Slang phrase nigger inside the woodpile "a concealed motive or unidentified element impacting a predicament within an adverse way" [OED 1989] is attested by 1800; Thornton's "American Glossary" (1912) defines it as "A manner of accounting for that disappearance of gas," for this reason "an unsolved thriller.The slang time period "Niga" can be a hig