Replacing the receiver for the third time, Angela wondered if David had decided to play sleuth after all.

Professionals stay away from treating their own, so I, not Jonah's physician father, played sleuth to his assorted ailments.

Merely as the commissioner's friend, a man such as Cranston might have decided to play amateur sleuth.

"Hey, you want to play sleuth, develop a taste for the tedious stuff."

The chameleon quality that allows an actor in a mystery to play sleuth or villain with equal ease also takes a toll on his psyche.

If Nick is a flop playing sleuth, he's much more fun playing publisher.

After the initial response, Mr. Robertson said, he had to play sleuth for statuettes from the missing years.

Nighy plays the boozy actor and amateur sleuth investigating a real-life death, as it were, on the set of a television detective series.

But no, you had to play go-it-alone sleuth.

But nobody was in the mood to play sleuth at what was supposed to be a conference about the opportunities for American business in China.