Quotes About Mystery

The door shut behind them all, and locked. The women stared at it, mesmerized, and observed across it the wavering shadow of an uncanny cloud. Behind the chamfered windows the sun was obscured by drifting wreaths of grey smoke, and the silence filled with the crackling of flames. The youngest surviving Crawford, in leaving, had deftly set fire to the castle.

Why? Oh, well - I thought you'd be rather an attractive person to marry. That's all. I mean, I sort of took a fancy to you. I can't tell you why. There's no rule about it, you know.

I say, I don't think the human frame is very thoughtfully constructed for this sleuthhound business. If one could go on all fours, or had eyes in ones knees, it would be a lot more practical'… 'What luck! Here's a deep, damp ditch on the other side, which I shall now proceed to fall into.' A slithering crash proclaimed that he had carried out his intention.

My idea is that Miss Vane didn't do it, said Wimsey. I dare say that's an idea which has already occurred to you, but with the weight of my great mind behind it, no doubt it strikes the imagination more forcibly.

Bunter!" "Yes, my lord." "Her Grace tells me that a respectable Battersea architect has discovered a dead man in his bath." "Indeed, my lord? That's very gratifying." "Very, Bunter. Your choice of words is unerring. I wish Eton and Balliol had done as much for me...

It has been said, by myself and others, that a love-interest is only an intrusion upon a detective story. But to the characters involved, the detective-interest might well seem an irritating intrusion upon their love-story.

can I have the heart to fluster the flustered Thipps further—that's very difficult to say quickly—by appearing in a top-hat and frock-coat? I think not. Ten to one he will overlook my trousers and mistake me for the undertaker. A grey suit, I fancy, neat but not gaudy, with a hat to tone, suits my other self better. Exit the amateur of first editions; new motive introduced by solo bassoon; enter Sherlock Holmes, disguised as a walking gentleman.

I heard them saying something about a razor—Miss Vane! What killed him?' There were no kindly words for this—not even a long, scientific, Latin name. 'His throat was cut, Mrs Weldon.' (Brutal Saxon monosyllables.)

WHAT IN THE WORLD, Wimsey, are you doing in this Morgue?" demanded Captain Fentiman, flinging aside the Evening Banner with the air of a man released from an irksome duty.

Yesterday she looked like a Renaissance portrait stepped out of its frame. I put it down first of all to the effect of gold lamé, but on consideration, I think it was probably due to "lerve.

It's a curious thing, but people cannot resist anonymous letters. It's like free sample offers. They appeal to all one's lower instincts.

his thoughts revolving silently in this squirrel-cage of mystification.

It is always reasonably easy to get conversation going in a pub, and it will be a black day for detectives when beer is abolished. After

This was a syllogistic monstrosity even worse than the last, thought Wimsey. A man who could reason like that could not reason at all. He constructed a new syllogism for himself. The man who committed this murder was not a fool. Weldon is a fool. Therefore Weldon did not commit this murder. That appeared to be sound, so far as it went.

I say, Parker, these are funny cases, ain't they? Every line of inquiry seems to peter out. It's awfully exciting up to a point, you know, and then nothing comes of it. It's like rivers getting lost in the sand.

to tell the reader what the detective has observed and deduced – but to make the observations and deductions turn out to be incorrect, thus leading up to a carefully manufactured surprise packet in the last chapter.

Exactly. He is the Most Unlikely Person, and that is why Sherlock Holmes would suspect him at once.

Scotland Yard! he cried.

When I was a lad, there wasn't none of this myster'ousness about. Everything was straightforward an' proper. But ever since eddication come in, it's been nothing but puzzlement, and fillin' up forms and 'ospital papers and sustificates and such, before you can get even as much as your Lord George pension.

You know,' he said. 'I rather liked Ferguson, and I couldn't stick Campbell at any price. I rather wish—' 'Can't be helped, Wimsey,' said the Chief Constable. 'Murder is murder, you know.' 'Not always,' said Wimsey.

The agents of the miraculous which the novelist has at his command are, roughly speaking, conversion and coincidence;

Hitherto, said Lord Peter, as they picked their painful way through the little wood on the trail of Gent's No. 10's, I have always maintained that those obliging criminals who strew their tracks with little articles of personal adornment--here he is, on a squashed fungus--were an invention of detective fiction for the benefit of the author. I see that I have still something to learn about my job.

Detective-story writers are obliged by their disagreeable profession to invent startling and unpleasant incidents and people, and are (I presume) at liberty to imagine what might happen if such incidents and people were to intrude upon the life of an innocent and well-ordered community;

Victim," said the Hon. Freddy, "victim. Me for the corpse in the library.