"You see, my dear Watson"-he propped8 his test-tube in the rack and began to lecture with the air of a professor addressing his class-"it is not really difficult to construct a series of inferences, each dependent upon its predecessor9 and each simple in itself. If, after doing so, one simply knocks out all the central inferences and presents one's audience with the starting-point and the conclusion, one may produce a startling, though possibly a meretricious11, effect. Now, it was not really difficult, by an inspection12 of the groove13 between your left forefinger14 and thumb, to feel sure that you did not propose to invest your small capital in the goldfields."