# Identify this short story (excerpt?)? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [August 6, 2002, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522 "2002-08-06T01:52:33Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![chique](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@chique](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chique)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/1 "2002-08-06T01:52:33Z")
My memory of this is sketchy, at best, but maybe someone will recognize it… Two men (A and B) were walking down an alley when A says … something. I forget what. B amazed because, whatever A just said was EXACTLY what B was thinking at the moment. “However did you know I was thinking that?” says B. A goes off into a long, convoluted story about B kicking a cobblestone which got him thinking about this and then that and then the other and then the play they had just seen and then Orion (and here A says “And just at that moment you glanced up at the sky, so I knew you were thinking of Orion.”) and then yet another thing, all of which led up to the initial comment. For some reason I think this is Poe or A. C. Doyle. Any guesses? ---
**Author:** ![ndorward](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c2a13f/32.png) [@ndorward](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ndorward)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 5:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/2 "2002-08-06T05:21:30Z")
You’ve got a very, very distorted memory of the opening of a Holmes story–if I get a moment I’ll track down which one. Holmes & Watson are sitting in their quarters & Holmes breaks in on Watson’s train of reflection to make an uncanny reply to what he’s thinking, & then in response to Watson’s incredulity retraces his deductions. My recollection was that Holmes’s comment was something about the foolishness of nations’ settling quarrels by means of war. ---
**Author:** ![ndorward](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c2a13f/32.png) [@ndorward](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ndorward)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 5:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/3 "2002-08-06T05:25:57Z")
Found it. It’s the opening of “The Resident Patient”, in the _Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes_. ---
**Author:** ![MrVisible](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/46a35a/32.png) [@MrVisible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrVisible)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 5:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/4 "2002-08-06T05:31:32Z")
Amazing, **ndorward**. Simply amazing. However did you know that? ---
**Author:** ![chique](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@chique](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/chique)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 6:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/5 "2002-08-06T06:49:54Z")
**ndorward** …close, no cigar, but you’ve led me closer to the answer. I found _Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes_ online (I _love_ [The Gutenburg Project](http://promo.net/pg/index.html)…I should send them money). Paragraph eight: > [@](#): > > “You remember,” said he, “that some little time ago, when I read you **the passage in one of Poe’s sketches** , in which a close reasoner follows the unspoken thought of his companion, you were inclined to treat the matter as a mere tour de force of the author. On my remarking that I was constantly in the habit of doing the same thing you expressed incredulity.” I did say my memory was sketchy, but I clearly remember the reference to the constellation Orion. Now I have to go search Poe… Thanks for the lead 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 7:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/6 "2002-08-06T07:01:09Z")
It’s the narrator’s first recollections of Dupin in _Murder on the Rue Morgue_. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [August 6, 2002, 7:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/identify-this-short-story-excerpt/122522/7 "2002-08-06T07:07:51Z")
Now that I look it also has a **correct** title - _The Murders in the Rue Morgue_.