"Absently" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... Nora (absently). Maybe. (HELMER takes a bunch of keys out of his pocket and goes into the hall.) Torvald! what are you ...
— A Doll's House • Henrik Ibsen
... her feet, and absently put her letter to her fiance—which contained merely the sentence that they had arrived in Rome—into its envelope ...
— The Point of View • Elinor Glyn
... lest her mother discover her frivolity and lecture her long,—and, worse still, make her wet a comb and take all of the curl out. A loose strand blew across her tanned cheek, so that she reached up absently and tucked it behind her ear, where it would not stay ...
— Rim o' the World • B. M. Bower
... the caller, absently. "He is, certainly. A man's reputation for a little gaiety oughtn't to make a great difference to married people, of course. It's where young girls are in question. THEN it may be very, very dangerous. There are a great many things safe and proper for married ...
— The Turmoil - A Novel • Booth Tarkington
... the elephants mingled with the incessant clamour of the band. And back of all this, pointing upward in mute protest, rose a solemn church spire, white and majestic against a vast panorama of blue, moonlit hills, that encircled the whole lurid picture. Jim's eyes turned absently toward the church as he sat fumbling with the lock of ...
— Polly of the Circus • Margaret Mayo
... after "Sex" the words "She is probably feminine"; looked at him absently, glanced at what she had written, flushed a little, rubbed out the "she is probably," wondering why a moment's mental wandering should have committed her ...
— The Tracer of Lost Persons • Robert W. Chambers
... Miss Field had taken pity on what would otherwise have been solitary confinement, and that now it was time to dress. Meadows kissed her absently, and, with his head evidently still full of his walk, went to his dressing-room. When he reappeared, it was to find Doris attired in a little black gown, with which he was already too familiar. She saw at once the dissatisfaction in ...
— A Great Success • Mrs Humphry Ward
... Hollywood—?" Peter took the daffodils and began absently crumpling the waxed paper around them. His eyes, when he looked into the doctor's face, were very ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... strolled into the rotunda, where he gazed absently at the Washington statue and the Lafayette bust, although he saw neither. Conscious of a feeling of jealousy, he began to wish ill to the clever Secretary. "What business can she have with a man like ...
— Before the Dawn - A Story of the Fall of Richmond • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... not wanting to go to school," said Nance. Then she added absently, "Say, he's got to be a awful ...
— Calvary Alley • Alice Hegan Rice
... He looked from Reuben to Perez, whose face as he gazed absently at the coals on the hearth still wore the smile which had attracted his attention. This seemed to decide him, for as he turned again to Reub, ...
— The Duke of Stockbridge • Edward Bellamy
... Farwell laughed absently; his eyes were fixed on the water. Even in the Channel it had an angry look. The current was set from the Bay, and the stream rose and fell as if it had an ugly secret ...
— The Place Beyond the Winds • Harriet T. Comstock
... significance in the unconsidered speech than he had intended. The girl looked absently straight in front of her; he sat motionless, uncomfortable at his own words, but too wise to attempt to modify them by ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... silent, and began to pick three long stems of grass and braid them together. Lois sat absently twisting the fringe on one end of the soft scarf of yellow crepe, which was knotted across her bosom, and fell almost to the hem ...
— John Ward, Preacher • Margaret Deland
... little Chelwoods was ever a quarter as pretty as that gypsy child, even when they were babies," continued his wife gazing absently at the rose, "and now they're ...
— A Pair of Clogs • Amy Walton
... that donkey he shifted angrily in his chair and his foot struck a bit of paper upon the floor. It rustled and the rustle attracted his attention. Absently he stepped and picked up the paper. It was the slip which had fallen from the Cabot, Bancroft and Cabot letter and was a check drawn to his order for fourteen thousand, three hundred and ten dollars and thirty-eight cents, his share of the ...
— Galusha the Magnificent • Joseph C. Lincoln
... thing. He bowed, a trifle absently, and passed within a few feet of them—near enough for ...
— The Cricket • Marjorie Cooke
... Emagudu, The Home of the Dead," the Zulu replied absently, for he was looking towards the kraal of Nanea, which was situated at an hour's walk away over the ridge to ...
— Black Heart and White Heart • H. Rider Haggard
... Francis had made any concessions in her appearance in deference to the committee, for she looked as though she had come straight from her kitchen, a suspicion strengthened by the strand of grass she carried in her fingers and played with absently throughout. She appeared quite at home as she settled herself in the chair, scanning with the greatest interest the faces of the committeemen as if she were memorizing each ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... brother's half languid gait, that told of bodily strength impaired by disuse, had become in the elder an impatient elasticity as if he moved on springs. His thoughts were clearly elsewhere; his eyes wandered absently to and fro, and his pre-occupation was obvious enough to me later on, when I offered him my card and reminded ...
— Captain Mansana and Mother's Hands • Bjoernstjerne Bjoernson
... evolutions absently. His heart was ill-attuned to dances. But the thing had to be done, so it was as well to get it over. When the last movement had been completed, he raised ...
— The Swoop! or How Clarence Saved England - A Tale of the Great Invasion • P. G. Wodehouse
... absently, "no one could regret more profoundly than the Grand Duke any accident or fatality which might befall his royal kinsman, yet even the holy saints cannot prevent evil chances!" He paused to sip his coffee. ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... the withered sedge, all frost-covered!" said Rotha in her happiness, tripping up to his side, with a sprig newly plucked in her hand. Ralph answered her absently, and she rattled on to herself, "Rotha shall keep you, beautiful sedge! How you glisten in the moonlight!" Then the girl broke out with a snatch of ...
— The Shadow of a Crime - A Cumbrian Romance • Hall Caine
... her somewhat absently. She was amazed and impatient at her early return. Had an hour really gone by since she had fled from the ball-room? However, to satisfy the child, who seemed uneasy, she told her that she had felt ...
— A Love Episode • Emile Zola
... said Mrs. Honeychurch absently. "But isn't it intolerable that a person whom we're told to imitate should go round spreading slander? It was, I believe, chiefly owing to him that the old man was dropped. People pretended he was vulgar, ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster
... my question on this head somewhat absently, for he evidently was debating within himself some very serious matter; but his answer was of a sort that Young found entirely satisfactory. In the heart of the city, he said, was the Treasure-house ...
— The Aztec Treasure-House • Thomas Allibone Janvier
... "Oh," said Audrey, absently, "have you, granny?" She was not deeply interested, and at that moment one of her schoolfellows went by with a new hat on, a light blue one, with a white 'bottle-brush' bobbing about on it, and she found that much more absorbing. "How is mother?" she asked, when the 'bottle-brush' ...
— Anxious Audrey • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... her side, looking sadly and wistfully at the dancers. At the end of the dance, the girls pick up their baskets and go off in different directions across the green. SUSAN and her GRANDMOTHER remain in their places. The gipsy continues to smoke and SUSAN absently turns over the ...
— Six Plays • Florence Henrietta Darwin
... gyringa-bush at the house corner, sat a little woman with a small, pale face, the still attractive features perceptibly sharpened by years, of which the half-gray hair bore further testimony. The eyes, just now fixed absently upon the dusking landscape, were light gray and a little faded, while around the lips there were crow's-feet, especially when they were pressed together, as now, in an unsatisfied, almost pathetic look, evidently habitual to her face when in repose. There was withal something ...
— A Summer Evening's Dream - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... eyebrows as if trying to recall something, and absently began to pull the knife out of his pocket. Augustus was ...
— The Reflections of Ambrosine - A Novel • Elinor Glyn
... Millar nodded absently and barely replied to Herman's cordial greeting. He was still enraged at the interruption which had prevented the success of his infamous plan. Herman turned quickly to Karl ...
— The Devil - A Tragedy of the Heart and Conscience • Joseph O'Brien
... repeated Lumley, absently; "well, I will go and present myself. I see she is growing tired of the signor. I will sound her as to the ...
— Ernest Maltravers, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... criticism as well as those of his great English contemporary. 'In dealing', observes Mr. Lane-Poole, 'with the difficulties arising in the Government of a peculiarly heterogeneous empire, he stands absently supreme among Oriental sovereigns, and may even challenge comparison with ...
— Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official • William Sleeman
... He spoke absently, in a low voice, as though talking to some person whom Tony could not see, and the boy was silent a minute ...
— Alone In London • Hesba Stretton
... replied she absently. "It was the fault of my training. Ever since I can remember I've been taught to be on my guard, lest the men shouldn't like me." In her new freedom she looked back tranquilly upon the struggle she ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... might be so amended as to be more temperately diabolical; but please to remember that the gentle agonies with which we afflict you are wholesome and exhilarating compared with the ills we ladle out to one another. During the reign of His Pellucid Refulgence, Khatchoo Khan," he continued, absently dropping his wriggling auditor into the brook, "no less than three hundred thousand Persian subjects were put to death, in a pleasing variety of ingenious ways, ...
— Cobwebs From an Empty Skull • Ambrose Bierce (AKA: Dod Grile)
... late afternoon, Jerry trotted aft, after having administered another lesson to the wild-dog, and found Skipper seated on the deck, back against the low rail, knees drawn up, and gazing absently off to leeward. Jerry sniffed his bare calf—not that he needed to identify it, but just because he liked to, and in a sort of friendly greeting. But Van Horn took no notice, continuing to stare out across the sea. Nor was he aware of ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... not one of our people. She would be just adorable then. Don't you think so, Hesden?" she said aloud as her son entered. Having been informed of the subject of her cogitations, Mr. Hesden Le Moyne replied, somewhat absently and irrelevantly, as ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee
... heart and mind, and they chattered as gaily and irresponsibly as children. But when supper was over, and they settled themselves in the little sitting-room, a curious constraint fell upon them both. She sat stroking the kitten, which had curled up beside her, while he gazed absently at the rosy gleam of the glowing coals behind the isinglass door of the little stove, and for a long time there was ...
— The Crevice • William John Burns and Isabel Ostrander
... interesting," the lady replied absently; but the next moment, inspired by a hidden thought, she added with quickened interest, "Please don't think me inquisitive, but how can a fortune be made out of a thing like mustard? People take so little ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, January 5, 1916 • Various
... I'm disappointed in that girl," declared Peggy, absently smoothing out the crumpled paper. Her bright face was clouded. "Wednesday she was just as interested and ambitious as she could be. And now she's given up. It doesn't ...
— Peggy Raymond's Vacation - or Friendly Terrace Transplanted • Harriet L. (Harriet Lummis) Smith
... the girl, absently. There were so many "points" upon which the old gentlewoman insisted that some of them fell on unheeding ears. At present, she was conscious only of two things: she must either remain alone behind in ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... for Geneva before the night-express. Lynde lighted the cigar which he had been unconsciously holding between his fingers all this while, and on the plea of cashing a draft at a banker's left the two gentlemen together. He wandered absently into the Place de la Concorde, crossed the crowded bridge there, and plunged into the narrow streets of the Latin Quarter. Finding his way back after an hour or so to the other bank of the Seine, he seated himself on ...
— The Queen of Sheba & My Cousin the Colonel • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... returned Marjorie absently. Her mind was still on her discovery. Should she tell Captain about it? Perhaps it would be best. Briefly she acquainted her mother with what she had ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... 1698. Richardo Powell Armiger Thesaurar." The words, set in four panels, which formed a frieze beneath the pediment of a fine brick portico, summarised the history of one of the tall houses at the upper end of King's Bench Walk and as I, somewhat absently, read over the inscription, my attention was divided between admiration of the exquisitely finished carved brickwork and the quiet dignity of the building, and an effort to reconstitute the dead and ...
— The Red Thumb Mark • R. Austin Freeman
... getting well paid for her work. Yet, he was perpetually in debt, and his wages were always overdrawn. Whenever I came into the office after my two-o'clock lunch, and found him seated on his wooden chair, in the corner, gazing absently out at the dingy chimneys opposite—apparently too abstracted to observe my entrance, I knew I had only to go to my desk to find, placed in a conspicuous position thereon, a very small, dirty bit of paper, with these words laboriously inscribed upon it: "Mr. Dunkin Sir ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 6 • Various
... absently. His slender fingers were patting the velvet nose of the stallion and he was talking to it in an affectionate undertone—meaningless words, perhaps, such as a mother uses to soothe a child. When Strann set his foot in the stirrup and gathered up the reins the black horse cringed ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... And how beautiful, too, were his drawings! The more Gabriel thought of it the more indignant he grew. Indeed, he did not half-enjoy the bread and savoury soup made of black beans, that the cook dished out for him; he took his wooden bowl, and sitting on a bench, ate absently, thinking all the while of ...
— Gabriel and the Hour Book • Evaleen Stein
... She absently allowed him to lead her a few steps; then, with another look full of tender pity and regret at his agitated face, she extricated herself from his embrace and walked rapidly to the door. Quickening her steps to escape his pursuing grasp, she pushed through the ...
— Duffels • Edward Eggleston
... dragged up a chair and sat straddled across it, his arms on the back, looking at her with ardent eyes. She kept her own averted. She seemed to find it hard to begin what it was she wanted to say. She stood beside the dressing-table absently fingering the trinkets lying there. Among them was a portrait of Challoner in a silver frame. The pictured eyes seemed to be watching her as she stood trying to avoid the human ones. With sudden ...
— The Second Honeymoon • Ruby M. Ayres
... Mrs. Fenelby, absently, for she was busy with Bobberts. "How much is ten per cent. of twenty-five hundred ...
— The Cheerful Smugglers • Ellis Parker Butler
... Winton nodded absently. It was one of his minor fads to ignore his lineage, which ran decently back to a Colonial governor on his father's side, and to assert that he did not know his grandfather's middle name—which was accounted for by the very simple fact that the elder ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde
... He looked absently at the sealed envelope, his handsome blond features thoughtful. The House of Plantagenet had endured for eight centuries, and the blood of Henry of Anjou ran thin in its veins, but the Norman strain was as strong as ever, having ...
— The Eyes Have It • Gordon Randall Garrett
... private desk-rooms in the rear, one of them labeled "President" in inconspicuous gilt lettering. Entering, with less assurance than if he had been the humblest of place-seekers out of a job, Ford was almost relieved to find only a closed desk, and a young man absently scanning ...
— Empire Builders • Francis Lynde
... somewhat absently. He put out his huge foot and pushed the ground-glass door shut between his little den and the book-keepers, ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... again, too, with a vague sensation of familiarity with it, or with the book, or something somehow connected with it, he could not tell exactly what; but a slightly uncomfortable feeling remained as he laid aside the book and stood with brows knitted and eyes absently ...
— Blue-Bird Weather • Robert W. Chambers
... flaring at the corners. There was Christmas in the very air and Christmas in the storekeeper's till. It had been a very busy day. He thought of it with a satisfied nod as he stood a moment breathing the brisk air of the winter day, absently fingering the coupon the girl had paid for the shawl. A thin voice at his elbow said: "Merry Christmas, ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... edge of the water," his mother said absently, while she tried to fold an organdie gown to ...
— Phebe, Her Profession - A Sequel to Teddy: Her Book • Anna Chapin Ray
... looking with his dreamy smile through the window, across which the shadows of the autumn trees flitted and played. Listlessly he took up a pen, nibbed the feather with his old odd smile, and began to scrawl absently on the sheet of paper ...
— The Last of the Foresters • John Esten Cooke
... acknowledged absently. Then he continued his explanation. "Fortunately, there was a small body of information on extra-rational mental faculties that had been developed over the past century, and as soon as we expanded it sufficiently, ...
— Shock Absorber • E.G. von Wald
... surprisedly. "How you did startle me! Why, where did you come from? Yessir!" and he deftly manoeuvered so as to catch a glimpse of the bar over Cassidy's shoulder. "You surely startled me bad. Excuse me," he murmured absently; ...
— McClure's Magazine, Vol. 31, No. 1, May 1908 • Various
... mornings or afternoons, taking trunks out or putting them in. With the trunks set into the corridors and opened for them, they would spend the hours looking the contents over, talking to their neighbors, or rapt in long silences when they hesitated with things held off or up, and, after gazing absently at them, putting them back again. Sometimes they varied the process by laying things aside for sending home, and receipting for them at the office as ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells
... the direction of her sleepy eyes, and saw that both Miss Lee and Hilda appeared to be put out. The former was talking absently to Mr. Bellamy, and glancing continually in the direction of that gentleman's wife. The latter, too, whilst appearing to listen to some compliment from George, was gazing at Mrs. Bellamy with a curious look of dislike and apprehension ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... absently, putting on a little more pressure. Trigger hushed resignedly. They watched. In about a minute, the gliding thing reached the edge of the table. Trigger gathered herself to duck out from under Mantelish's hands and go flying out of the chair if it looked as if the plasmoid was ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... the scholars of the whole class in such consternation that they all wistfully and absently ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... the meaning of the move until they were actually on the polished dancing-floor. Owing to the darkness of the December afternoon, the large empty room was lit up as brilliantly as at night. For a minute they stood on the threshold, looking absently at the palms grouped in the corners and the garlands festooning the walls. It was only then that Pruyn saw the motive of her coming; and for an instant he forgot his worry in the perception that this woman had ...
— The Inner Shrine • Basil King
... would have talked after that, but she did not. When I spoke to her once or twice she answered absently; and presently she forgot me altogether, and began ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... head to come over and hear some more, for herself, you will not take it amiss? It will be for love of the child." Then, as a correction to what might have seemed a stint of courtesy:—"And for the pleasure of a visit to you, ma'am." Said old Maisie absently:—"I hope she will." And then Widow Thrale saw that all this talking had been quite ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... dissolved in a carefree radiance. At work, she mixed up her faultless card catalogues and laughed at her mistakes. Once, during our busy hours of distribution, we caught her blithely granting the request of fat Mere Copillet for a cook stove and thereupon absently presenting that jovial dame with a pair of sabots, much too small for her portly foot, to the amusement of all the good wives gathered in the Red Cross office. They laughed loudly in a sympathetic crowd, and Mademoiselle Gaston laughed also, and they loved her more than ...
— Where the Sabots Clatter Again • Katherine Shortall
... to the alcove, from the alcove to the room, as if he had lost his way, gazed absently out of the window and lay down on the bench, feeling all the more miserable because no one ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... before, sits on the bench, leaning his arms on the table. His hat lies before him. He gazes absently and immovably ...
— Little Eyolf • Henrik Ibsen
... studying the many curios. Occasionally Grumbach wiped his forehead, and, absently, the inner rim of his hat. Perhaps the three of them waited twenty minutes; then the chancellor came in. He bowed cordially and drew chairs about his desk. He placed Grumbach in the full glare of the lamp. Carmichael ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath
... did?" Madame Carter amended the title as if absently. "Mrs. Carter," she added, with a glance toward the near-by group in whose centre they could see the cream-coloured gown with its pink poppies, "told me that she was surprised to see that you had- -had ...
— Harriet and the Piper - (Norris Volume XI) • Kathleen Norris
... her hat and an orchid on her white coat. Mrs. Hastings, taking no more account of her presence than she had of St. George's, tilted back her head and looked at the primroses in the window as closely as at anything, and absently presented him. ...
— Romance Island • Zona Gale
... excitable, Pocahontas assented absently; she was bracing her will, and steeling her nerves to endure without flinching. Not for worlds would she—even by the quivering of an eyelash—let Norma see the torture she was inflicting. She felt that Norma had ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... his helmet absently. If they could blast out of the orbit and drive into the sun.... He estimated the result. A few miles per second of less speed would let them be pulled so far within the sun's field of gravity that, within an hour or so, small boats would ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... walked up leisurely; the girl had relinquished the bridle and was guiding the mare with the slightest pressure of knee and heel. She sat at ease, head lowered, absently retying the ribbon on the hair at her neck. When it was adjusted to her satisfaction she passed a hat-pin through her sombrero, touched the bright, thick hair above her forehead, straightened out, stretching her legs in the stirrups. ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... said absently. "No, we have all the time in the world. There's no scandal possible in being out motoring with your husband, even if you ...
— I've Married Marjorie • Margaret Widdemer
... little one's hand, which nestled confidingly in mine, and said, half absently, "And she never ...
— Emerson's Wife and Other Western Stories • Florence Finch Kelly
... should," she said slowly, with something very like a sigh. "He was the only man I ever knew who made me do what I did not want to do and made me wish to be something better than I was," she added absently. ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... Mister Ford 'e kept 'is room. Was it?—would there be—? "Well, an' therr's an 'arvest bug; 'tis some earrly for they!" Wonderful how she pounces on all such creatures, when I can't even see them. She pressed it absently between finger and thumb, and began manoeuvring round another way. Long before she had reached her point, we had gulped down our coffee, and departed. But as we rode out she came at a run, holding her skirts high with either hand, raised her old eyes bright ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... absently. Then, to the spare man at the head of the table: "I have been next door, talking to the American Secretary of War. A dull fellow. Convinced, is he, that Arvania harbors only kind thoughts for this great stupid nation. They ...
— The Radiant Shell • Paul Ernst
... that pleasure,' said little Felix, bowing again, and absently taking up a bottle which lay ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... absently. It seemed to be a habit with him, probably to cover up his thinking-time. Finally he said, "Hammond, you're clean. As soon as I identified you I took a dig of your folder at headquarters. You're a bit rough and fast on that prehistoric cannon of ...
— Stop Look and Dig • George O. Smith
... at the watch on her wrist, compared it with the splendid Empire clock on the mantelpiece, and went with a bewildered look to the telephone on her writing-desk. Having gone through a considerable amount of torture by calling up the wrong number and absently ringing off as soon as she had got the right one, she at last found ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... appear to understand the scheme of the loan; but he takes the money, and is quite stunned by his good fortune. He thanks me absently, and goes and shows the piece to the guards, with a smile that illumines and transfigures his whole person. At Bologna, he has come to his senses; he loads me with blessings, he is ready to weep; he reverences me, he wishes me a good voyage, endless prosperity, ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... table with eyes absently fixed, going over in his mind the conversation that had just passed, recalling the leisurely, supercilious tones, the semi-ironical kindness with which his brother had revealed the situation. Why had he troubled himself to do so? ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... remind the little lady of what her letter had promised. She told Miss Black about the other children's godmothers, and how lucky the others thought she was to have a godmother alive and in Ireland. Miss Black patted her hand absently, and gazed round ...
— The Weans at Rowallan • Kathleen Fitzpatrick
... interfere in what does not concern him?" said she, angrily, turning her head away. She stood a moment in thought, absently pushing forward the roll of linen with her foot. Then, shrugging her shoulders and raising her head, she said slowly, while ...
— A Woodland Queen, Complete • Andre Theuriet
... Aubrey stood absently fingering the pattern on the wallpaper. He suddenly experienced a great craving for a pipe, but felt that the etiquette of the situation hardly permitted him ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... repeated Panna mechanically, absently, as if the words which she slowly uttered belonged to an unknown, incomprehensible language. She stared at the gardener with dilated eyes, and her lips moved without emitting any sound. At last, however, understanding of the present returned, and the words escaped with ...
— How Women Love - (Soul Analysis) • Max Simon Nordau
... she gave him absently her customary answer. He pointed to a great striped tent of red and white linen, adorned with fluttering streamers and guarded by more sentries in shining mail; and she rode ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... anything!" she answered, with a child's puzzled laugh. "I stick to my bond, I dress and talk and eat and go about- -" Her voice dropped; she stared absently at the table. ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... with the thrill of anticipation, leaped on a gun carriage and absently whistled a shrill medley, beginning with "Yaka-hula," and ending with "Just a Song at Twilight." There was food for thought in the progress of his efforts from the frivolous to the pensive, but there was little time for such thoughts. ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons
... at the rooms of Naroumoff, of the Horse Guards. The long winter night passed away imperceptibly, and it was five o'clock in the morning before the company sat down to supper. Those who had won ate with a good appetite; the others sat staring absently at their empty plates. When the champagne appeared, however, the conversation became more animated, and all ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... to Miss Davis at the school-room fireside. Phyllis and Nell were in the drawing-room with their mother. Miss Davis was netting energetically, and Hetty, who had been studying busily, dropped her book and was gazing absently into the fire. ...
— Hetty Gray - Nobody's Bairn • Rosa Mulholland
... came in while Romayne was speaking. He went through the ceremonies of introduction to the master of Vange Abbey with perfect politeness, but a little absently. His mind was bent on putting his suspicion of Stella to the test of confirmation. Not waiting to be presented, he turned to her with the air of fatherly interest and chastened admiration which he well knew how to assume ...
— The Black Robe • Wilkie Collins
... credit if he had succeeded in eliciting them? What could I know, indeed? I sit on my little stool and sometimes there are great people who give me their hands, and they are thoughtful. And sometimes I ask questions and they answer me absently, because, after all, what does it matter?—a manicurist from the shop downstairs, earning her thirty shillings a week, and anxious to be agreeable for the sake of her tip! And then sometimes while I am there they dictate letters, or a caller comes, or the telephone rings. One does not think ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... not a conscious falsehood, but just a word or two of political patter, dropped automatically, absently. In truth, Mr. Bamberger, possessed by his inspiration, was wondering why the deuce it had never occurred to him until this moment. Still more curious, too, that it had never occurred to his brother Isidore! This Isidore, after ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... the center scratched absently at its stomach with a furry paw and he lowered the bow, feeling a little foolish at having bothered to raise it against animals so ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin
... absently. He had the papers in his hand, and was running them over. Both men were pulling at their cigars with strong puffs, and the room was so vaporous with smoke that Steering was beginning to see very clearly ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young
... his gaze, she absently jogged the carriage while the baby slept, and Arthur, holding Danvers' hand, waited ...
— A Man of Two Countries • Alice Harriman
... Absently he sipped the hot water, almost afraid to ask a question. Then, just because of his inner fears, he forced out ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton
... to the rector. The double suffering of certain and uncertain sorrow had begun to shake the strong man. The butler looked at him wonderingly, as he threw himself on a bench in the passage and stared absently at the clock on the opposite wall. The master had somebody with him, he said, but he heard the study door open—the stranger seemed to be coming out, and as Adam was in a hurry, he would let the master know ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot
... Miss Schuyler, absently; adding, to one of her maids, "Take care of that afghan; wrap it in an old linen sheet; it was knitted by a very dear friend, and I do not want it moth-eaten; I had rather lose a camel's-hair shawl." Which evidence or regard seemed very extravagant to the girl who was obeying instructions, ...
— Prince Lazybones and Other Stories • Mrs. W. J. Hays
... board with mingled affection and ignominy. None of the Canadians seemed amused by this; they regarded it with serious composure as a fitting decorum, and Mr. Arbuton had no comment to make upon it. But at the first embrace bestowed upon the horse by the grooms the colonel said absently, "Ah! long-lost brother," and Kitty laughed; and as the scruples of each brute were successively overcome, she helped to give some grotesque interpretation to the various scenes of the melodrama, while Mr. Arbuton stood beside her, and sheltered her with his umbrella; and a spice of malice ...
— A Chance Acquaintance • W. D. Howells
... "Yeah." Cash meditated, absently eyeing the burros. "Where it's green." He looked at the near hills, and at the desert, and at the dreary march of the starved animals. "It's a long way to green country," ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... you both, I'm sure," said Adelaide absently. The Chicago express would be getting in at four o'clock—about five hours. Absurd! The morning papers said Mr. Whitney had had a relapse. "Very noble," she repeated absently. "But I doubt if anybody ...
— The Second Generation • David Graham Phillips
... his teeth together, which was a symptom it were well for the other to recognize but did not. Then Andy smiled, which was another symptom. He fingered the spur absently, laid it down and reached, with the gesture that betrays the act as having become second nature, for ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... minutes she racked her brain, unable to place the incident. Then, her eyes falling absently upon the newspaper once more, the last word of the paragraph suddenly unlocked the ...
— The Splendid Folly • Margaret Pedler
... near the window. He turned absently and looked out, down into the busy street. There he saw something which caused him intense surprise, though he did not show it; for, like any man of strong purpose, his face had but one expression, and that of thoughtful attention. He saw Captain Cable, of the Minnie, ...
— The Vultures • Henry Seton Merriman
... carefully on a projecting beam and looked about him, smiling. A cat leaped down from the turkey-red lounge and came across, rubbing his legs. He bent and stroked her absently. ...
— Uncle William - The Man Who Was Shif'less • Jennette Lee
... about it," said Giovanni, absently. "After all, I do not wonder—it is amazing that I should have recognised her at all. I should forget anything to-night, except that I am to ...
— Saracinesca • F. Marion Crawford
... eye, ranging the Night, From its big circling ever absently Returns, thou large, low star, to fix on thee. Maria! Star? No star; a Light, a Light! Wouldst leap ashore, Heart? Yonder burns a Light! 'Pedro Gutierrez, wake! come up to me. I prithee stand and gaze about the sea; What seest?' 'Admiral, like as land—a Light!' 'Well, Sanchez ...
— Christopher Columbus and His Monument Columbia • Various
... details Knightley remarked. He laid down his fork, he rested his elbow on the table, his forehead upon his hand. Then absently he began to hum over to himself a tune. The rhythm of it was somehow familiar to the Surgeon's ears. Where had he heard it before? Then with a start he remembered. It was this very rhythm, that very tune, which Scrope's fingers ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... "Thanks," Plemponi said absently. "Always doing that. Confusing them...." He dropped the tray where it belonged, shoved his hands into the chef's cleaning recess and waved them around, then came back, still looking absent-minded, ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... was deeply absorbed in some scientific subject when the nurse announced the arrival of a boy. "What—who?" stammered the professor absently. "Why interrupt me—isn't my wife ...
— Jokes For All Occasions - Selected and Edited by One of America's Foremost Public Speakers • Anonymous
... dived absently into his coat pockets. "We'll miss that train as sure as—— Where in the nation's that pipe o' mine got to?" He rummaged despairingly. "Oh, I forgot! Susan Winters said I wasn't to take it, for fear the smoke might be bad ...
— Treasure Valley • Marian Keith
... do do it,' said Anthea, absently beginning to build a card-house for the Lamb—'mixing up what you're saying, I mean. We ought to practise doing it so as to be ready for mysterious occasions. We're talking about THAT,' she said to Jane and Robert, frowning, and ...
— The Phoenix and the Carpet • E. Nesbit
... tried to pull her tail, which stuck out from her little gold-laced garibaldi. [Footnote: Garibaldi: a jacket which took its name from its likeness in shape to the red shirt worn by the Italian patriot Garibaldi.] To me she was always very amiable; confidently she laid her wrinkled hand in mine and absently she accepted the little attentions I was able to offer her. She was very fond of sweetmeats, and burnt almonds were, in her opinion, the most delectable ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... and air of superb disdain was as august as a goddess. Florrie, moving backwards, had now got nearly to the scullery door with her wringing and splashing and wiping; and she had dirtied even her face. As Hilda absently looked at her, she thought somehow of Mr. Cannon's white wristbands. She saw the washing and the ironing of those wristbands, and a slatternly woman or two sighing and grumbling amid wreaths of steam, and a background of cinders and suds ...
— Hilda Lessways • Arnold Bennett
... off to bed early, saying "good-night everybody" rather absently. She climbed up the stairs wearily. When her mother slipped away from the others, having started the victrola and urged them to dancing, she found Gloria ready for bed but standing before her window, looking out at the first ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... thousand pardons," he said to the hostess absently. "It is a great pleasure to be here,—somehow I thought I knew that man. I am sure ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... time, I mused, absently. 'Yesterday—' I stopped, suddenly. Yesterday! There was no yesterday. The yesterday of which I spoke had been swallowed up in the abyss of years, ages gone. I grew ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson
... tarried in his pacing by the window; with hands clasped behind him he was looking absently out upon the driven snow. Upon his face was an expression which Susannah only sometimes saw, and that in the moments which she felt to be his best. She believed this man to have true moments of humility and high resolve; it was only a question with her how far ...
— The Mormon Prophet • Lily Dougall
... pretty," agreed Lucy, absently. In her mind she was wondering how she could find the money for all these ...
— The Making of Mona • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... number?' he said. Lawford was gazing gloomily into the fire. 'Oh, Annandale,' he replied absently. 'I don't know ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... in the morning, when Robert went to bed, and he slept very late. Willet awoke shortly after dawn, dressed himself and went to the window, where he stood, gazing absently at the deepening sunlight on the green hills, although he saw the incidents of the heated night before far more vividly. He was a man who did not favor bloodshed, though it was a hard and stern age, and the slaying of Boucher, who would have added another to his victims, did not trouble him even ...
— The Hunters of the Hills • Joseph Altsheler
... takes off his boot and sock, empties half a pint of sand out of them, and pulls up his trouser-leg. His leg is sheathed to the knee in dust and sweat; he absently scrapes it with his knife, and presently he amuses himself by moistening a strip with his forefinger and shaving it, as if he were vaguely curious to see if he is still a ...
— Children of the Bush • Henry Lawson
... when the sunshine lies like a flood upon the earth, and high clouds hang motionless in the far-distant blue—a day at the very heels of which it would seem that summer was lurking. Maurice Guest stood at his window, both sides of which were flung open, drinking in the warm air, and gazing absently up at the stretch of sky, against which the dark roof-lines of the houses opposite stood out abruptly. His hands were in his pockets, and, to a light beat of the foot, he hummed softly to himself, but what, he could not have told: whether some fragment of melody ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... too bad, too bad," said he, drawing the remnant of the shroud about him and leaning his jaw pensively on his hand. Then he put his left foot up on his knee and fell to scratching his anklebone absently with a rusty nail which he got out of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... provide the means to furnish such an education as he ought to have, is what puzzles me," continued Mrs. Smiley, pausing in her needle-work to study that problem more closely, and gazing absently at the face of her guest. "Will ten years more of school-teaching ...
— The New Penelope and Other Stories and Poems • Frances Fuller Victor
... he had a moment's meditation where he stood; it found issue in an articulate "Poor dear thing!"—an exclamation marked at once with patience and impatience, with resignation and ridicule. After which, waiting for his daughter, Lord Theign slowly and absently roamed, finding matches at last and lighting his cigarette—all with an air of concern that had settled on him more heavily from the moment of his finding himself alone. His luxury of gloom—if ...
— The Outcry • Henry James
... waited a minute, knocked again, then pulled the door open a crack and looked in. The old woman sat there rocking back and forth, steadily, quietly. But her thin fingers were rolling a corner of her apron hem painstakingly, as if she meant to hem it again. Her eyes were fixed absently upon the futile task. Casey watched her as long as he dared and cleared his throat twice in the hope that she would notice him. But the old woman rocked back and forth and rolled her apron hem; unrolled it ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... who was drawing absently with his fingers on the table, said, "Do you see, Yakov, why this did not please me? . . . Let us go into the matter thoroughly, and understand what you are really doing, and what the result may be. Your wife is pregnant. You struck her last night on her sides and breast. That means ...
— Creatures That Once Were Men • Maxim Gorky
... She was perfectly willing to go. They left the place together and entered a four-wheeler. During the drive she scarcely opened her lips. She sat in a corner looking absently out of the window, and nervously clasping and unclasping her hands. She answered a remark of Sydney Barnes' without ...
— The Avenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... returned to the veranda. It was unoccupied for chilly evening breezes had driven the loungers indoors. Absently he paced the creaking boards and, having reached a corner of the building, continued his promenade along what seemed to be the rear of the building. Here a line of doors opened on the veranda like the upper ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... the hotel suite's window at the street below. He peered absently at his thin wrist, looked blank for a moment, then realized all over again that his watch was being cleaned. He stared down at the street once more, his ...
— The Common Man • Guy McCord (AKA Dallas McCord Reynolds)
... handsome face had a fine thought in it, looked a trifle absently from one of them to the other; but it was to Nanda he spoke. "Do you ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... smoking and ground the stub into the earth with his heel. For another minute or two he sat there without speaking, absently flipping pebbles ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... silent in her place, puzzled, wistful, wounded, her idle hands folded, looking at him for a while, then absently before her, and he knew that her mind was busy again with the preacher feller's books. If he had known better how to explain his heart, if she had known how to show him the impersonal eagerness of her awakening mind—! But, savage and silent, they sat there, loving each other, hurt, but locked ...
— The Branding Iron • Katharine Newlin Burt
... said, with a pull of his cap and a swift respectful glance at the stoep. Clive, awake by now on her oak chest, responded absently without raising her head ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... Percival listened absently to the talk and watched Miss Milbrey, now one of the group in the dining-room. Presently he saw her take a lighted candle from one of the laughing girls and ...
— The Spenders - A Tale of the Third Generation • Harry Leon Wilson
... said Crewe absently. 'I should like to know the business details. What arrangement was made, I wonder, when he took Barmby ...
— In the Year of Jubilee • George Gissing
... Soleil nodded, absently, looking at Charley. The moondog gave a strange, electronic whimper. There was an odd expression on the girl's face. A flash of inspiration seemed to ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... smiled absently, her big eyes brilliant. Unconsciously she was wondering what dancing could mean to these elders of hers. . . . Dancing was the stir of youth . . . the carnival of the blood . . . the beat of expectancy and excitement. . ...
— The Innocent Adventuress • Mary Hastings Bradley
... distance, carrying his heavy load. Editor Goodman was absent at the moment, but the other proprietor, Denis E. McCarthy, signified that the caller might state his errand. The wanderer regarded him with a far-away look and said, absently ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine
... soon went home and the rest of us went to bed,—all except Mrs. O'Shaughnessy, who was so cranky and snappy that we left her by the fire. It seemed hours after when I awoke. She was still sitting by the fire; she was absently marking in the ashes with a stick. I happened to be the first one up next morning and as I stirred up the fire I saw "Baby" written in the ashes. We had breakfasted and the men had gone their ways when Mrs. O'Shaughnessy said ...
— Letters on an Elk Hunt • Elinore Pruitt Stewart |
