This challenge was like a bomb.

"Not the same thing."

"Detective stories, bah!"

"Oh, I say, Rankin, that's literary melodrama."

Rankin, satisfied, smiled and winked victoriously over to Tommers, who
was listening from an adjacent table.

"Of course your suggestion is out of order, my dear man, to this
extent," said Quinny, who never surrendered, "in that I am talking of
fundamentals and you are citing details. Nevertheless, I could answer
that the situation you give, as well as the whole school it belongs to,
can be traced back to the commonest of human emotions, curiosity; and
that the story of Bluebeard and the Moonstone are to all purposes
identically the same."

At this Steingall, who had waited hopefully, gasped and made as though
to leave the table.

"I shall take up your contention," said Quinny without pause for breath,
"first, because you have opened up one of my pet topics, and, second,
because it gives me a chance to talk." He gave a sidelong glance at
Steingall and winked at De Gollyer. "What is the peculiar fascination
that the detective problem exercises over the human mind? You will say
curiosity. Yes and no. Admit at once that the whole art of a detective
story consists in the statement of the problem. Any one can do it. I can