The Bishop murder case

Of all the criminal cases in which Philo Vance participated as an unofficial investigator, the most sinister, the most bizarre, the seemingly most incomprehensible, and certainl...

“Tut, tut!” Vance waved his hand airily. “That’s plagiarism. I said it first.” (He was striving to overcome his own sense of perplexity by a lightness of attitude.) “And now the...

When we reached the main hall Captain Dubois and Detective Bellamy, the finger-print experts from Headquarters, were just arriving. Detective Snitkin, who had evidently been wat...

Markham studied the man appraisingly. He was perhaps sixty years old. His features were markedly acromegalic; and this distortion extended to his entire figure. His hands were l...

Vance, after glancing at the strange message with its even stranger signature, reached for his monocle with that slow deliberation which I knew indicated a keen suppressed inter...

When we were again in the Dillard drawing-room and Miss Dillard had left us to rejoin her uncle in the library, Vance, without preliminaries, proceeded to the business in hand.

When we were again alone in the drawing-room Vance rose and, stretching himself, went to the window. The scene that had just been enacted, with its startling climax, had left us...

There is no need to recall here the nation-wide sensation caused by Robin’s murder. Every one remembers how that startling tragedy was featured in the country’s press. It was re...

Markham sat staring at Vance like a man hypnotized. Heath stood rigid, his mouth partly open, his cigar held a few inches from his lips. There was something almost comic in the...

It was shortly after two o’clock when we reached the Dillard house. Pyne answered our ring; and if our visit caused him any surprise he succeeded admirably in hiding it. In the...

“Even though you saw no one,” pursued Vance, “would it not have been possible for some member of the household to have gone out and returned without your knowing it?”

The following morning the front pages of the metropolitan press carried sensational stories which surpassed Markham’s worst fears. In addition to the _World_ two other leading m...

“It would be dangerous, madam,” he said, with impressive solemnity, “if what happened here last night became known. Should the person who played this joke on you find out that y...

As we walked slowly toward the Dillard house it was decided that immediate inquiries should be made regarding the whereabouts the night before of every person connected in any w...

This piece of news had a profound effect on Markham. As was his habit when agitated, he rose and began pacing back and forth, his hands clasped behind him. Heath, too, though sl...

After lunch at the Élysée Markham and Heath continued down-town. A hard afternoon lay before them. Markham’s routine work had accumulated; and the Sergeant, having taken on the...

When Heath had got rid of Quinan with promises such as would have gladdened any reporter’s heart,* there were several minutes of tense silence in the office. “The Bishop” had be...

When the doctor had straightened Mrs. Drukker’s body on the bed and covered it with a sheet, we returned down-stairs. Barstead took his departure at once after promising to send...

The professor was plainly perturbed when we entered the library that noon. He sat in an easy chair with his back to the window, a glass of his precious port on the table beside...

It was past one o’clock, and Markham, Vance and I rode to the Stuyvesant Club. Heath remained at the Drukker house to carry on the routine work, to draw up his report, and to de...

“Yes,” sighed Vance. “A sad and depressin’ world. Each step appears to tangle us a little more. And the amazin’ part of it is, the truth is staring us in the face; only, we can’...

The astounding news of Pardee’s death had a curiously disturbing effect on Vance. He stared at Markham unbelievingly. Then he rang hastily for Currie and ordered his clothes and...

Eight days went by. The Drukker funeral was held in the little house on 76th Street, attended only by the Dillards and Arnesson and a few men from the university who came to pay...

With this astounding revelation the Bishop murder case entered its final and most terrible phase. Heath had been informed of Vance’s discovery; and it was arranged that we shoul...

“She’s going to be all right,” he announced, sinking into a chair and lighting a cigarette. “She was only unconscious, had fainted from shock and fright; and she was half-suffoc...

When Markham and Vance and I departed from the Dillard house an hour later, I thought the Bishop affair was over. And it was over as far as the public was concerned. But there w...