T undotted

'Who's getting all the stuff?'
'And "stuff" would be?'
'Evidence, reports, emails, everything. The ball of wax, remember?'
'Me. Well, I should say us.'
'I liked the first answer better, boss. Oh, by the way, remember "Nimue"?'
The mystery word...
'What about it?'
'I just found another reference to it. You want me to follow up?'
'Think we better. I don't want to leave any T undotted. So to speak."


Now I can finally get down to my question. Why didn't the boss say either 'I don't want to leave any T uncrossed' or 'i undotted?'
I didn't feel it was safe enough for me to assume that it's just a typo.

Um, could it be that the speaker really meant what he said?

Since the amount of ink to cross a "t" is very small, just slightly bigger than that needed to dot an "i", maybe our speaker sees such crossing process as being more or less the same thing as a dotting one.

That's just a conjecture. I'm inclined to think we really have a sort of typo there.

By the way, choose, where did you find that dialogue?

Quizzically,

Achab

Interesting.
"The Sleeping Doll" By Jeffery Deaver.

It's a joke. In this context, "So to speak" means "I realize it didn't say it correctly; I did that intentionally for humorous effect".

I'm not sure I understood the explanation by Another Guest, but it prompted me to think again.

Upon reading that dialogue again, and keeping in mind that we're dealing with a novel here, I think the author may have intentionally got his character merge the two expressions, "to not leave any I undotted" and "to not leave any T uncrossed."

By doing so, the author may have tried to convey some feeling, such as the fact that his character is carrying on the conversation while agitated, or that his character is a rather amusingly nerdy kind of person who tend to mix things up. Something like that.

The final "so to speak" is the way the character acknowledges the unintentionally humorous slip he made.

Is that what Another Guest means? If so, I think he's probably right. Maybe it's not a typo, but a deliberate wording done to bring about an effect. A joke, yes. But mind you, not from the part of the character, but from the part of the author. After all, would you ever deliberately say "I don't want to leave any T undotted" to sound witty?

With every good wish,

Achab