Morgan looked embarrassed.
"Well," he said, "you see, to tell you the truth, I’m William Block Tournedos too. And I thoroughly agree with you. That's my graft."
"Graft?"
"Yes. They're written for the critics' benefit. You see, the critics, as differentiated from the reading public, are required to like any story that is probable. I discovered a long time ago the way to write a probable and real story. You must have (1) no action, (2) no atmosphere whatever — that's very important — (3) as few interesting characters as possible, (4) absolutely no digressions, and (5) above all things, no deduction. Digressions are the curse of probability… which is a funny way of looking at life in general; and the detective may uncover all he can, so long as he never deduces anything. Observe those rules, my children; then you may outrage real probability as much as you like, and the critics will call it ingenious."
"Hooray!" said Madeleine, and took another drink.
Patricia said: "You've whipped your hobbyhorse to death, Hank. Go back to the problem… Why couldn't this be a story; I mean, from your own preferences in stories?"
Morgan grinned, getting his breath. It could," he admitted, "up to and including the time of the murder. After that…" He scowled.
A sharp premonition made Hugh look up. He remembered that this was the person who had told them to look for the buttonhook.
"What do you mean, after that?"
"I don't think the American is guilty. And," said Morgan, "of all the motiveless and unenterprising sluggards to gather up as suspects, the rest of us are the worst! At least, in a crime story, you get a lot of motives and plenty of suspicious behavior. You have a quarrel overheard by the butler, and somebody threatening to kill somebody, and somebody else sneaking out to bury a blood-stained handkerchief in the flower bed… But here we've nothing of the kind.