective in Paris. He has accomplished more in this matter than all the others put together, and he will go with you, for you will find in the commander's instructions that you have more than one thing to do on your way to the Gulf. I gave ...
— Fighting for the Right • Oliver Optic
... I've got to be at my cabin a minute or two about eight o'clock." This was an awkward matter, and cost him much thought. But he found a way to beat the difficulty. "We'll go for a walk, and I'll leave him in the road a minute, so that he won't see what it is I do: the best way to throw a detective off the track, anyway, is to have him along when you are preparing the thing. Yes, that's the safest—I'll take ...
— A Double Barrelled Detective Story • Mark Twain
... detective!" she sobbed. "Oh, how wretched I've been. Pay the man, dear, and take me—take me any place where there is light. I'm dying from the sight and sound of ...
— Nedra • George Barr McCutcheon
... follow her and see; but although the good lady was as vigorous and sprightly as ever, carrying a crutch more for ornament than use, she abandoned this plan because it did not seem suitable to the dignity of a decayed gentlewoman. She employed a detective. ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... uppermost in Theron's mind, now that he saw them actually coming toward him. He had avoided this the previous evening, in the Octavius depot, with some skill, he flattered himself. It gave him a pleasurable sense of being a man of affairs, almost a detective, to be confronted by the necessity now of baffling observation once again. He was still rather without plans for keeping them in view, once they left the station. He had supposed that he would be able to hear what hotel they directed their driver to take them to, ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... discussed this matter, Doctor," said the detective, "you gave it as your opinion that Ivan Saranoff was at the bottom of it and that the same plague which devastated the Meuse Valley in Belgium would eventually make an appearance in the United States. You ...
— Poisoned Air • Sterner St. Paul Meek
... in his integrity of a good detective, but he saw now that an impenetrably attentive reserve towards this incident would have served his reputation better. On the other hand, he admitted to himself that it was difficult to preserve one's reputation ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... detective work have had any interest for them in any case. They would have been willing to concede the medium all the machinery she desired. There was no danger that they could be deceived as to the reality of the face and form that for so many years had ...
— Miss Ludington's Sister • Edward Bellamy
... out of a boss's mouth. There are also strict rules of honesty observed among these men, and if one swagger were to purloin the smallest article from a station which had fed and sheltered him, every other swagger in all the country side would immediately become an amateur detective to make the thief give up his spoil. A pair of old boots was once missing from a neighbouring station, and suspicion fell upon a swagger. Justice was perhaps somewhat tardy in this instance, as it rested entirely in the hands of every tramp who passed that way; but at the end ...
— Station Amusements • Lady Barker
... he could, yes! But he couldn't; he had no key. The police keys were not there; they were kept in the Detective Department. ...
— Hunger • Knut Hamsun
... could be secured. My friend said his photographer had a kodak which he wore inside his vest, the opening protruding from a button-hole. All he had to do was to stand in front of an object and pull a cord. Such a kodak is known as a "detective camera." There are several designs, all very clever. I once saw my face reproduced in a paper, and until I heard about this camera it was a mystery how the original was obtained, as I had not ...
— As A Chinaman Saw Us - Passages from his Letters to a Friend at Home • Anonymous
... Portsmouth Square. This is a large building of several stories with numerous offices. The chief in his office on the main floor, on the right hand of the entrance, received us courteously and assigned to us a detective according to an arrangement previously made with Ashton. In the office were portraits of police commissioners and the chiefs and others who had been connected with the department for many years. Entering ...
— By the Golden Gate • Joseph Carey
... latter passed through the hotel corridor, while Tilden, trembling with suppressed emotion, expressed the belief that the Boss would close his career in jail or in exile.[1327] One wonders that Tilden, being a natural detective, should have delayed strenuous action until the Times' exposure, but when, at last, a knowledge of the colossal frauds suddenly opened the way to successful battle, he seized the advantage with the skill and persistency ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... see that," she answered. "Why should you have suspected him when even the authorities didn't guess? You are not a detective. You are a—a very brave, generous gentleman, who trusted a girl against all the evidence and helped her and protected her and risked your life for hers. Isn't that enough? And about their frightening me downstairs—they didn't. You see, ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... the murder of Fraser is told very differently in Bosworth-Smith's Life of Lord Lawrence, where all the detective credit is given to Lord L., apparently on his own authority. See also an article in the Quarterly Review for April 1883, by Sir H. Yule, and another in ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman |
