- Emmett Clayton: Well, chess *is* the ultimate test of the human mind, isn't it?
- Tomlin Dudek: You think so? I always thought it was women.
- [last lines]
- Columbo: I'm sorry, Mr. Clayton, but along with all the other trivial evidence that we've talked about, the murderer in this case just had to be a deaf man.
- 2nd Reporter: Mr. Clayton, there's the world's most legendary chess genius, comes out of retirement just to play you, and you're not even curious enough...
- Emmett Clayton: Curiosity breeds sympathy, my friend, and sympathy is one emotion a champion can not afford on the night before the match.
- Columbo: [continuing to yell as he did when the trash compactor was on] It would be easier if I didn't have to yell! But for the damn machine!
- Emmett Clayton: Then turn the damn machine off!
- [starts to leave, stops and realizes the machine isn't running]
- Linda Robinson: He is despicable. He always was and he always will be. You'll beat him, Mr.Dudek. You will beat him at the only thing he really cares about.
- Columbo: Actually sir, from what I know about chess players, that is the important ones, they're sort of like geniuses, unpredictable and erratic.
- Mazoor Berozski: Lieutenant, I shall rely that your investigative imagination is... somewhat better than that of your underling.
- Columbo: Dentures, right? Dentures? Those are false teeth.
- Mazoor Berozski: Den...
- Columbo: Dentures.
- Mazoor Berozski: Dentures.
- Columbo: Now, he does wear false teeth, doesn't he? It seems that the ambulance driver found them.Well, I never had that problem yet myself but... I remember somebody mentioned toilet articles. Bear with me one second. Ah yes, here we are. Just an ordinary toothbrush. Now, it seems to me... you see, my grandfather, he wore dentures ever since he was 40. And as far as I can recall, he never used just an ordinary toothbrush.
- Columbo: Boy, you know my wife went to visit her mother for a few days, and it's like everything was waiting for her to leave so it could happen to me. First the kitchen sink and then the pilot light in the stove. I don't even know what a pilot light is. And this thing wakes me up at six a.m. scratching that ear.
- Mazoor Berozski: I am the coach to Tomlin Dudek.
- Columbo: Coach? You mean like a football team? Something like that? That kind of coach?
- Mazoor Berozski: It's hardly the same, Lieutenant.
- Proprietor: Well, all I know is I was... I was standing at the table pouring the wine, when the little, round gentleman with an accent, he pushed forward the salt, and this gentlemen pushed out the pepper, and pretty soon, they were pushing all the things on the table, and I didn't know what they were doing. Later on, I found out that they were playing chess. But I have never seen anything like that.