"Private detective" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... ready to get off," he said. "You know this hyperspace freighter, the Andromeda? Some private group in Storisende has chartered her. She's loading supplies now. I have a private detective agency, Barton-Massarra, trying to find out where's she's going. I think you'd better get this ...
— The Cosmic Computer • Henry Beam Piper
... had lain much among novels in which the private detective was omnipotent, the unraveller of all mysteries, the avenger of ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon
... from a leading New York merchant a letter of introduction to a well-known private detective whom, as a fellow-countryman, I succeeded in so far interesting in my work that I had no difficulty in getting from him all the useful information that he possessed; but to my request for practical assistance he replied that half of the detectives in his own employment were Irish, and that the ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman
... 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. ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... discussion. Some thought the old gentleman, arrived that day from London, to be a new kind of commercial traveler, with designs upon the gardens of the gentry; others that he was a sort of scientific collector; others, again, that he was a private detective; and since there was no evidence at all, good or bad, in support of any one of these suggestions, a very ...
— The Necromancers • Robert Hugh Benson
... a private detective would undertake the job. Sometimes I've been tempted—yet no, I don't believe I ever did come near to playing the game as ...
— Winnie Childs - The Shop Girl • C. N. Williamson
... a brilliant man, was at least good-natured. He acknowledged the right of the accused and his family to ask for outside assistance, and agreed with Muller that it was better to have some one in the official service brought in, rather than a private detective whose work, in its eventual results, might bring shame on the police. Muller explained that Miss Graumann did not want her nephew to know that it was she who had asked for aid in his behalf, and that it could only redound to his, Lange's, credit if it were understood that he ...
— The Case of the Registered Letter • Augusta Groner
... he's so much worse than the average private detective," replied the caretaker. "He's out for his day's wages, and the easier he can get them, ...
— The Call of the Beaver Patrol - or, A Break in the Glacier • V. T. Sherman
... an hour ago: 'Come at once, if possible, with another doctor. Man—Innocent Smith—gone mad on premises, and doing dreadful things. Do you know anything of him?' I went round at once to a distinguished colleague of mine, a doctor who is also a private detective and an authority on criminal lunacy; he has come round with me, and is waiting in the cab. Now you calmly tell me that this criminal madman is a highly sweet and sane old thing, with accompaniments that set me speculating on your ...
— Manalive • G. K. Chesterton
... night a youngish man, extremely like Simon Shawn, was brought by Simon into Hugo's presence under the dome. This was Simon's brother, Albert Shawn, a member of Hugo's private detective force. ...
— Hugo - A Fantasia on Modern Themes • Arnold Bennett
... Jerry Belknap, private detective, followed close behind her, and himself closed the door carefully. Constance crossed the room, drew back the curtains, and pushed open the shutters of the terrace windows, thus letting in a flood of light. Then turning, she seated herself upon a fauteuil, ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch
... after hearing this report from his private detective, and then got into his chaise, and turned Caustic's head in the direction of the Dudley mansion. He had been suspicious of Dick from the first. He did not like his mixed blood, not his looks, nor his ways. He had formed a conjecture about his ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... the conditions I gave his movements a considerable amount of my attention during the next few days. He had certainly been amongst the most assiduous of her admirers, and I discovered that he had put a private detective on to the business who was chiefly ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... of one of the many private detective agencies that found it to their advantage to keep in touch ...
— The Canterbury Puzzles - And Other Curious Problems • Henry Ernest Dudeney
... grit clear through. He disbursed at the rate of one hundred thousand per week for secret service. The aid of the Pinkertons and of countless private detective agencies was called in, and in addition to this thousands were upon our payroll. Our agents swarmed everywhere, in all guises, penetrating all classes of society. They grasped at a myriad clues; hundreds ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... he caught sight of the face of his old friend Patke, whom he had come across more than once during that day. The former non-commissioned officer had apparently reached the goal of his ambitions and become a private detective. ...
— The Malady of the Century • Max Nordau
... to the wise," it began. "Two men from a private detective concern have been employed since yesterday in watching the movements of your companion, for the purpose of safe-guarding her against good- looking young men, I suspect. I have it from the most reliable of sources ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... she said at last, "that you are a private detective. I come to ask for your help in a matter of some difficulty. Some papers of the utmost importance, not only to me but to others, are in the possession of a person who intends to profit by the information contained in them to do myself and my friends an irreparable ...
— The Ashiel mystery - A Detective Story • Mrs. Charles Bryce
... received your dispatch. There has been foul play. Report the case at police headquarters. Set private detective on the track of the missing lady. Last seen at the gate of the Hudson River Railway depot, waiting for 7:30 a.m. train for West Point yesterday morning, but not seen on train. Give me ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... been well punished, and Tommy has been wired to to come home at once, so he has been punished. And Hilary's punishment here is to come. It will take the form of such endless banter and chaff from her brothers and sisters that it will be a long time before she thinks of playing private detective to any ...
— The Rebellion of Margaret • Geraldine Mockler
... had not the power to detain him. I am merely a private detective, and can neither arrest a man nor threaten him with arrest. That is why I have come to you. You, with the powers of the law behind you, can frighten Benson into a confession much more effectually ...
— The Shrieking Pit • Arthur J. Rees
... even so far as to guarantee his expenses. This disgusted Pinney, and turned his thoughts strongly toward another calling. It was not altogether strange to him; he had already done some minor pieces of amateur detective work, and acquitted himself with gratifying success; and he had lately seen a private detective, who attested his appreciation of Pinney's skill by offering him a partnership. His wife was not in favor of his undertaking the work, though she could not deny that he had some distinct qualification for it. The air of confidence which he diffused about him unconsciously, and which often ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... that Tyburn minx, I thought that you had realized the situation, that you saw that I found life with you detestable and intolerable, and that you meant to give me a chance to divorce you. I employed a private detective with what I had saved out of the house-money, and had you watched. The detective reported that there was nothing good enough—or bad enough——for the High Court, and that the woman seemed to be doing most ...
— If Winter Don't - A B C D E F Notsomuchinson • Barry Pain
... seemed to have settled on him; the excitement of the chase became, for the moment, forgotten. The scope of his mental visuality no longer included the figure of the agent from the private detective bureau. An anxiety more poignant moved him; his thoughts centered on that other matter—the cause of Miss Van Rolsen's apprehensions—the while those emotions that had held him a listener behind ...
— A Man and His Money • Frederic Stewart Isham
... of opinion, however, that Anderson Crow had served, all told, thirty-eight years, the aforesaid hiatus being the result of a decision on his part to permanently abandon public life in order to carry on his work as a private detective. Mr. Ed. Higgins held the office for two years and then retired, claiming that there wasn't any sense in Tinkletown having two marshals and only paying for one. And, as the salary and perquisites were too meagre to warrant a division, and the duties of office barely sufficient ...
— Anderson Crow, Detective • George Barr McCutcheon
... touch of private detective business," answered Mr. Gerald Byner with a smile. "We undertake to find people, to watch people, to recover lost property, and so on. In this case we're acting for Messrs. Vickers, Marshall & Hebbleton, Solicitors, of Cannon Street. They want James ...
— The Talleyrand Maxim • J. S. Fletcher |
