De Gustibus Non Desputandum Es
On Matters Of Opinion There Can Be No Debate

"Beagle." Ellery glared. "Beagle... Of course. Of course. No other possibility. None whatever. If I'd had the brain of a wood louse... Beagle, Laurel, beagle!" And he swept her off her feet and planted five kisses on the top of her wet head. Then he tossed her on her unmade bed and before her horrified eyes went into a fast tap - an accomplishment which was one of his most sacred secrets, unknown even to his father. And Ellery chanted, "Merci, my pretty one, my she-detective. You have follow ze clue of ze ar-sen-ique, of ze little frog, of ze wallette, of ze eversing but ze sing you know all ze time - zat is to say, ze beagle. Oh, ze beagle!" And he changed to a softshoe.

"But what's the breed of dog got to do with anything, Ellery?" moaned Laurel. "The only connection I can see with the word 'beagle' is its slang meaning. Isn't a 'beagle' a detective?"

"Ironic, isn't it?" chortled Ellery; and he exited doing a Shuffle-Off-to-Buffalo, blowing farewell kisses and almost breaking the prominent nose of Mrs. Monk, Laurel's housekeeper, who had it pressed in absolute terror to the bedroom door.

-The Origin of Evil, Ellery Queen

There was a smell of Time in the air tonight. He smiled and turned the fancy in his mind. There was a thought. What did Time smell like? Like dust and clocks and people. And if you wondered what Time sounded like it sounded like water running in a dark cave and voices crying and dirt dropping down upon hollow box lids, and rain. And, going further, what did Time look like? Time looked like snow dropping silently into a black room or it looked like a silent film in an ancient theater, down and down into nothing. That was how Time smelled and looked and sounded. And tonight - Tomás shoved a hand into the wind outside the truck - tonight you could almost touch Time.

-The Martian Chronicles, Ray Bradbury