Only in French

     "I have spoken to him. He promises. It appears that he forgets. It is, of course, true thata he is Italian, and that Fritzl is Hungarian and - "

    "At the Restaurant Maillaux there are no waiters who are Italian," Andre said. "There are no waiters who are Hungarian. All are French. If they speak among themselves, they speak in French. Many of the patrons can tell when waiters are speaking in French and when in Italian. it is a flaw, William. A serious flaw. It is undermining."

(from Murder Is Served, by Richard and Frances Lockridge)

Have to have a grade

     "Anyway," he said, "I had them write this term paper. In class." He looked at Jerry North. "It's the end of the winter term, you know," he said. "They have to have grades. I have to find out which have been listening, or even thinking. So they write these papers."

(from Murder Is Served, by Richard and Frances Lockridge)

Which raises the question, Why do we have to have grades?

It's all relative

     "I told you that you were taking this job too seriously."

    "It's a fault. People pay me for a job, I have to do it. Boone Silva felt the same way."

    "Boone? What happened to Boone?"

    "You wasted your money, Lang. He just wasn't the man for the job."

    "I was told he was the fastest - "

    "That's what he thought, Lang. But fast is relative, you know. Maybe he was a right fast man where he came from, but this here's a big country."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Bad guys don't change much

     "Is there trouble, Borden?"

    "I am hoping there won't be. I shall be making an arrest now."

    "Be careful, Borden."

    "That I'll be, but he's a foolish man. He's killed six men to cover up a crime for which no one wanted him. And I do not doubt he'll be foolish still."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Bad odds

 Borden Chantry smiled. Such men as Boone Silva liked to kill, but they trusted in their speed and marksmanship - and in the present case there was a chance for neither. Whatever skill Boone might have was negated by the reason of position. At the distance neither man could miss, and at the distance both would probably die. And Borden Chantry was banking that Silva did not want to die.

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Leave Western towns alone!

 "Blazer over at the express office was a sharpshooter with Sherman, and he fit in three, four Indian battles. Ain't hardly a man in any western town who wasn't in the war on one side or t'other, and most have fit Injuns since they were boys. An' most of them shot meat for the table. Anybody comes into one of these towns huntin' truble, he's askin for a stakeout on Boot Hill."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

The habit of thieves

 "Way I heard it, that dead man had money when he come to town. Where is it now? You can bet that whoever has it will want to spend it. What Pa always said. 'You let a thief have money,' he used to say, 'and there ain't one in fifty can keep it hid. They got to go out an' live high on the hog. All you got to do is watch."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Didn't know them all

     For a few minutes he simply stood in the street. It was an easy street, lazy-seeming and dusty, too warm part of the time, too cold and windy at others, yet it had the advantage of being familiar.

    He knew all the people on that street, knew what they were about. He recognized the rigs that stood there, knew the brands on the saddled stock along the hitching rail, and knew who rode most of the horses. Most of them were men he had worked with, men he knew and trusted. Yet somewhere among them was a murderer, which proved there was at least one man he did not know.

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Crafty dumb

     "Big Injun," Chantry suggested, "you make him a coffin. All right?"

    "Blanket good enough." Big Injun was abrupt. "Worms eat him, anyway."

    "I want a coffin for him. Will you make it or do I hire somebody else?"

    "One dollar?"

    "All right."

    Everything with Big Injun was one dollar. Didn't he know what twenty-five cents was? Or was he smart enough not to learn?

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

I won't mess with them!

     "Marshal, people have said some pretty hard things about me, but I don't think you ever heard anybody question my nerve."

    "That's right," Chantry agreed, honestly. "I never did."

    "Then understand this. I have a business here, a fair-sized investment in the town, but if those boys come looking I am going to crawl into the nearest hole and pull the hole in after me."

    "Who are they?"

    "I've said enough, and I pray to the good Lord that I am wrong, but Marshal . . . find your killer, and find him quick."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

If you have heard this novel, you know that "those boys" are the Sacketts, and the unidentified corpse at the beginning of the story is one of the lesser known of the Sackett characters.

Two qualifications for a marshal

     "You married a rancher, Bess, and when I can get on my feet, I'll go back to ranching. This is my country and I belong here. As for being a marshall . . . somebody has to do it."

    "But why does it have to be you?" she protested.

    "I am good with a gun, and they know it. More than that, I know when not to use a gun, and they know that, too."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Strong stuff

 A tall, handsome man with sandy hair stopped on the walk across the street. "What's the matter, Bord? You in trouble?"

"Seems like. There's a body in the street an' our postmistress is reading the riot act over it. You'd think she's never seen a dead man . . . at her age."

"Less you say about her age to her, the better off you'll be, Bord." He glanced at the body. "Who is it? Some drunk?"

"Prob'ly. I never did see so many men couldn't handle liquor. They get to drinkin' that block an' tackle whiskey and right away there's trouble."

"Block an' tackle whiskey?"

"Sure," Chantry chuckled at the old joke. "One drink an' you'll tackle anything."

(from Borden Chantry, by Louis L'Amour)

Couldn't quit scrapping

 "The Irish were a fighting lot and might have whipped the British a dozen times over if they could have stopped fighting amongst themselves, but they wouldn't put aside their old hatreds, and some of them invited the Danes to help, and a sorry day it was."

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Oh for one good night's sleep!

 He slept as he always did, waking often, listening for a few minutes, then going back to sleep again. He had lived so long in places where to sleep too soundly might mean death that he had lost the habit. What would it be like, he wondered, to sleep a night through without worry?

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Home on the desert

Suddenly, standing alone at the edge of the desert moonlight, silent in the stillness, Callaghen knew it was here he was going to stay. How, he did not know, for around him was desolation, yet a desolation that spoke to him in the softness of the wind, in the bareness of the mountains. But he knew at that moment that he would not leave the desert . . . or leaving, he would return.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Patience required

 He settled down to wait. He had water, and he knew how to be patient. Without patience no man should go into the desert. The rocks wait for the years to change them, the plants wait for the rain. The Indians, too, know how to wait.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Life in the Mohave Desert

     The Mohave is high desert, 2000 to 5000 feet above sea level, except in the 550 square miles or so of Death Valley, where at one point it falls to 282 feet below sea level.

    In summer the temperature can reach 134 degrees or more; in hollows, or in the bottom of washes or canyons, it can run a much as fifty degrees higher.

    Winter is a different story. Wind sweeps the desert day in and day out; it is often bitterly cold, and there is even showfall. The snow rarely lasts long, but winter in the Mohave can be brutal punishment.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Reason for hatred

 Twice, on flimsy excuses, he had broken Callaghen from sergeant to private, once by his order, once by his influence. And there is perhaps no one hated more by a man than one to whom he has done an injustice.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Concerning the desert

 That was the secret of the desert. One had to accomodate one's self to it. To the vast loneliness, the distances, the far-off hazy mountains, to the shadows they took on at dawn or at sunset. There was harshness in this land, but there was beauty, too. It was a country a man could grow to love.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

Unspectacular but necessary

 He considered Captain Hill. A good man, but a tired one. Nearing fifty yars of age, without influence and probably withut anything spectacular in his record, he would be shunted from post to post now, with no hope of promotion. A good man lot in the shuffle. He would be nearing retirement, a patient man who did his duty from day to day, just one of the man who help to make the whole machine work.

(from Callaghen, by Louis L'Amour)

The entertainment value of hiccups

     "Oh, I say," she said, "will you give this to Mr. Wooster when you see him?" She held out Mr. Wooster's cigarette case. "He must have dropped it somewhere. I say," she proceeded, "it's an awful lark. He's going to give a lecture to the school."

    "Indeed, miss?"

    "We love it when there are lectures. We sit and stare at the poor dears, and try to make them dry up. There was a man last term who got hiccoughs. Do you think Mr. Wooster will get hiccoughs?"

    "We can but hope for the best, miss."

    "It would be such a lark, wouldn't it?"

    "Highly enjoyable, miss."

    "Well, I must be getting back. I want to get a front seat." And she scampered off. An engaging child. Full of spirits.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

The ultimate faux pas

 Well, it was a respite, and I welcomed it. But I began to see that a crisis had arisen which would require adroit handling. Rarely had I observed Mr. Wooster more set on a thing. Indeed, I could recall no such exhibition of determination on his part since the time when he had insisted, against my frank disapproval, of wearing purple socks.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Couldn't be clearer

     "What I want - Jeeves, have you seen that play called I-forget-its-dashed-name?"

    "No, sir."

    "It's on at the What-d'you-call-it. I went last night. The hero's a bright chap who's buzzing along, you know, quite merry and bright, and suddenly a kid turns up and says she's his daughter. Left over from act one, you know - absolutely the first he'd heard of it. Well, of course, there's a bit of a fuss and they say to him "What-ho?" and he says, "Well, what about it/" and they say, "Well, what about it?" and he says, "Oh, all right, then, if that's the way you feel!" and he takes the kid and goes off with her out into the world together, you know."

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Too late now

 You may say what you like against Bingo, but nobody has ever found him a depressing host. Why, many a time in the days of his bachelorhood I've known him to start throwing bread before the soup course. Yet now he and Uncle Thomas were a pair. He looked haggard and careworn, like a Borgia who suddenly remembered that he has forgotten to shove cyanide in the consumme, and the dinner gong due any moment.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Now the hard part

     Looking back at it, I can see that what saved me from Colney Hatch in this crisis was my bright idea in buying up most of the contents of the local sweet-shop. By serving out sweets to the kid practically incessantly we managed to get through the rest of that day pretty satisfactorily. At eight o'clock he fell asleep in a chair; and, having undressed him by unbuttoning every button in sight and, where there were no  buttons, pulling till something gave, we carried him up to bed.

    Feddie stood looking at the pile of clothes on the floor with a sort of careworn wrinkle between his eyes and I knew what he was thinking. To get the kid undressed had been simple - a mere matter of muscle. But how were we to get him into his clothes again?

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Concerning Freddie and mosquitoes

 I don't know if you know Marvis Bay? It's in Dorsetshire; and, while not what you would call a fiercely exciting spot, has many good points. You spend the day there bathing and sitting on the sands, and in the evenings you stroll out on the shore with the mosquitoes. At nine p.m. you rub ointment on the wounds and go to bed. It was a simple, healthy life, and it seemed to suit poor old Freddie absolutely. Once the moon was up and the breeze sighing in the trees, you couldn't drag him from that beach with ropes. He became quite a popular pet with the mosquitoes. They would hang round waiting for him to come out, and would give a miss to perfectly good strollers just so as to be in good condition for him.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Your aunt's house

 The Paddck was one of those medium-sized houses with a goodish bit of very tidy garden and a carefully rolled gravel drive curving past a shrubbery that looked as if it had just come back from the dry cleaner - the sort of house you take one look at and say to yourself, "Somebody's aunt lives here."

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Scary folks

 I suppose everybody has had the experience of suddenly meeting smebody who reminded them frightfully of some fearful person. I mean to say, by way of an exaple, once when I was golfing in Scotland I saw a woman come into the hotel who was the living image of my Aunt Agatha. Probaby a very decnt sort, if I had only waited to see, but I didn't wait. I legged it that evening, utterly unable to stand the spectacle. And on another occasion I was driven out of a thoroughly festive night club because the head waiter reminded me of my Uncle Percy.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Concerning exhibitions

 About this particular binge, too, there seemed to me a lack of what you might call human interest. I mean to say, millions of people, no doubt, are so constituted that they scream with joy and excitement at the spectacle of a stuffed porcupine fish or a glass jar of seeds from Western Australia - but not Bertram. No, if you will take the word of one who would not deceive you, not Bertram.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

When bad memory strikes

     "He had lost the only girl he had ever loved, and you know what a man's like when that happens to    him."

    "How was that, sir?"

    "Apparently he fell in love with some girl on the boat going over to Nw York, and they parted at the Customs sheds, arranging to meet next day at her hotel. Well, you know what Biffy's like. He forgets his own name half the time. He never made a note of the address, and it passed clean out of his mind. He went about in a sort of trance, and suddenly woke up to find that he was engaged to Honoria Glossop."

    "I did not know of this, sir."

    "I don't suppose anybody knows of it except me. He told me when I was in Paris."

    "I should have supposed it would have been feasible to make inquiries, sir."

    "That's what I said. But he had forgotten her name."

    "That sounds remarkable, sir."

    "I said that too. But it's a fact. All he remembered was that her Christian name was Mabel. Well, you can't go scouring New York for a girl named Mabel, what?"

    "I appreciate the difficulty, sir."

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Froze him with a look

     "A fellow told me one about Wembley yesterday," I said, to help on the cheery flow of conversation. "Stop me if you've heard it before. Chap goes up to deaf chap outside the exhibition and says, 'It this Wembley?' 'Hey?' says deaf chap. 'Is this Wembley?' says chap. 'No, Thursday,' says deaf chap. Ha, ha, I mean, what?"

    The merry laughter froze on my lips. Sir Roderick sort of just waggled an eyebrow in my direction and I saw that it was back to the basket for Bertram. I never saw a man who had such a knack of making a fellow feel like a waste-product.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Not a very attractive sort

 Motty, the son, was about twenty-three, tall and thin and meek-looking. He had the same yellow hair as his mother, but he wore it plastered down and parted in the middle. His eyes bulged, too, but they weren't bright. They were a dull grey with pink rims. His chin gave up the struggle about half-way down, and he didn't appear to have any eyelashes. A mild, furtive, sheepish sort of blighter, in short.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Eftsoons

 "It became more and more apparent to me that this infernal kid must somehow be turned out eftsoons or right speedily." (from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

In case you heretofore had overlooked the word eftsoons, it is an archaic expression meaning "soon afterward."

Of course, there was that profile

I had known the family ever since I was a kid, and from boyhood up this old boy had put the fear of death into me. Time, the great healer, could never remove from my memory the occasion when he found me - then a stripling of fifteen - smoking one of his special cigars in the stables. He got after me with a hunting-crop just at the moment when I was beginning to realize that what I wanted most on earth was solitude and repose, and chased me more than a mile across difficult country. If there was a flaw, so to speak, in the pure joy of being engaged to Florence, it was the fact that she rather took after her father, and one was never certain when she might erupt. She had a wonderful profile, though.

(from Carry On, Jeeves, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Lord Emsworth's bull's eye

     The old killer instinct had awakened. Reloading with the swift efficiency of some hunter of the woods, Lord Emsworth went to the eindow. He was a little uncertain as to what he intended to do when he got there, except that he had a clear determination to loose off at something. There flitted into his mind what his grandson George had said about tickling up cows, and this served to some extent to crystallize his aims. True, cows are not plentiful on the terrace of Blandings Castle. Still, one might have wandered there. You never knew with cows.

    There were no cows. Only Rupert Baxter. The ex-secretary was in the act of throwing away a cigarette.

    Most men are careless in the matter of throwing away cigarettes. The world is their ashtray. But Rupert Baxter had a tidy soul. He allowed the thing to fall to the ground like any ordinary young man, it is true, but immediately he had done so his better self awakened. He stooped to pick up the object that disfigured the smooth flagged stones, and the invitation of that becklning trousers' seat would have been too powerful for a stronger man than Lord Emsworth to resist.

    He pulled the trigger, and Rupert Baxter sprang into the air with a sharp cry. Lord Emsworth reseated himself and took up Whiffle on The Care of The Pig.

(from "The Crime Wave At Blandings, by Sir Pelham Wodehouse")

Sure shot

     "Ah, I see Beach has brought it to you. I want you to lock that gun up somewhere, Clarence. George is not to be allowed to have it any more."

    "Why not?"

    "Because he is not to be trusted with it. Do you know what happened? He shot Mr. Baxter."

    "What!"

    "Yes. Out on the drive just now. I noticed that the boy's manner was sullen when I introduced him to Mr. Baxter, and said that he was going to be his tutor. He disappeared into the shrubbery, and just now, as Mr. Baxter was standing on the drive, George shot him from behind a bush."

    "Good!" cried Lord Emsworth, then prudently added the word "gracious."

(from "The Crime Wave at Blandings," by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Confounded Scotchman!

 Presently Lord Emsworth left the potting shed and started to wander towards the house. He had never felt happier. All day his mood had been one of perfect contentment and tranquility, and for once in a way Angus McAllister had done nothing to disturb it. Too often, when you tried to reason with that human mule, he had a way  saying "mphm" and looking Scotch and then saying "Grmph" and looking Scotch again, and after that just fingering his beard and looking Scotch without speaking, which was intensely irritating to a sensitive employer.

(from "The Crime Wave At Blandings," by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Whodunits

 Those who read thrillers are an impatient race. They chafe at scenic rhapsodies and want to get on to the rough stuff. When, they ask, did the dirty work start? Who were mixed up in it? Was there blood, and, if so, how much? And - most particularly - where was everybody and what was everybody doing at whatever time it was? The Chronicler who wishes to grip must supply this information at the earliest possible moment.

(from "The Crime Wave at Blandings," by Sir Pelham Wodehouse)

Always a trench coat - always

     Only one light showed in the ramshackle old house, a dim light from a front window. Neil Shannon hunched his shoulders inside the trench coat and looked up and down the street. There was only darkness and the slanting rain. He stepped out of the doorway of the empty building and crossed the street.

    There was a short walk up to the unpainted house, and he went along the walkway and up the steps. Through the pocket of the trench coat, he could easily reach his .38 Colt automatic, and it felt good.

(from "The Vanished Blonde," by Louis L'Amour. And did you really expect that he would not be wearing a trench coat? Really?)

Do or die

     Peligro stopped suddenly, then deliberately pushed through a thick wall of brush beside the path. After a few minutes, they stood in a small clearing. Under the arching branches was an autogyro, the outline of its rotating wing lost in the shadows.

    Ponga Jim looked at the Colombian with respect. "Well, I'm stumped," he said. "You think of everything, don't you?"

    Juan Peligro winked. "One does or one dies, my friend."

    (from "Wings Over Brazil," by Louis L'Amour)

Cold shoulder

     He was sitting over a glass of wine and a cigar when the door opened and he saw a tall, fine-looking old man come in with a girl - a girl who took his breath away.

    The Cactus Kid sat up a little straighter. She was Spanish, and beautiful. Her eyes swept the room and then came to rest on him. They left him, and they returned. The Kid smiled.

    Abruptly her glance chilled. One eyebrow lifted slightly and she turned away from him. The Kid hunched his shoulders, feeling frostbitten around the edges of his ego.

(from "The Cactus Kid," by Louis L'Amour)

One tough bunch

 When we get to Dilbecker's swanky-looking apartment, there are half a dozen gun guys loafing in the living room. Any one of them would have kidnapped and murdered his own nephew for a dime, and they all look me over with a sort of professional stare as though measuring up space in a cornerstone or a foundation.

(from "Fighter's Fiasco," by Louis L'Amour)

The worth of a good horse

 I said nothing. Somewhere out there in the night, and I could have put a bullet through the sound, was Jory Benton. The trouble was, he had my horse, and I'd no desire to kill a good horse in trying for a bad man.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Real adventure

 Now I was facing up to a shooting fight when all I wanted to do was work cattle and see the country. I'd heard of men who supposedly looked for adventure, but to me that was a lot of nonsense. Adventure was nothing but a romantic name for trouble, and nobody over eighteen in his right mind looked for it. Most of what people called adventure happened in the ordinary course of the day's work.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Shed no tears for me

 Danny had not returned during the night, and we looked at the empty bunk, but no comment was made. Each of us at one time or another had found such empty bunks in the morning; sometimes a horse returned with a bloody saddle, sometimes nothing. 

It was a hard life we lived and a hard land in which we lived it and there was no time for mourning when work had to be done.

There would be one man less to do the work. And one man less at the table, one horse less to be saddled in the morning.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Lois L'Amour)

Gridley ought to have taken a nap

 One of the most famous lines in U. S. military history was said by Admiral George Dewey to Captain Charles Vernon Gridley at the Battle of Manila Bay in 1898: "You may fire when you are ready, Gridley." Gridley fired, but he might have been better served personally to have gone to sick bay. After the battle, Gridley was not in a condition to celebrate, suffering from dysentery and what appears to have been liver cancer. The heat and stress of the conning tower further weakened him. Dewey would have relieved him of command had not Gridley protested.

Self-inflicted loneliness

 He got to his feet and mounted up. Then he turned, started to say something, and rode away. He was a hard man, a very hard man, but a lonely one. He was a man who believed the world had built a wall around him, and he was eternally battering at it to make breaches, never understanding that the wall was of his own building.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Etiquette among cattle

     "You are working cattle for a neighbor, and from what I hear you are known as a man who is good with a gun. Yet you have the manners of a gentleman."

    I smiled at him. "Sir, manners do not care who wears them, no more than clothes. Manners can be acquired, clothes can be bought."

    "Yes, yes, of course. But there is a certain style, sir, a certain style. One knows a gentleman, sir."

    "I've not noticed that it matters to the cattle, sir, if a man has a good horse and knows how to swing a rope. I don't believe they have any preference as to whether a man is a gentleman or not."

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Time to watch your language

 Fuentes came off the floor with a gun in his hand. Rolf rolled over against the wall, grabbing around in the darkness for his rifle. I lay flat on the floor, my side hurting like the very devil, with a bruised elbow that made me want to swear, but I didn't. This was one time when a single cuss word might get a man killed.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Give him his due

 Nobody lives long low-rating an enemy. You've got to give the other fellow credit for having as much savvy as you have, and maybe a little more.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Not a pleasant night

 It was a cold, miserable night. But there had been many of those, and it was not the first time. I'd slept out with nothing but a slicker and a saddle blanket. . . . Nor would it be the last.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Friends at mealtime

 Somebody had been at the corral. Somebody had drunk here, but why had they not come by the lineshack? In cattle country, even an enemy would be welcomed at mealtime, and many a cattleman in sheep country had eaten at sheep wagons. In a country where meals and food might be many miles apart, enmity often vanished at the side of the table.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

What it means to die

     Rusted rims of wagon wheels, the solid oak of a hub, scattered bolts and charred wood. It was not much for a man to leave behind.

    Fuentes indicated the bones. "You and me, amigo . . . sometime."

    "I'm like the Irishman, Fuentes. If I knew where I was going to die, I'd never go near the place."

    "To die is nothing. One is here, one is no longer here. It is only that at the end one must be able to say, 'I was a man.'"

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

In bad shape!

 I was two days out of coffee and one day out of grub, with an empty canteen riding my saddle horn. And I was tired of talking to my horse and getting only a twitch of the ears for answer.

(from The Man From the Broken Hills, by Louis L'Amour)

Why realism?

 Who came up with this idea that realism is a necessary and desirable component of entertainment? It seems to me that the reason for entertainment is to gain respite from the ugly realities of life. I realize that it can be carried to extremes, but I don't need to see an actors entrails in order to know that he got shot or to get a verbatim transcription of the profanity someone used in order to know that he cursed. 

But he was polite about it

     Ben Cowan looked down at this boot toes. He looked up the street and down the street, and then he looked up at her, and thought nobody had ever lived who was so beautiful. He said, "I'll come back."

    He turned quickly toward the restaurant, then stopped and looked around. "And I won't be gone long!"

    He led them all inside and seated them and ordered bull beef for them, with frijoles and tortillas and plenty of coffee. He had no appetite himself. He just sat there staring out of the window.

    Bijah Catlow looked at him. "Ben, I swear I never saw the like. The most beautiful girl in Sonora, an' you almost muffed it! I'd a notion to slug you!"

    "Shut up," Ben said, politely.

(from Catlow, by Louis L'Amour)

Elephant trees

 Louis L'Amour's novel Catlow mentions elephant trees as being a plant in the desert. I don't recall it being a regular occupant of South Logan County.

Die at the hand of a woman

 The pistol muzzle was a black mouth that watched him. She would be a good shot, he decided; instinct and hatred would point that pistol, and nothing was more deadly.

(from Catlow, by Louis L'Amour)

Look twice

 People who saw Catlow for the first time knew him immediately for a tough, dangerous man. But with Ben, although people might take a second look at him, it was only the old-timers who sized him up as a man to leave alone. It is a fact that really dangerous men often do not look it.

(from Catlow, by Louis L'Amour)

Grammatical query concerning "don't"

 Generally speaking, we use "don't" in place of "do not." However, I suppose it technically could be used in place of "does not," couldn't it? In that case the apostrophe would just be representing more missing letters. So then, when we say "He don't," it would be correct, wouldn't it?

Cross Timbers

     The Cross Timbers country was hell's borderland. It was a stubby forest of blackjack and post-oak mixed with occasional patches of prickly pear. Along the few small streams, most of them intermittent, were redbud, persimmon, and dogwood. Here and there were open meadows, varying in extent. In places the forest was practically impenetrable.

    Blackjack, a kind of scrub oak, had a way of sending roots out just under the surface, and at various distances new trees would spring up from these roots. The result was a series of dense thickets, the earth beneath them matted with roots, their stiff branches intermingled.

    There were trails made by wid horses and occasional small herds of buffalo or deer, and these usually led from meadow to meadow across the vast stretch of country covered by the Cross Timbers.

    This is Louis L'Amour's description of the Cross Timbers area that stretches from near Coffeyville, Kansas down across Oklahoma and into central Texas. It was the setting for "Cross Timbers Trouble," the first story in The Coffeyville Tetralogy, which I wrote in 2022.

Very short resume

 Sitting in the shade of a juniper I put together a cross, and on an old wagon tailgate that had been laid beside the road for a long time, I carved out the words: HE PLAYED OUT HIS HAND 1881

It was not much of an end for a man, but Bodie was not much of a man.

(from Silver Canyon, by Louis L'Amour)

That feminine trait

     She was standing as she had been, staring at me, her eyes astonished, but no longer quite so angry as curious.

    "Good afternoon!" I lifted my hat. "I'll call on you later."

    It was the time to leave. Had I attempted to push the acquaintance further I'd have gotten exactly nowhere, but now she would be curious, and there is no trait that women possess more fortunate for men.

(from Silver Canyon, by Louis L'Amour)

Pick the right type of critter

     He backed up, holding the gate open for them. As they passed he looked up at Timm. "I s'pose you know you're ridin' with a couple of wolves?"

    Timm chuckled. "Sure do," he said cheerfully, "an' you know, Rice, I feel fifteen years younger! Anyway," he added, "I like the company of wolves better than coyotes."

(from Utah Blaine, by Louis L'Amour)

The character of gunfighters

    "There's talk about what would happen if you and Tom should meet."

    Well, I was mad. I got up and walked across the office and swore. Yes, and I wasn't a swearing man. Oddly enough, thinking back, I can't remember many gunfighters who were. Most of them I knew were sparing in the use of words as well as whisky.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

Rough way to die

 That seventh man wasn't going to cause anybody any harm. Seems he got drunk one night and on the way home something scared his horse and he got bucked off and with a foot caught in the stirrup there wasn't much he could do. Somewhere along the line he'd lost his pistol and couldn't kill the horse. He was found tangled in some brush, his foot still in the stirrup, and the only way they knew him was by his boots, which were new, and his saddle and horse. A man dragged like that is no pretty sight, and he had been dead for ten to twelve hours.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

Something between them

     Sometimes the most imporant things in a man's life are the ones he talks about the least. It was that way with Dru and me. No day passed that I did not think of her much of the time. She was always with me, and even when we were together we didn't talk a lot because so much of the time there was no need for words; it was something that existed between us that we both understood.

    The happiest hours of my life were those when I was riding with Dru or sitting across a table from her. And I'll always remember her face by candlelight. It weemed I was always seeing it that way, and soft sounds of the rustle of gowns, the tinkle of silver and glass, and Dru's voice, never raised and always exiting.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

Easy proposal

     "Tyrel - be careful!'

    That made me grin. "Why, ma'am," I said, grinning at her, "I'm the most careful man you know. Getting myself killed is the last idea in my mind. I want to come back to you."

    She just looked at me. "You know, Dru, we've waited long enough. When I've caught these men I am going to resign and we are going to be married - and I'm not taking no for an answer."

    Her eyes laughed at me. "Who said no?"

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

How society views violence

     Right then I felt sorry for Martin Brady, although his kind would outlast my kind because people have a greater tolerance for evil than for violence. If crooked gambling, thieving, and robbingare covered ovrr, folks will tolerate it longer than outright violence, even when the violence may be cleansing.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

That's politics

     "Politics ain't much different, Tyrel, than one of these icebergs you hear tell of. Most of what goes on is beneath the surface. It doesn't make any difference how good a man is, or how good his ideas are, or even how honest he is unless he can put across a progrm, and that's politics."

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

Now that's strong!

 The cook brought me a plate of grub and it smelled so good I didn't even look up until I'd emptied that plate and another, and swallowed three cups of hot black coffee. Up in the hills we like our coffee strong, but this here would make bobwire grow on a man's chst in the place of hair.

(from The Daybreakers, by Louis L'Amour)

Definitely no Ancreds!

     Stumped for an answer, as she had so often been since her arrival at Ancreton, Troy said: "I suppose the country does feel a bit queer when you're used to bricks and morter."

    "It feels, to be frank, like death warmed up. Not that I don't say you could do something with that Jack's-come-home up there. You know. Weekend parties, with the old bunch coming down and all the fun and games. And no Ancreds. Well, I wouldn't mind Ceddie. He's one-of-those, of course, but I always think they're good mixers in their own way. I've got it all worked out. Something to do, isn't it, making plans? It may come up in the lift one of these days; you never know. But no Ancreds when I throw a party in the Baronial Hall. You bet, no Ancreds."

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

When a painter is really rolling

 Troy had decided to go straight for the head. She had laid in a general scheme for her work, an exciting affair of wet shadows and sharp accents. This could be completed without him. She was painting well. The touch of flamboyancy that she had dreaded was absent. She had returned often to the play. Its threat of horror was now a factor in her approach to her work. She was strongly aware of that sense of a directive power which comes only when all is well with painters. With any luck, she thought, I'll be able to say: "Did the fool that is me, make this?"

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Just retribution

 On the second terrace some thirty little girls and  boys were digging in time to their own singing. A red-haired young woman, clad in  breechs and sweater, shouted the rhythmic orders. Troy was just in time to see a little boy in the  back row deliberately heave a spadeful of soil down the neck of a near-by little girl. Singing shrilly, she retaliated by catching him a swinging smack across the rump with the flat of her spade.

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Silent suffering

 "Having discovered, after two or three colourless fentures, that he was a bad actor, he set about teaching himself to become a good producer. In this, after a struggle, he succeeded, and is now established as director for Incorporated Playhouses, Limited, Unicorn Theatre. He has never been known to lose his temper at rehearsals, but may sometimes be observed, alone in the stalls, rocking to and fro with his head in his hands."

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Emotional, one and all

 "Collectively and severally," Nigen had written, "the Ancreds, all but one, are over-emotionalized. Anyone attempting to describe or explain their behaviour must keep this characteristic firmly in mind, for without it they would scarcely exist. Sir Henry Ancred is perhaps the worst of the lot, but, because he is an actor, his friends accept his behaviour as part of his stock-in-trade, and apart from an occasional feeling of shyness in his presence, seldom make the mistake of worrying about him. Whether he was drawn to his wife (now deceased) by the discovery of a similar trait in her character, or whether, by the phenomenon of marital acclimatization, Lady Ancred learnt to exhibit emotion with a virtuosity equal to that of her husband, cannot be discovered. It can only be recorded that she did so; and died."

Wonderful family!

     "Rather a large party," said Katti. "Fun for you."

    "There'll be a good many rows, of course," Thomas replied. "When you get two or three Ancreds gathered together they are certain to hurt each other's feelings. That's where I come in handy, because I'm the insensitive one and they talk to me about each other. And about Sonia, I needn't say. We shall all talk about Sonia."

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

The ultimate indulgence

 "The portrait would hang under the minstrels' gallery with special lighting. He doesn't mind what he pays. It's to commemorate his seventy-fifth birthday. His own idea is that the nation ought to have given it to him, but as the nation doesn't seem to have thought of that, he's giving it to himself. And to posterity, of course."

(from Final Curtain, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Charlie's only claim

    "Your brother's wife had suffered accident, she was no longer able to work at profession, she was penniless and alone. You sent for her. What more natural than that action? You helped her to position, that she might help you."

    Tarneverro shrugged. "You have a remarkable imagination, Mr. Chan."

    "No, no - you flatter me," Charlie cried. "It has just been proved I have not imagination enough. Only one claim I make for myself - when light at last begins to stream in, I do not close the shutters."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

I was here

     "To be young, in love, and on this beach," he said. "What greater happiness than that? Taste it to the full. It happens once, then time moves on. Moment comes when gold and pearls can not buy back the raven locks of youth."

    "Why, Charlie, you're getting sentimental," Bradshaw cried.

    Chan nodded. "I think of my own courtship on this shore - so long ago. How long, you wonder? I am now father of eleven children - judge for yourself."

    "You must be very proud of them," Julie ventured.

    "As proud as they will permit," Chan answered. "At least, I have done my part to link past with future. When I move on, leaving eleven offspring, can any man say I have not been here? I think not."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Glad to be rid of them

     "Do you think Robert Fyfe took those lost bits of the photograph?" Bradshaw inquired.

    Charlie shook his head. "Impossible. He had not yet arrived on scene. Alas! it is not so simple as that. It is not simple at all." He sighed. "I fear I will be worn to human skeleton before I disentangle this web. And you" - he looked at the girl - "you alone have melted off at least seven pounds."

    "I'm so sorry," Julie said.

    "Do not fret. Always my daughters tell me I am too enormous for beauty. And beauty is, of course, my only aim." He stood up. "Well, that is that. Jimmy, do not let this young woman escape you. She has proved herself faithful one. Also, she is most unexpert deceiver I have ever met. What a wife she will make for somebody."

    "Me, I hope," Bradshaw grinned.

    "I hope so, too." Charlie turned to the girl. "Accept him, and all is forgiven between you and me. The seven pounds is gladly donated."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Busy fly

     A glance at his watch told him that he had no time for his usual leisurely lunch. He had instead a sandwich and a glass of milk, then went to the station. The Chief was pacing the floor of the detectives' room.

    "Hello, Charlie," he cried. "I've been wondering where you were. Pretty busy this morning, I take it?"

    "Like fly on hot griddle," Chan answered. "And just as eager to get off."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Straining at the beltline

     "I seek only to narrow search," Chan explained. "That will be all, thank you. Can you name hour of next boat to mainland?"

    "I certainly can," answered the Britisher. "There's one tomorrow at noon. I hope to heaven - "

    "I will extend myself to the utmost," smiled Chan. "Though, to look at me, many might remark that I had already done so."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Be careful with your praise

     "My perusal was of a necessity hurried," Chan replied. "Imagine it covered the ground."

    "Is that the best you can say for it?" the boy complained.

    Charlie shrugged. "Always think twice before you scatter tributes," he answered. "If no one had praised the donkey's song, he would not still be singing."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

To know me is to love me

     "Want to keep the poor kid cheered up," Bradshaw explained, as he and Chan walked toward the pavilion. "This has been a pretty tough shock for her. But in time I think I can convince her that all her troubles are over. That is - if she'll marry me."

    "You possess excellent opinion of yourself," Charlie smiled.

    "Why shouldn't I? I know myself so well."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

The old ways slip away

 He went out and got his car, and as he drove down the hill he thought about his children. He had always been proud of the fact that they were all American citizens. But, perhaps because of this very fact, they seemed to be growing away from him - the gulf widened daily. They made no effort to remember the precepts and the odes; they spoke the English language in a manner that grated on Charlie's sensitive ear.

(from The Black Camel,  by Earl Derr Biggers)

Was Charlie a fatalist?

 Today, however, he preferred to reflect on the problem that lay before him. Insoluble it had appeared when he went to bed, but he had slept soundly in the knowledge that what is to be will be, and now he felt a new energy stirring within him. Was he, then, a mainland policeman to be stumped and helpless in the face of a question that had, no doubt, some simple answer? It was a matter, however, that called for prompt and intelligent action on his part. He thought of the crane who, waiting for the sea to disappear and leave him dry fish to eat, died of starvation. Chan had no intention of emulating that stupid bird.

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Fathers are like that

     "How did you get here [Honolulu] in the first place?" the actor inquired.

    "I went down to the South Seas to paint. Might be a good place for some people - but for me - well, the first thing I knew I was on the beach. After a long time, my people sent me money to come home. I managed to get aboard a boat, but unfortunately it stopped for a day at this port. And - have you tried any of the okolehau they call a drink in this paradise?"

    Fyfe smiled. "I understand. You forgot to go back to your ship."

    "My dear sir," Smith shrugged, "I forgot the world. When I woke up, the boat was two days out. Oddly enough, my father seemed annoyed. A rather impatient man."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Climb out of the well

     Charlie was getting into his flivver when the Chief came down the steps of Halekaua Hale.

    "Thought you'd gone home, Charlie," he said.

    "I was for a moment delayed," Chan explained.

    His superior came up eagerly. "Anything new?"

    "I remain just where I always have been," the detective sighed.

    "You're not really as much in the dark on this case as you say you are?" asked the Chief anxiously.

    Chan nodded. "The man who sits in a well sees little of the sky."

    "Well, climb out, Charlie, climb out."

    "I am planning swift ascent," the detective answered, and starting his engine, sped off at last in the direction of his house on Punchbowl Hill.

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

It's up to Charlie

     "You've got something on Tarneverro?" asked the Chief, looking at him keenly.

    "With regard to killing - not one solitary thing. At moment when that took place, I believe he was most decidedly elsewhere. Gazing in another direction - kindly permit that I gaze that way a few hours longer before I divulge my thoughts." The plump detective put one hand to his head. "Haie, just now I wander, lost in maze of doubts and questionings."

    "You'll have to cut that out, Charlie," his Chief told him in a kindly  but somewhat worried tone. "The honor of the force is at stake. If these people are going to come over here to our quiet little city and murder each other at Waikiki, we've got to prove to them that they can't get away with it. I rely on you."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Don't go by appearances

     "We mustn't let it stump us," replied the Chief briskly. He was an intelligent man, and he knew where to lean. He foresaw that he was going to do some heavy leaning in the next few days. With an appraising glance, he surveyed his assistant. Charlie looked sleepy and somewhat worn - nothing alert, nothing clever in his appearance now. The Chief consoled himself with memories. Chan, he reflected, was ever keener than he looked.

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Poor California!

     "Stay on, I beg of you, and enjoy beauties of spot, on which subject Mr. Bradshaw will be happy to make oration for you any time, any place."

    "That's right," the boy nodded. "Loaf on a palm-fringed shore and forget your troubles. Somewhere winter is raging - "

    "In July?" Van Horn inquired.

    "Sure - at the South Pole, for example. Put Hollywood out of your thoughts. Remember - Hawaii has the climate California thinks it has."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Funeral feast

     "Wu complains that no one eats his dinner," he smiled. "He is great artist who lacks appreciation, and his ancient heart cracks with rage."

    "Well," remarked Jimmy Bradshaw, "I suppose it's an unfeeling thing to say, but I could put away a little of his handiwork."

    Chan nodded. "I have thought of that. Later, perhaps. Why not? Do the dead gain if the living starve?"

(from The Black Camel by Earl Derr Biggers)

Keep digging

     The fortune-teller looked keenly at Charlie. "What have you accomplished?" he wanted to know.

    Charlie shrugged. "Up to the present moment, I seem to have been setting off fireworks in the rain."

    "That's precisely what I thought," Tarneverro said impatiently.

    "Do not lose heart," Chan advised. "Changing the figure, I might add that to dig up the tree, we must start with the root. All this digging is routine matter that does not fascinate, but at any moment we may strike a root of vital importance."

(from The Black Camel by Earl Derr Biggers)

Of ancient heathen races

     "Please detail your activities from hour of twenty minutes past seven onward," Chan requested.

    "I was engaged with my duties, sir, in the dining-room and the kitchen. I may add that it has been a rather trying evening, in my department. The Chinese cook has exhibited all the worst qualities of a heathen race - I'm sure I beg your pardon."

    "A heathen race," repeated Charlie gravely, "that was busy inventing the art of printing at a moment when gentlemen in Great Britain were still beating one another over head ith spiked clubs."

(from The Black Camel by Earl Derr Biggers)

A butler does have his dignity

     "You were in Hollywood before that, maybe?"

    "For about eighteen months, I was."

    "A butler, always?"

    "Always a butler, sir. I had a number of berths before I went with Miss Fane. I am bound to ay that I was unhappy in all of them."

    "The work was, perhaps, too difficult?"

    "Not at all, sir. I objected to the familiarity of my employers. There is a certain reserve that should exit between servant and master. I found that lacking. The ladies I worked for would often weep in my presence and tell me stories of unrequited love. The gentlemen who engaged me were inclined to treat me like some long-lost brother. One in particular was accustomed to address me as 'old pal' and when a bit under the influence, would embrace me in the presence of guests. A man has his dignity, sir."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

A threat with some teeth in it

 "Kashimo, you may enjoy yourself by keen observation of the neighborhood. But if you repeat one former performance and spoil any footprints for me, I will at once arrange for you to return to former position as janitor of fish market."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Of beggars and bridges

     "Long time I have been in present business," he said softly, "but rough blunt feelings do not come natural to me yet. I am sorry for this lady. Never before this moment have I seen her - yet I am so very sorry." He stood up. "The black camel has knelt at plenty famous gate tonight," he added.

    Tarneverro remained some distance from the body. He seemed to control himself with an effort. "Poor Shelah!" he muttered. "Life was very sweet to her."

    "It is sweet to all of us," Charlie nodded. "Even the beggar hesitates to cross a rotting bridge."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Even butlers lose their cool

     Bradshaw stood looking about the little group. Jessop came in and, picking up the silver tray on which he had served the cocktails, prepared to collect the empty glasses. Outside the door, The Song of the Islands trailed off into silence.

    "Shelah Fane has  been murdered in the pavilion," said the boy in a low voice.

    There was a sudden crash. Jessop had been guilty of his first error in forty years of service. He had dropped the silver tray.

    "I beg pardon," he said to no one in particular.

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Preparing for a long speech

     "By the way, Inspector, this is a happy meeting. I was thinking of calling you up. Just how do you plan to spend the evening?"

    "I attend Rotary club banquet in this hotel," Chan explained.

    "Good. You'll be here some time?"

    Chan nodded. "I fear so. It happens very few after-dinner speeches are equipped with self-stopper."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Hollywood? No big deal.

     "Tell me," she cut in. "What do you think of Shelah?"

    "Shelah?" He paused. "Oh, she's all right. Nice and friendly but - a bit artificial - a good actress, on and off. In the past two years I've met enough screen stars to start a Holywood of my own, and what I always say is - doffing my hat to southern California - you can have 'em."

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Just waiting

     The Oceanic swung about to the channel entrance. There stood Diamond Head, like a great lion - if you want the time-worn simile - crouched to spring. A crouching lion, yes; the figure is plausible up to that point; but as for springing - well, there has never been the slightest chance of that. Diamond Head is a kamaaina of the islands, and has long ago sensed the futility of acting on impulse - of acting, as a matter of fact, at all.

(from The Black Camel, by Earl Derr Biggers)

Stay away from wildcats

     "Maestro," Alleyn said, "I am very ignorant in these matters, but I imagine that the relationship between pedagogue and pupil is, or at least can be, very close, very intimate."

    "My dear Mr. Alleyn, if you are suggesting - "

    "Which I am not. Not for a moment. There can be close relationships that have no romantic overtones."

    "Of course. And allow me to say that with a pupil it would be in the highest degree a mistake to allow oneself to become involved in such an attachment. And apart from all that," he added with feeling, "when the lady has the temperament of a wildcat and the appetite of a hyena, it would be sheer lunacy."

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Stiff upper lip

     "Bed-making! Gear?" he exclaimed. "But I am baffled. Here is the most distinguished painter of our time, whom I have, above all things, desired to meet and she talks of bed-making as a sequence to murder."

    "She's being British," said Alleyn. "If there were any  bullets about she'd bite on them. Pay no attention."

    "That's right," Troy assured Signor Lattienzo. "It's a substitute for hysterics."

(from Photo Finish by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

No, don't use that!

     Troy inserted her thin hand in a gingerly fashion into a large pocket of her dress. Using only her first finger and her thumb, she drew out something wrapped in one of Alleyn's handkerchiefs. She was in the habit of using them, as she preferred a large one, and she had been known when intent on her work to confuse the handkerchief and her paint rag, with regrettable results to the handkerchief and to her face.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

The light side of crime

     "Little beast," said Troy. "Cruel little pig, tormenting her like that. And everybody thinking it a jolly joke. And the shaming thing is, it was rather funny."

    "That's the worst of ill-doing, isn't it? It so often has its funny side. Come to think of it, I don't believe I could have stuck my job out if it wasn't so. The earliest playwrights knew all about that: their devils more often than not were clowns and their clowns were always cruel."

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Nightmares

     "I'm abroad in the night because I can't sleep. I can't help seeing - everything - her. Whenever I close my eyes - there it is. If I do doze - it's there. Like those crummy old horror films. An awful face suddenly rushing at one. It might as well be one of Dracula's ladies after the full treatment."

(from Photo Finish by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Original with Holmes?

 "When all likely places have been fruitlessly explored, begin on the unlikely and carry on into the preposterous." (from Photo Finish by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

This is a principle that Sherlock Holmes quotes. One wonders if Marsh is quoting Sir Arthur, or if Sir Arthur was quoting someone else.

Vendetta - leave it alone

     "But what a picture!" said Dr. Carmichael. "You know? Cutting the dress, ripping it open, placing the photograph over the heart, and then using the knife. I mean - it's so - so farfetched. Why?"

    "As farfetched as a vengeful killing in a Jacobean play," Alleyn said and then: "Yes. A vengeful killing."

    "Are you - are we," Carmichael asked, "not going to withdraw the weapon?"

    "I'm afraid not. I've blown my top often enough when some well-meaning fool had interfered with the  body. In this case I'd be the well-meaning fool."

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

How they carry on!

     "If you ask me," Troy said, "it needs only another outrage like this and she'll break down completely. She was literally shaking all over as if she had a rigor. She can't go on like that. Don't you agree?"

    "Not really. Not necessarily. Have you ever watched two Italians having a discussion on the street? Furious gestures, shrieks, glaring eyes, faces close together. Any moment, you think, it'll be a free-for-all, and then without warning they burst out laughing and hit each other's shoulders in comradely accord. I'd say she was of the purest Italian - perhaps Sicilian - peasant stock and utterly uninhibited. Add to that the propensity of all public performers to cut up rough and throw temperaments left and right when they think they've been slighted, and you've got la Sommita. You'll see."

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Moonlit view

     And, sure enough, when he reached their room he found her in bed and fast asleep. Before joining her he went to the heavy window curtains, parted them, and saw the Lake in moonlight close beneath him, stretching away like a silver plain into the mountains. Incongruous, he thought, and impertinent, for this little knot of noisy, self-important people with their self-imposed luxury and seriocomic concerns to be set down at the heart of such an immense serenity.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Who is he?

 He was shortish and dark and had run a little to what is sometmes called expense-account fat. His eyes were large, and his face closed: a face that it would be easy to forget since it seemed to say nothing.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Smells good

 "The air up there was wonderfully fresh and smelled aromatically of manuka scrub patching warm, tussocky earth." (from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Manuka scrub, sometimes called tea tree, is a flowering plant in the myrtle family native to New Zealand and southeast Australia. Tussock grasses or bunch grasses are a group of grass species clumps, tufts, hummocks, or bunches, rather than forming a lawn.

With emphasis!

 It was handwritten and all that might be expected. Points of exclamation proliferated. Underscorings doubled and trebled to an extent that would have made Queen Victoria's correspondence appear by contrast a model of stony reticence. The subject matter lurched into incoherence, but the general idea was to the effect that if the "Head of Scotland Yard" didn't do something pretty smartly he would have only himself to blame when the writer's career came to a catastrophic halt. On her knees she remained distractedly and again in enormous calligraphy, sincerely, Isabella Sommita.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Sheep-farmed?

 "He pointed out mountains that had been sheep-farmed by the first landholders." (from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

That is an interesting verb - "sheep-farmed." I had an English teacher friend once who observed that when we invent a verb, we generally do so in its regular form. For example, if we had trimmed our yard yesterday, most people would say that we "Weed-eated" or "Weed-eatered," instead of "Weed-ate."

What is that?!

    There is a belief held by people of the theatre that nobody over the age of twenty-five should allow themselves to be photographed from below. Here, the camera had evidently been half-a-flight beneath the diva, who therefore appeared to be richly endowed with chins and more than slightly en bon point. The Governer-General, by some momentary accident, seemed to regard her with incredulity and loathing.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

In a test tube

    Fifteen minutes later his Assistant Commissioner received him in the manner to which he had become accustomed: rather as if he was some sort of specimen produced in a bad light to be peered at, doubtfully. The A. C. was as well furnished with mannerisms as he was with brains, and that would be underestimating them.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

One gulp

     "She wants you," said the woman. "Also the music."

    "All right, Maria," said Mr. Ruby, and to the young man, "Maria is Madame's dresser. You'd better go."

    So Rupert, whose surname was Bartholomew, clutching his opera, walked into La Sommita's bedroom like a fly, if he'd only known it, into a one-way web.

    "She'll eat that kid," Mr. Ruby said dispassioinarely, "in one meal."

    "Halfway down her throat already," her protector agreed.

(from Photo Finish, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Speak right up!

     "Well?" she said. "I hope you're convinced about Lugg now."

    To her astonishment Mr. Campion linked her arm through his.

    "You are now, my dear madam, about to become my Doctor Watson," he said. "You will ask the inane questions, and I shall answer them with all that scintillating and superior wisdom which makes me such a favourite at all my clubs. They used to laugh when I got up to speak. Now they gag me. But do I care? No, I speak my mind. I like a plain man, a straightforward man, a man who calls a spade a pail."

    "Stop showing off," said Penny placidly, as they emerged into the garden. "What are you going to do?"

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Do it yourself

     Mr. Campion rose to his feet. "Look here, Stanislaus," he said, "you know as well as I do that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the police are the only people in the world to protect a man and his property. But the hundredth time, when publicity is fatal, and the only way out is a drastic spot of eradication, then the private individual has to get busy on his own account."

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

At least he tried

     Mr. Campion sat down again. "Come in," he said. "Shut the door carefully behind you. Stand up straight, and wipe the egg off your upper lip."

    The leer broadened. "I can grow a moustache if I like, can't I?" said Mr. Walker without malice.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Trilby hat

In Margery Allingham's novel The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, in the Albert Campion series, she makes mention of a "Trilby hat." This is a hat with "a shorter brim which is angled down at the front and slightly turned up at the back." It derives its name from the stage adaptation of George du Maurier's 1894 novel Trilby.

Proving the rule by the exception

     Val frowned. "Aunt Di," he said, "was what Uncle Lionel's brother Adolphe used to call a freak of nature. I remember him saying to me, 'Val, my boy, you never get a woman who is a complete fool. Many men achieve that distinction, but never a woman. The exception which proves that rule is your Aunt Diana.' He didn't like her."

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

An old Jew

     Mr. Israel Melchizedek was the miracle of good breeding, the refined and intellectual Jew. Looking at him one was irrestistibly reminded of the fact that his ancestors had ancestors who had conversed with Jehovah. He was nearing seventy years of age, a tall, lean old fellow with a firm delicate face of what might well have been polished ivory.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Better fill up

     "I think the sooner we get on the better. What i suggest is that we split up. Penny, you and I will take the precious suitcase in the two-seater. Val and Miss Cairey will follow close behind to come to our assistance if necessary. Have you got enough gas?"

    Penny looked at him in surprise. "I think so," she said, but as he hesitated she added, laughing, "I'll go and see if you like."

    Mr. Campion looked more foolish than before. "Twice armed is he who speeds with an excuse, but thrice is he whose car is full of juice," he remarked absently.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Good guesser

     "How on earth did you know?" she said. Mr. Campion sighed with relief.

    "The process of elimination," said he oracularly as he picked up the suitcase and trudged back to the car with it, "combined with a modicum of common sense, will always assist us to arrive at the correct conclusion with the maximum of possible accuracy and the minimum of hard labour. Which being translated means: I guessed it."

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

A bad way to go

     "I'm going to London too," said Mr. Campion, climbing in. "It's a long way from here, isn't it?" he went on with apparent imbecility. "I knew I'd never walk it."

    Penny stared at him, her cheeks flushing. "Surely you can't go off and leave the Tower unprotected," she said, and there was a note of amusement in her voice.

    "Never laugh at a great man," said Mr. Campion. "Remember what happened to the vulgar little girls who threw stons at Elisha. I can imagine few worse deaths than being eaten by a bear," he added conversationally.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Crehan as Grant

 Actor Joseph Crehan was noted for having played U. S. Grant in movies nine times between 1939 and 1958.

A thoroughly dislikable woman

It was this quality which had earned her the unique position in the county which she undoubtedly occupied. Everybody knew her, nobody liked her, and most people were a little afraid of her. Her astounding success with any species of horseflesh earned her a grudging admiration. Nobody snubbed her because the tongue capable of it had not yet been born. Her rudeness and studied discourtesy were a byword for some fifty square miles, yet she came and went where she pleased because the only way of stopping her would have been to hurl her bodily from one's front door, no mean feat in itself, and this method had not yet occurred to the conservative minds of her principal victims.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Do you know anyone like this?

Out of my depth

    "Dad really had cause for a grievance, you see, only Professor Cairey himself doesn't shoot, so you can't expect him to understand. And anyhow, he only wants asking. Dad's so silly that way."

    "Professor? said Campion thoughtfully. "What does he profess?"

    "Archaeology," said Penny proptly. "But you don't think . . .?"

    "My dear girl," said Mr. Campion, "I can't see the wood for the trees. 'And in the night imagining some fear, how easy doth a bush appear a bear.' You see," he added with sudden seriousness, "if your aunt met her death by someone's design, I'm not only out of my depth, but I might just as well have left my water-wings at home."

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Can't afford to be rich

 The slight signs of neglect which a sudden rise in the cost of labour combined with a strangling land tax had induced upon the lawns and gardens had only succeeded in mellowing and softening the pretentiousness of the estate, and in the haze of the morning it looked kindly and inviting in spite of the fact that the doctor's venerable motor car stood outside the square doorway and the blinds were drawn in all the front windows.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham. If you are a reader of the comic writings of Sir P. G. Wodehouse, you will find more than once that he uses this financial fact ("strangling land tax") as the backdrop for the plot, i.e., noble families in castles or large manor houses who have become virtually impoverished because of the high rates of taxation in the period.)

Definitely old-fashioned

 It was a fairy-tale village peopled by yokels who, if they did not wear the traditional white smocks so beloved of film producers, at least climbed the rough steps to the church on a Sunday morning in top hats of unquestionale antiquity.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

NOT a tourist trap

 The village of Sanctuary lay in that part of Suffolk which the railway has ignored and the motorists have not yet discovered. Moreover, the steep-sided valley of which it consisted, with the squat Norman church on one eminence and the Tower on the other, did not lie on the direct route to anywhere, so that no one turned down the narrow cherry-lined lane which was its southern approach unless he had actual business in the village. The place itself was one of those staggering pieces of beauty that made Morland paint in spite of all the noggins of rum in the world.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Definitely not feminine

    She was of a type not uncommon among the "landed gentry," but mercifully rare elsewhere. Superbly self-possessed, she was slightly masculine in appearance, with square flat shoulders and narrow hips. Her hair was cut short under her mannish felt, her suit was perfectly tailored and the collar of her blouse fitted tightly at her throat.

    She managed to enter the room noisily and sat down so that her face was toward them. It was a handsome face, but one to which the epithet of "beautiful" would have seemed absurd.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

An unappealing waiter

 There was no one in sight, so he tapped the counter irresolutely. Almost immediately a door to the right of the stove was jerked open and there appeared a mountain of a man with the largest and most lugubrious face he had ever seen. A small tablecloth had been tied across his stomch by the way of an apron, and his great muscular arms were bare to the elbow. For the rest, his head was bald, and the bone of his nose had sustained an irreparable injury.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Destitute

 A man who is literally destitute is like a straw in the wind; any tiny current is suficient to set him drifting in a new direction. His time and energies are of no value to him: anything is worth while.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Coincidence

 Not the least remarkable thing about a coincidence is that once it has happened one names it, accepts it, and leaves it at that.

(from The Gyrth Chalice Mystery, by Margery Allingham)

Maori tattoos

 "Being one of the last of the old regime she had a tattood chin." (from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh. She is referencing the custom of Maori women of placing tattoo marks on their chins.)

Let her sink by herself

 "Don't you think it would be much pleasanter to go a little way towards tne sea and smoke a cigarette? This morbid desire to look at sinking ships! Isn't it kinder to let her go down alone? I feel that it would be rather like watching the public execution of a good friend."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Approximately

     "Yes," he said. "The footprints after all, and I can tell you exactly how they would be described by the know-alls. Several confused impressions of the Booted Foot, two being more clearly defined and making an angle of approximately thirty degrees the one with the other. Distance between inside margins of heel, half an inch. Distance between position of outside margin of big toes, approximately ten inches. This latter pair of impressions was found in damp clay but had been protected from recent rain by a bank which overhung them at a height of approximately three feet. There's great virtue in the word 'approximately.'"

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Don't jump!

    "If you want to see anything," said Simon, "You'll have to get up there. Do you mind heights?"

    "Speaking for myself," said Gaunt, "they inspire me with vertigo, nausea, and a strongly marked impulse toward felo-de-se. However, having come so far I refuse to turn back. That fence looks tolerably strong. I shall clint to it." He smiled at Barbara. "If you happen to notice a mad glint of suicide in my eye," he said, "I wish you'd fling your arms round me and thus restore me to my nobler self."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh) 

Theatrical sissies

     "Look, Mr. Bell, don't start telling me it's 'incredible.' You've been getting round with theatrical sissies for so long you don't know a real man when you see one."

    "My dear Claire," said Dikon with some heat, "may I suggest that speaking in the back of your throat and going out of your way to insult everybody that doesn't is not the sole evidence of virility. And if real men spend their time trying to kill and bribe each other, I infinitely prefer my theatrical sissies." Dikon removed his spectacles and polished them with his handkerchief.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

LIkable parasite

 In contrast to Smith, Simon appeared to be almost cordial. Dikon was not quite sure how he stood with this curious young man, but he had a notion that his passive acceptance of the role cast for him in the lake incident as the remover of Barbara, and his suggestion that Simon should drive the car, had given him a kind of status. He thought that Simon disapproved of him on general principles as a parasite and a freak, but didn't altogether dislike him.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Buckle down!

 After breakast Mrs. Claire and Barbara, assisted in a leisurely manner by Huia, bucketed into their household duties with their customary air of laying back their ears and rushing their fences.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

The soul of discretion

     "You're feeling a bit better now?"

    "A bit. You're very kind, aren't you?" said Barbara rather as if she saw Dikon for the first time. "I mean, to take trouble over our frightfulness."

    "You must stop being apologetic," Dikon said. "So far I've taken no trouble at all."

    "You listen nicely," Barara said.

    "I'm almost ghoulishly discreet, if that's any recommendation."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Not our sort

     "Barbara darling," said Mrs. Claire in her special voice, "some day you will understand that there are folk who move in rather loud and vulger sets, and who may seem to be very exciting, and who I expect are all very rich. But, my dear," Mr. Claire added, gently, exhibiting a photograph of an enormously obese peer in bathing shorts, supported on the one hand by a famous coryphee and on the other by a fashionable prize fighter - "my dear, they are not Our Sort."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Getting above himself

     "It's a touch of the old blood-and-thunder dope, isn't it, sir? Mortgage and all. The villain still pursued her. Only the juvenile to cast, and there, as we say in The Dream, sir, is a play fitted. I used to enjoy them old pieces."

    "You talk too much, Colly," said Gaunt mildly.

    "That's right, sir. Beg pardon, I'm sure. Associating with young Mr. Claire must have brought out the latent democracy in me soul. I tell him there's no call to worry over his sister. 'It's easy seen she hates his guts,' I said, if you'll excuse me."

    "I'll excuse you altogether. I'm going to work."

    "Thank you, sir," said Colly neatly, and closed the door.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Scunner

 "He's taken a scunner on anything that looks like smart business." (from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Scunner - "an unreasonable or extreme dislike or prejudice"

An eerie scene

 They moved forward and reached a point where the scrub and grass came to an end and the path descended a steep bank to traverse a region of solidified blue mud, sinter mounds, hot pools and geysers. The sulphurous smell was very strong. The track, defined at intervals by stakes to which pieces of white rag had been tied, went forward over naked hillocks towards the hip-roofs of the native settlement.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

A different sort of killer

     There was another silence broken unexpectedly by Geoffrey Gaunt. "In fact, Dr. Ackrington," said Gaunt, "you think we have a potential murderer among us?"

    "I do."

    "Strange. I've never thought of a murderer before as an insufferable bore."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

Six-shooter blondes

 The war had brought them closer together. The Colonel commanded the local Home Guard and considered that he owed his life to his pakeha friends, and though he thought them funny, loved them. It did not offend him, therefore, when Colonel Claire furtively read a novel under his very nose. He rumbled on magnificently with his story, in amiable competition with Texas Rangers and six-shooter blondes.

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)

I'll be just as dead

     "For pity's sake, my dear Dikon, drive a little away from the edge of the abyss. Can this mountain goat track possibly be a main road?"

    "It's the only road from Harpoon to Wai-ata-tapu, sir. You wanted somewhere quiet, you know, and these are not mountains. There are no mountains in the Northland. The big stuff is in the South."

    "I'm afraid you're a scenic snob. To me this is a mountain. When I fall over the edge of this precipice, I shall not be found with a sneer on my lips because the drop was merely five hundred feet instead of a thousand."

(from Colour Scheme, by Dame Ngaio Marsh)