Barton Ward also began to stroke his mustache and smile.

But it was twenty seconds more before Watson Bard's corrugated brow relaxed and his eyes twinkled with the idea that had come so much more readily to the other two.
"Cleggett," said Wilton Barnstable, "you have heard of the deductive method as applied to the work of the detective ?" "I have," said Cleggett.

"I have read Poe's detective tales and Doyle's Sherlock Holmes stories." "Ah! Sherlock Holmes!" The three detectives looked at each other with glances in which were mingled both bitterness and amusement; the look seemed to dispose of Sherlock Holmes.

Once again Cleggett had a fleeting thought that Wilton Barnstable might possibly be a vain man.
"Sherlock Holmes," said Barnstable, "never existed.

His marvelous feats are not possible in real life, Cleggett.