The incredible thing happens at the beginning of the story always, you notice, not the end. A Sherlock Holmes story is never a trick story. - Rex Stout

Bosh. I find a rival – but no, I won't flatter myself that Tecumseh Fox would consider himself a rival of Dol Bonner – I find an eminent detective in your apartment, and that alone is enough, without adding that he is concealed in your bedroom while I am discussing my business with you...

The only thing I want is something I can't have; and that is to know if, 100 years from now, people will still buy my books.

I really mean what I say. A Dickens character to me is a theatrical projection of a character. Not that it isn't real. It's real, but in that removed sense. But Sherlock Holmes is simply there. I would be astonished if I went to 221½ B Baker Street and didn't find him.