false clue
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Ackroyd equates a MacGuffin with a red herring, which means almost the opposite: a false clue.
From Washington Post • Oct. 19, 2016
You may think the scene is some kind of a MacGuffin, a false clue, but it isn't.
From Seattle Times • Jun. 29, 2012
That, too, could be a false clue, since everything Nicholson does can be attributed to psychosis, to a weakened mind placed under intolerable pressure by isolation.
From Time Magazine Archive
One of them conceived the idea of tossing his clothes upon the sea-beach to establish a false clue of drowning, until they could decide what was to be done with him.
From Average Jones by Adams, Samuel Hopkins
Those men sometimes betray secrets committed to their keeping, and work up a false clue rather than have it supposed they are not earning their money.
From Struggling Upward, or Luke Larkin's Luck by Alger, Horatio
