Whose Body? Quotes
"Oh, damn!" said Lord Peter Wimsey at Piccadilly Circus. "Hi, driver!"
"I’m afraid it’s an awkward place to turn in," said Lord Peter, answering the thought rather than the words.
"His long, amiable face looked as if it had generated spontaneously from his top hat, as white maggots breed from Gorgonzola."
"Thought you was in a hurry," said the man, overcome with a sense of injury.
"Thanks," said Lord Peter; "and you might find me my catalogue, would you? I think I must have left it in my bedroom, or on the desk."
"Such a quaint thing," said the Duchess. "I thought I’d tell you. You know little Mr. Thipps?"
"A dead man, dear, with nothing on but a pair of pince-nez."
"Poor little Thipps! Uncommonly awkward for him."
"I wish Eton and Balliol had done as much for me."
"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."
"Exit the amateur of first editions; new motive introduced by solo bassoon; enter Sherlock Holmes, disguised as a walking gentleman."
"It’s a sweet little problem, Parker mine."
"I couldn’t have done better myself. The thought of the Dante makes my mouth water—and the Four Sons of Aymon. And you’ve saved me £60—that’s glorious."
"‘On such a night as this—’ Bunter and I were just sitting down to carouse."
"We both have got a body in a bath,We both have got a body in a bath—For in spite of all temptationsTo go in for cheap sensationsWe insist upon a body in a bath—"
"Sugg’s a beautiful, braying ass," said Lord Peter.
"Gentlemen, this is no laughing matter. My client—an upright and honourable gentleman—is being tried for his life—for his life, gentlemen—"
"It’s Greek to me," he said, "and £50 seems a ridiculous price for a few bits of glass."
"I look at you, and Sugg appears a myth, a fable, an idiot-boy, spawned in a moonlight hour by some fantastic poet’s brain."
"There was an old man of WhitehavenWho danced a quadrille with a raven,But they said: It’s absurdTo encourage that bird—So they smashed that old man of Whitehaven."
"He’s self-made, of course, but he don’t pretend to be anything else."
"A quiet, orderly, domestic life, Mr. Bunter, has much to be said for it."
"It’s a hard life, valeting by day and developing by night—morning tea at any time from 6:30 to 11, and criminal investigation at all hours."
"Fact is, my mother is gettin’ up this bazaar, and she thought it’d be an awfully interestin’ sideshow to have some lectures—sort of little talks, y’know—by eminent business men of all nations."
"You see, all my mother’s friends will be there, and we’ve none of us any money—not what you’d call money, I mean—but we like awfully to hear about the people who can make money. Gives us a sort of uplifted feelin’, don’t you know."
"To pump, by means of an ingenious lie, a hospitable gentleman whom you are inclined to suspect of a peculiarly malicious murder, and to accept from him in the course of the proceedings a large cheque for a charitable object, has something about it unpalatable to any but the hardened Secret Service agent."
Dyed it red," said Lord Peter. "Odd thing is," continued Wimsey, "they can’t lay hands on the bottle. Somethin’ fishy there, don’t you think, what?
"I’m sure if I had nerves I should go to Sir Julian just to look at him—eyes like that give one something to think about, and that’s what most of these people want, only I never had any—nerves, I mean."
"I am not ignorant of the rise of another school of thought, Mr. Parker, but its exponents are mostly charlatans or self-deceivers."
"Science is different—I’m sure if I had nerves I should go to Sir Julian just to look at him—eyes like that give one something to think about, and that’s what most of these people want, only I never had any—nerves, I mean."
"One must keep one’s hand and eye in training. This place is far more important to me than Harley Street, and some day I shall abandon my consulting practice altogether and settle down here to cut up my subjects and write my books in peace."
"But when you can really investigate, Mr. Parker, and break up the dead, or for preference the living body with the scalpel, you always find the footmarks—the little trail of ruin or disorder left by madness or disease or drink or any other similar pest."
"I hold no brief for the pleasantness of my profession, Sir Julian. I am very much obliged to you for telling me this. I might otherwise have wasted valuable time following up a false trail."
"It’s only in Sherlock Holmes and stories like that, that people think things out logically."
"You never know. It’d be beastly awkward if the person died suddenly tomorrow."
"His mind had been warped in its young growth by 'Raffles' and 'Sherlock Holmes', or the sentiments for which they stand."
"Beds are turned down by the housekeeper, earlier than ten o’clock."
"A scar on the arm? Yes, I don’t know if we shall be able to find that—yes—any little constitutional weakness that might—?"
"I mean, that if you get nerve-sensations of any kind producing the reactions which we call horror, fear, and sense of responsibility, they may go on to make disturbance right along the old channel, and produce in their turn physical changes which you will call by the names you were accustomed to associate with them—dread of German mines, responsibility for the lives of your men, strained attention and the inability to distinguish small sounds through the overpowering noise of guns."
"We were just in time, my lord. We rang the bell and marched straight up past his man to the library."
"I never had any patience with that kind of attitude, and I will freely admit now that the game is yours."
"The really essential factors of success in any undertaking are money and opportunity, and as a rule, the man who can make the first can make the second."
"Meanwhile, I carefully studied criminology in fiction and fact—my work on Criminal Lunacy was a side-product of this activity—and saw how, in every murder, the real crux of the problem was the disposal of the body."
"The sole difficulty would be that of destroying all connection between my personality and that of the corpse."
"I bought a couple of hundred more shares in my own name, and left the matter to take care of itself."
"The surest and simplest method of making a thing appear to have been done is to do it."
"I was not afraid of leaving marks. I hesitated whether to chance the banging of the front door, but decided it would be safer to take the latchkey."
"I had an overcoat of much the same pattern as Levy’s, and had taken the precaution to pack an opera hat in my suitcase."
"I waited about for a few minutes, and heard it strike the quarter past midnight."
"As I shall die by my own hand, I imagine that there may be a little difficulty about this. Will you do me the favour, if you can, of seeing the persons concerned in the inquest, and obtaining that the brain is not damaged by an unskilful practitioner at the postmortem, and that the body is disposed of according to my wish?"
"Isn’t it queer? All that coolness, all those brains—and then he couldn’t resist writing a confession to show how clever he was, even to keep his head out of the noose."