“By the way,” I asked suddenly, stopping and turning upon Stamford, “how the deuce did he know that I had come from Afghanistan?”
My companion smiled an enigmatical smile. “That’s just his little peculiarity,” he said. “A good many people have wanted to know how he finds things out.”
“Oh! a mystery is it?” I cried, rubbing my hands. “This is very piquant . . . ”
—Dr. Watson, in Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s A Study in Scarlet
LADY BRACKNELL. Dead! When did Mr. Bunbury die? His death must have been extremely sudden.
ALGERNON (airily). Oh, I killed Bunbury this afternoon. I mean poor Bunbury died this afternoon.
LADY BRACKNELL. What did he die of?
ALGERNON. Bunbury? Oh, he was quite exploded.
—from Oscar Wilde’s The Importance of Being Earnest
The audience at the Delacorte Theater in Central Park laughed uproariously this summer when Edwin Drood’s wicked uncle Jasper wished the heroine many happy returns of the day:
JASPER. Rosa, the happiest of birthdays to you. I only pray I may be able to say these words on each of your birthdays.
ROSA. I fear that is not likely, since, as you know, your own nephew Edwin and I will be departing for Egypt once we are married.
Poor Jasper! A respectable choirmaster by day and closet opium-fiend by night, Jasper is passionately in love with Rosa—an awkward contingency, since Rosa is manifestly
