No man was ever taken to hell by a woman unless he already had a ticke — Nero Wolfe

"But by gum I had got him to the station twenty minutes ahead of time, notwithstanding such items as three bags and two suitcases and two overcoats for a four days absence in the month of April, Fritz Brenner standing on the stoop with tears in his eyes as we left the house ... and even tough little Saul Panzer, after dumping us at the station, choking off a tremolo as he told Wolfe goodbye. You might have thought we were bound for the stratosphere to shine up the moon and pick wild stars."

"What do we do when we have no clues? Do you know?" "No, sir." "We make one."

"I am nobodys friend. How much can you pay?"

"To assert dignity is to lose it."

"But in connection with my remark to Mr. Kommers it occurs to me that no publication either before or since the invention of printing, no theological treatise and no political or scientific creed, has ever been as narrowly dogmatic or as offensively arbitrary in its prejudices as a railway timetable."

"I understand the technique of eccentricity; it would be futile for a man to labor at establishing a reputation for oddity if he were ready at the slightest provocation to revert to normal action."