"Ajar" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... speak, for an inner door stood ajar, and from the other side came the faintly heard ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... sallied forth again, arm in arm, and went down the Row to Torrence and climbed the stairs to Number 14. As the door was half open knocking was a needless formality—especially as the noise within would have prevented its being heard—and so Tim pushed the portal further ajar and entered, followed by Don, on a most animated scene. Eight boys were sprawled or seated around the room, while another, a thin, tall, unkempt youth with a shock of very black hair which was always falling over his eyes and being brushed aside, was standing in a small clearing between ...
— Left Guard Gilbert • Ralph Henry Barbour
... bright The hills yet glowed afar: "Sweet sister, yon ineffable light Is but the gates ajar! And evermore, by night and day, We children still are three, Tho' I have gone a little way To open ...
— The Poets and Poetry of Cecil County, Maryland • Various
... sample refrigerator was ajar only two or three feet. When Orme was there a few minutes before it had been wide open. He wondered whether the girl had chosen it as her hiding-place. If she had, his plan of action would be simplified, ...
— The Girl and The Bill - An American Story of Mystery, Romance and Adventure • Bannister Merwin
... was raised high. They drank with a shout of applause to Fritz Klopp, who sat without stirring his glass, one hand upon it, and the other buried among the heaps of gold, his head resting against the back of the chair, and his red mouth still ajar in that ...
— Harrigan • Max Brand
... tossed the match out the open top of the window, then paused in his tracks with the cigarette two inches from his mouth—which fell faintly ajar. His eyes were focussed upon a spot of brilliant color on the roof of a house farther ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... said the man, "to distinguish them from the Irish English, who are worse than pagans, who are Jews and heretics." I made no answer, but passed on to the room which had been prepared for me, and from which, the door being ajar, I heard the following conversation passing between ...
— The Bible in Spain • George Borrow
... the shop itself would have held Janice Day's attention even for a moment; but from within (the front door stood ajar) came the wailing notes of a violin, the uncertain bow of the performer seeking out the notes of "Silver Threads Among ...
— Janice Day at Poketown • Helen Beecher Long
... to the red pillar-box by the door. As she did so, a cold blast struck her. Could it be that for once the faultless routine of the house had been relaxed, that one of the servants had left the outer door ajar? She walked over to the vestibule—yes, both doors were wide. The night rushed in on a vicious wind. As she pushed the vestibule door shut, she heard the dogs sniffing and whining on the threshold. She crossed the vestibule, and heard voices and the tramping of feet in the darkness—then ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... find the master of the place in a grass-green dressing-gown with crimson plush facings and an embroidered smoking-cap of Asiatic extraction, and a hideously fat, unpleasant dog in a stinking brass collar would be snoring at his side.... All the doors always ajar.... ...
— The Jew And Other Stories • Ivan Turgenev
... seemed to give the time of certain trains. And small-paned windows gave one sitting before the instruments an unobstructed view up and down the track. In the corner behind the door was a small safe, with door ajar, and a desk quite as small, with, "Express Office: Hours, 8 A.M. to 6 P.M." on a ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... The window was ajar, as if it had been pushed to negligently by someone entering, and in a flash Bernard had it wide. He went in as though he ...
— The Lamp in the Desert • Ethel M. Dell
... entered, set the shaded lamp upon the table and glanced sharply at Orsino. He could not help noticing the look. In a moment she was gone, and the door closed behind her. Maria Consuelo looked over her shoulder to see that it had not been left ajar. ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... and, drawing his sword he led the way swiftly, yet cautiously, to the stairs once more. In passing he glanced over the rails. The guardroom door stood ajar, and he caught the murmurs of subdued conversation. But he did not pause. Had the door stood wide he would not have paused then. There was not a second to be lost; to wait was to increase the already overwhelming danger. Cautiously, and ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... that there abode to me of my life but [till] the morrow, when the chief of the police would seek me. When it was the time of sundown, I passed through one of the streets, and beheld a woman at a window. Her door was ajar and she was clapping her hands and casting furtive glances at me, as who should say, "Come up by the door." So I went up, without suspicion, and when I entered, she rose and clasped me to her breast 1 marvelled at her affair ...
— Tales from the Arabic Volumes 1-3 • John Payne
... device. The inner airlock door in the orbit-ship was triggered to a fuse. He had left it ajar; the moment it was closed, by anyone intending to board the Scavenger, the fuse would burn, a circuit would open, and the little ship's autopilot would go on active. The ship would blast away from its moorings, head out ...
— Gold in the Sky • Alan Edward Nourse
... other hand, it is owing to a child, says a sweet Italian legend, that "the gates of heaven are forever ajar." A little girl-angel, up in heaven, sat grief-stricken beside the gate, and begged the celestial warder to set the ...
— The Child and Childhood in Folk-Thought • Alexander F. Chamberlain
... open the door, which the Breton had left ajar, and stalked in upon us, fuming and blowing out his cheeks for all the world like a bantam cock with its feathers erect. He was a short, pursy man; with a short nose, a wide face, and small eyes. But had he been ...
— From the Memoirs of a Minister of France • Stanley Weyman
... despair standing behind man ready to touch him with its terrible finger if for too long he finds himself content. What has given this ghastly shape the right to haunt us from the hour we are born until the hour we die? What has given it the right to stand always at our door, keeping that door ajar with its impalpable yet plainly horrible hand, ready to enter at the moment it sees fit? The greatest philosopher that ever lived succumbs before it at last; and he only is a philosopher, in any sane sense, who ...
— Light On The Path and Through the Gates of Gold • Mabel Collins
... through a raw autumn day in England. The presence of fine dust in the air—the dust of the African desert to which this effect is said to be owing—may perhaps account for the peculiar oppressiveness of the scirocco; certain it is, that after two days of it every nerve in the body seems set ajar. Luckily however it only lasts for three days and dies down into rain as the wind veers round to ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green
... sparkled on the hearth. The pendulum of the clock went on with its monotonous ticking, but it seemed to me that all this calm was only apparent, that everything about me must be in a state of expectation like myself and sharing my emotion. In the bedroom beyond, the door of which was ajar, I could see the end of the cradle and the shadow of the nurse who ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... through a little garden to the door of the house, which stood ajar. She pushed it open, and looked in; then, turning round, she said: "She is not here, sir; but she is close at hand. Wait here till I go and fetch her." She went to a house a little farther up the hill, and I presently saw her returning ...
— Romano Lavo-Lil - Title: Romany Dictionary - Title: Gypsy Dictionary • George Borrow
... ajar behind her, expecting Kate to follow her in. But Kate, evidently, had not followed. She stood out there alone with Mr. Garvan, her arms behind her, her slender figure drawn up beneath the swinging hall lamp, her pert little head, circled by the braids she wore coiled clear around it when ...
— The Madigans • Miriam Michelson
... Goupil, who found the street door ajar, opened that of the little salon, and showed his hideous face blazing with thoughts of vengeance which had crowded into his mind as he ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac
... this lady had nothing to do with her. And yet I felt very uneasy, and my good angel would not listen to counsel. Finally I took courage, murmuring something to myself about the masquerade of life, and rapped on the door, which stood ajar. ...
— Memories • Max Muller
... the shop-caretaker to mount two flights of stairs, having mounted which they would perceive in front of them a door, where they were to ring again. This door was usually closed, but to-night Tom found it ajar. He peeped out and downwards, and thought of the vast showroom below and the wonderful regions of the street. Then he drew in his head, and concealed himself behind the plush portiere. From his hiding-place he could watch the door of Uncle Henry's and Aunt Susan's bedroom, and he ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... attracts my attention; they are setting just inside the door of a little shop. The two women in charge look scared nearly out of their wits as I appear at the door and point to the basket; both of them retreat pell-mell into a rear apartment, and, holding the door ajar, peep curiously through to see what I am going to do. While my attention is directed for a moment to something down the street, one daring soul darts out and bears the basket of oranges triumphantly into ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... tallow, turmeric, turpentine, and tin; When lo! a decent personage in black Entered and most politely said: "Your footman, sir, has gone his nightly track To the King's Head, And left your door ajar; which I Observed in passing by, And thought it neighborly to give you notice." "Ten thousand thanks; how very few get, In time of danger, Such kind attentions from a stranger! Assuredly, that fellow's throat is Doomed to a final ...
— The Book of Humorous Verse • Various
... door of the drawing-room, in which the candles were burning, and went into the dining-room, in which there was no light. Leaving the door ajar, he waited to intercept his landlady on her way back to her supper ...
— Man and Wife • Wilkie Collins
... side steps out into the beloved garden. Silently I watched the tall figure with the white hair silvered radiantly by the moonlight go slowly down the path, past the old graybeard poplars, and even up to the lilac hedge that ran as a bulwark in front of the dark chapel door, which I could see was ajar as ...
— The Heart's Kingdom • Maria Thompson Daviess
... on and on alone, and presently saw a tiny hamlet hidden among some trees. She made for this as fast as her trembling limbs could carry her and rushed breathlessly into a small red brick-house, the door of which stood slightly ajar, crying: "Shut the door! Dacoits are following me!" Then, overcome with fear and exhaustion, she ...
— Bengal Dacoits and Tigers • Maharanee Sunity Devee
... before, he ceremoniously indicated to a warden that the gates were to be opened. There was a great clanking of chains, the drawing of iron bolts, the whirl of a windlass, and the ponderous gates swung slowly ajar. ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon
... themselves before the door. It stood ajar. Inside sat a sergeant at a flat-top desk. He, too, was of the cavalry. There were also two privates in ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Ranks - or, Two Recruits in the United States Army • H. Irving Hancock
... ground sullenly ajar, And upwards, joyous, like a rising star, She rose and vanished in ...
— The World's Best Poetry, Volume 3 - Sorrow and Consolation • Various
... box to reach the little staircase which led to the box above. She thought she heard voices, and stopping at the door, listened. Perhaps Crewe had come down or the colonel. But it was not Crewe's voice she heard. The door was slightly ajar, and the man who was talking was evidently on the point of departure, because she glimpsed his hand upon the handle and his voice was so distinct that he must have been ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... away in the storm and darkness? Why no, of course not. Sallie was only a little child sleeping quietly in her own little room. See, the door was ajar and a ray of light from the lamp in Sallie's room was streaming across the kitchen floor. He must go in and extinguish the light before it awakened the sleeping child. Why had Martha left the lamp burning? Surely she must know it would disturb the child. ...
— The Alchemist's Secret • Isabel Cecilia Williams
... made every juryman's breast swell with pride, and from their box they poured in a long stream, and clattered over the floor of the Court to the jury-room, the door of which stood ajar, ready to ...
— The Tale of Timber Town • Alfred Grace
... a pew and bookboard, bought at the roup of an old church, and thus transformed into a garden-seat. There were many of them in Thrums that year. All the doors, except that of the smithy, were shut, until one of them blew ajar, when Dite knew at once, from the smell which crossed the road, that Blinder was in the bunk pulling the teeth of his potatoes. May Ann Irons, the blind man's niece, came out at this door to beat the cistern with a bass, and she gave Dite a wag of her head. He was to be married to her if ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie
... went into the garden, into the great avenue where the leaves were dropping, softly one by one; and when the Palace lights went out, one after the other, the crow led little Gerda to the back door, which was ajar. ...
— Stories from Hans Andersen • Hans Christian Andersen
... the kitchen door ajar and looked out; between it and Thore stood old Ole, with his cap-visor down over his eyes, for the cap was too large now that he had lost his hair. In order to be able to see he threw his head pretty far back; he held his staff in his ...
— A Happy Boy • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... could have told my master where his oats went to. My groom used to come every morning about six o'clock, and with him a little boy, who always had a covered basket with him. He used to go with his father into the harness-room, where the corn was kept, and I could see them, when the door stood ajar, fill a little bag with oats out of the bin, and then ...
— Black Beauty • Anna Sewell
... pockets. The hum of the busy street rose to his ears, but he did not hear it. Nor did he see the motor cars whizzing past, the drays lumbering along, the thronged sidewalks of Powers Avenue. A door that had for years been ajar in his heart had swung to with a crash. The incredible folly of his dream was laid bare to him. Despised, distrusted and disgraced, there was no chance that he might be even a friend to her. She moved in another world, one he could not ...
— The Vision Spendid • William MacLeod Raine
... did not get as far as Ward C then. Margaret MacLean found the door of the board-room ajar, and, glancing in, looked square into the eyes of the Founder of Saint Margaret's, where he hung in his great gold frame—silent ...
— The Primrose Ring • Ruth Sawyer
... very good to me, Nan—pushed the gate of Paradise at least ajar. And if it closes now, I've no earthly right to grumble. . . . After all, I'm only one amongst your many friends." He reclaimed her hands and drew them against his breast. "Good-bye, beloved," he said. His ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... attic of a dark night. What horrid, strange, suggestive, unaccountable noises you will hear! The stillness of night is a vulgar error. All the dead things seem to be alive. Crack! That is the old chest of drawers; you never hear it crack in the daytime. Creak! There's a door ajar; you ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... the door to; pulled off his over-coat; wrenched off his outer 'kerchief; slammed them on a branch of the clothes-tree; banged his hat on top of them; wheeled about; pushed in the door of his library; strode in, and, leaving the door ajar, threw himself into an easy chair, and sat there in the fire-reddened dusk, with his white brows knit, and his arms tightly locked on his breast. The ghost had followed him, sadly, and now stood motionless in a corner of the room, its spectral hands ...
— The Ghost • William. D. O'Connor
... feel shut out," she said to herself, and so she left it standing invitingly ajar that in case the girl cared to come in she would not have to knock. She smiled to herself as she did it. She knew well enough Nan would not care to come in. "Still there might be a chance!"—she left the ...
— The Governess • Julie M. Lippmann
... her heart beating, hurried home. The house door was still ajar. She pushed it back, slipped inside, caught her breath and listened. Then she closed the door softly behind her, and with that little act of attempted secrecy realised that she was now a rebel, that things ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... corridor moodily towards my own room. As I passed Hilda Wade's door, I saw it half ajar. She stood a little within, and beckoned me ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... reach. It rocked stiffly in its place, a most palpable and reassuring waxwork. He unwound the cerements from the hollow and unyielding head; and the face was new to him; it had not been there the other afternoon. It was a young face like his own, as ill-mounted on high shoulders, with thickish lips ajar, and only a pair of intelligent eyes to redeem an apparent heaviness: one and all his own identical characteristics. And no wonder, for the last recruit to the waxen army of murderers was ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... the churchyard, taking care to leave the door slightly ajar, in order to facilitate his grandson's entrance. For an instant he lingered in the chancel. The yellow moonlight fell upon the monuments of his race; and, directed by the instinct of hate, Alan's eye rested upon the gilded entablature of his perfidious brother, ...
— Rookwood • William Harrison Ainsworth
... chair, as the child Pansie on her pillow; and sometimes the spirits that were watching him beheld a calm surprise draw slowly over his features and brighten into joy, yet not so vividly as to break his evening quietude. The gate of heaven had been kindly left ajar, that this forlorn old creature might catch a glimpse within. All the night afterwards, he would be semi-conscious of an intangible bliss diffused through the fitful lapses of an old man's slumber, and would awake, at early dawn, with a faint thrilling of the heart-strings, as ...
— The Dolliver Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... came to the door, sir, I found it was ajar, and though I listened, I could not hear a sound. So I pushed the door against the big curtain, and called softly, 'Ramo! Mr Ramo!' but there was no answer, and then I felt a bit alarmed, and, after waiting a moment, I went ...
— The Dark House - A Knot Unravelled • George Manville Fenn
... quickened as he passed beyond the ancient fort, over the burial-place of the dead, and into Churchill. He met no one at the factor's, and the door leading into Miss Brokaw's room was partly ajar. A great fire was burning in the fireplace, and he saw Eileen seated in the rich glow of it, smiling at him as he entered. He closed the door, and when he turned she had risen and was holding out her hands to him. She had dressed for him, ...
— Flower of the North • James Oliver Curwood
... or a cat, glided up the steps through the open door, and in another moment had again concealed herself beneath the leaves of a large table that stood in the hall close to the door of the sick-room, which, standing ajar, gave her an opportunity of studying once more the situation of things within. In the corner farthest from her lurking-place stood the bed on which her master was slumbering, concealing with its ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 48, October, 1861 • Various
... story would amuse her twice as much when she should read it printed; it was in vain that Mrs. Woodward assured her that Charley should come up to her room door; and hear her thanks as he stood in the passage, with the door ajar. Katie was determined to hear the story read. It must be read, if read at all, that Saturday night, as it was to be sent to the editor in the course of the week; and reading 'Crinoline and Macassar' out loud on a Sunday ...
— The Three Clerks • Anthony Trollope
... small, and being scarce more than ajar I was not surprised that only a very faint light entered by it. If the top were removed I doubted not I should be able to get a view of the cabin, enough to show me where the windows or port-holes were. So I went to work with the hanger again, insensibly ...
— The Frozen Pirate • W. Clark Russell
... as the natives supposed it, occurred. Among the presents offered by the king was ajar of honey; this one of the servants upset without breaking the pot. Had it been broken, the omen would have been unfortunate; as it was, the governor was highly pleased, and ordered the poor to be called in ...
— Great African Travellers - From Mungo Park to Livingstone and Stanley • W.H.G. Kingston
... where Violet could reach it, telling her to be sure to ring if she needed anything, then she went out, leaving the door slightly ajar. ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon
... uncommonly tired this morning of the palace garden, I know every stick and stone in it so well. I had been racing nine times round the gravel walk, and had got half way round to make up ten, when, luckily, I saw that the gardener had left the outer door ajar; so I thought I might as well take the opportunity of seeing what there was on the other side of the wall; accordingly I peeped out and found that I was in a kind of road, with some such odd looking things, here and there, ...
— Tales From Catland, for Little Kittens • Tabitha Grimalkin
... stiffly erect, head uptilted—a striking figure, graceful, supple, almost commanding. In fact, so attractive was the picture she made as she stood a moment on the sidewalk, that a passing policeman, seized by a gallant impulse, opened the door of the waiting taxicab and held it ajar while she entered. ...
— The Substitute Prisoner • Max Marcin
... feebly and closed it again. Having closed it, he reopened it and allowed it to remain ajar, as it were. It was his ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... at the front-door, and in a moment I heard the woman coming up the basement stairs. I had risen when the doctor made the last remark, and was pacing up and down the room, deliberating on what should be done. The parlor-door was ajar, and as the woman admitted the new-comers, I caught a glimpse of them. They were three rough, hard-looking characters; and one, from his unsteady gait, I judged to be intoxicated. She seemed glad to see them, and led them into the room from whence the noises proceeded. In a moment ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No 3, September, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy. • Various
... was unpacking in the next room; the door was ajar, and Miss Jakes could hear the creaking of lifted trays and the rustling of multitudinous tissue-paper layers. The sounds suggested an answer to a dim question that had begun to hover in her travel-worn mind. One came back every ...
— Franklin Kane • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... events, kept her door a little ajar, and wee Jean, being slightly, very slightly, disturbed by the noise in the room and the light which penetrated faintly under her eider-down quilt, purred in a louder and more satisfied manner than ever. She thought she might rise a trifle and ...
— Hollyhock - A Spirit of Mischief • L. T. Meade
... purpose? Had it nothing to hold? A world full of meaning, my friend, if 'twere told. You remember those jars in the Arabian Night, As they stood 'neath the stars in Al' Baba's eyesight: Little dreamed Ali Baba what ajar could excite— For how much did betide When a man was inside! When from under each cover a man was to spring, Where then was the empty, insignificant thing? It was so with this jar, 'Twasn't hollow by far; Breathless at first as an exhausted ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. I., No. IV., April, 1862 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... yards of the house. Of course you will take your rifles with you and keep a sharp lookout; but they will have heard the bell, if they are in the neighborhood, and will guess that we are on the alert, so they are not likely to attempt a surprise. Shut one of the gates and leave the other ajar, with the bar handy to put up in case you have to make a run for it. Harold will go up to the lookout while you ...
— True to the Old Flag - A Tale of the American War of Independence • G. A. Henty
... everything shrinks from a beggar like me! Perhaps 'tis a dream; but sometimes, when I lie Gazing far up in the dark blue sky, Watching for hours some large bright star, I fancy the beautiful gates are ajar, ...
— Poems Teachers Ask For, Book Two • Various
... hymn!" scoffed Heywood. He halted where, between the butcher's and a book-shop, the song poured loud through an open doorway. Nodding at a placard, he added: "Here we are: 'Jesus Religion Chapel.' Hear 'em yanging! 'There is a gate that stands ajar.' That being the ...
— Dragon's blood • Henry Milner Rideout
... more, Jack was thinking as he watched the trio descend. He and Phil were occupying a strategic position, from which they could see but not be seen; in fact, they had left the front door slightly ajar with that ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... an end to all uncertainty, for the door was set ajar and little Celine admitted the priest. "I beg your pardon, Monsieur l'Abbe," said she, "but Mamma Theodore has gone out, and she told me not to open the door ...
— The Three Cities Trilogy, Complete - Lourdes, Rome and Paris • Emile Zola
... corridors as I musingly looked down from one of the arched openings, quite spellbound by the strangeness and dead silence of the place, broken only by the plash of waves on the sandy beach below. I had found my way down through a wooden door half ajar; and I thought of the possibility of some one's shutting it for the night, and leaving me a prisoner to await the spectres which I have no doubt throng here when it grows dark. Hastening up out of these chambers of the past, I escaped into the upper air, and walked ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... went out. She left the door ajar. The house was so still that one could seem to hear the silence. There was something terrible about it after the turmoil of sound. Then the silence was broken. A scream more terrible than ever pierced it like a sword. Another came. Gordon sprang up and faced James. The young man's eyes fell ...
— 'Doc.' Gordon • Mary E. Wilkins-Freeman
... her potato sliced, but never mashed. She could not bear to see a door open a single moment; and, even if she were at her meals, and the closet door happened to stand ajar, she would jump up and fly to shut it, with ...
— Parker's Second Reader • Richard G. Parker
... now, and the red glow was brighter. She looked toward the ruin; looked along the road; came down the steps and looked toward the swamp and the railway path. This time she took a few steps in the direction of the house; looked up at its open windows, at the front door standing ajar, at a pair of gloves and a branch from the vine at the ruin, that lay on the top step of the piazza, as if in passing one had put them there, intending to return in a moment. While she looked the distant whistle of a locomotive was heard echoing back and forth about the empty land, and the rumble ...
— Southern Lights and Shadows • Edited by William Dean Howells & Henry Mills Alden
... pink, puncture, lance, stick, prick, riddle, punch; stave in. cut a passage through; make way for, make room for. uncover, unclose, unrip^; lay open, cut open, rip open, throw open, pop open, blow open, pry open, tear open, pull open. Adj. open; perforated &c v.; perforate; wide open, ajar, unclosed, unstopped; oscitant^, gaping, yawning; patent. tubular, cannular^, fistulous; pervious, permeable; foraminous^; vesicular, vasicular^; porous, follicular, cribriform^, honeycombed, infundibular^, riddled; tubulous^, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... spawning, a male chooses a female companion and with great vigilance keeps off all those who wish to approach her. When the laying becomes imminent, the Rhodius, swimming up and down at the bottom of the stream, at length discovers a Unio. The bivalve is asleep with his shell ajar, not suspecting the plot which is being formed against him. It is a question of nothing less than of transforming him into furnished lodgings. The female fish bears underneath her tail a prolongation of the oviduct; she introduces it delicately ...
— The Industries of Animals • Frederic Houssay
... door just ajar he was able to watch the two men; but a couple of hours had passed before he saw them stretch themselves upon the floor, after carefully hiding away the little keg, and at last Hilary felt that he might venture to cross the great kitchen again and ...
— In the King's Name - The Cruise of the "Kestrel" • George Manville Fenn
... fellow's beginning to remember he has some old scores to settle up!" remarked the Director coolly to the head-keeper and his assistants; and they all stepped backwards, with a casual air, towards the big gate, which stood ajar to receive them. Just as they reached it, the old fire and fury surged back into the exile's veins, but heated seven fold by the ignominies which he had undergone. With a hoarse and bawling roar, such as had never before been heard in those guarded ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... if it were hewn in granite. "You are going to make a beginning to-night," he said. "You have been poisoned by that stuff long enough, and I am going to put a stop to it. Now get into bed, and be reasonable! Biddy, you clear out and do the same! You can leave the door ajar if you like. I'll call ...
— Greatheart • Ethel M. Dell
... ajar, and I could not bear to lose a word that dropped from those lips so near me. Yes, I listened, and got such a lesson as only a noble, gentle lady could give. I shall never forget your womanly art, and the way you contrived to make the benefaction sound nothing. 'We are all of us at ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... fallen leaves rattled in the verandah. In the midst of this Kokua was aware of another sound; whether of a beast or of a man she could scarce tell, but it was as sad as death, and cut her to the soul. Softly she arose, set the door ajar, and looked forth into the moonlit yard. There, under the bananas, lay Keawe, his mouth in the dust, and as he ...
— Island Nights' Entertainments • Robert Louis Stevenson
... sympathy, which seemed longing to express itself in a torrent of comforting words. Presently she put the letters together, tied them up carelessly with a piece of twine, and put them back into the drawer from which she had taken them. Just as she had finished doing this the door of the room, which was ajar, was pushed softly open, and a dark-eyed, Eastern-looking boy dressed in ...
— The Call of the Blood • Robert Smythe Hichens
... Miss Locke, smiling. 'The street door was just ajar, and Kitty crept in and curled herself up on the mat. It sounded so beautiful, you see; for Kitty and I only hear singing at church, and it is not often I can get there, with Phoebe wanting me; so it did us both good, you may ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey
... his return; but now that hope was gone. She must meet him again; and to what desperate extremities might he not proceed in the interview in which she must now be compelled to take a part! Then she remembered that she had left the door from her room to the passage ajar, and he might reach it before she could get there, and revealing to him her secret, cut off her last and only hope of escape. The thought awoke all her energies, and dashing along the narrow way at the top of ...
— Eveline Mandeville - The Horse Thief Rival • Alvin Addison
... haphazard, to feel my way in the dark along the wall, in order to reach the staircase. I discovered it at last and descended, partly falling and partly gliding. But there was not a soul downstairs. I merely found the door ajar, and breathed freer on reaching the street, for I had felt very strange inside the house. Urged on by terror, I rushed towards my dwelling-place, and buried myself in the cushions of my bed, in order to forget the terrible thing that ...
— The Severed Hand - From "German Tales" Published by the American Publishers' Corporation • Wilhelm Hauff
... fear, because in the months of living alone fear had utterly forsaken her; but hope had leaped so often, only to fall sickeningly, that she was half persuaded it must be a dream. Still the impression strengthened. She slipped out of bed. The door of the bedroom stood slightly ajar. ...
— North of Fifty-Three • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... revolutionary statesman on the 23d of March, 1775. In this alone were his resolutions "premature." The very men who opposed them because they were to be understood as closing the door against the possibility of peace, would have favored them had they only left that door open, or even ajar. But Patrick Henry demanded of the people of Virginia that they should treat all further talk of peace as mere prattle; that they should seize the actual situation by a bold grasp of it in front; that, ...
— Patrick Henry • Moses Coit Tyler
... original Necropolis. For what purpose this room was designed or used Edna could not imagine, and after a hasty survey of its singular furniture, she crossed the rotunda, and knocked at the door that stood slightly ajar. All was silent; but the smell of a cigar told her that the owner was within, ...
— St. Elmo • Augusta J. Evans
... rapidly. Not a window was opened, not a door stood ajar; it was the dawn but not the awaking. The end of the Rue de la Chanvrerie, opposite the barricade, had been evacuated by the troops, as we have stated it seemed to be free, and presented itself to passers-by with a sinister tranquillity. The Rue Saint-Denis was as dumb ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... ajar, and an apparently waiting group could be discerned without, consisting of the pedant, Scapin, Leander, and Zerbine; a reassuring and most welcome sight to poor Isabelle. For one instant the duke, in his rage, was tempted to draw his sword, make a furious charge upon the ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... We would return by the Boulevard de la Gare, which contained the most attractive villas in the town. In each of their gardens the moonlight, copying the art of Hubert Robert, had scattered its broken staircases of white marble, its fountains of water and gates temptingly ajar. Its beams had swept away the telegraph office. All that was left of it was a column, half shattered, but preserving the beauty of a ruin which endures for all time. I would by now be dragging my weary limbs, and ready to drop with sleep; the balmy scent of the lime-trees ...
— Swann's Way - (vol. 1 of Remembrance of Things Past) • Marcel Proust
... to strike out at once after breakfast to begin justifying Uncle Sebastian's faith in him, but so far he had not laid a plan. He noticed lettering on a door in the hall which dignified what lay beyond as a "lounging room." The door stood ajar, and he saw that the room was empty. He decided to go in and think. A thousand and one wonders awaited his curious eyes, but they must wait. His hundred dollars had dwindled perceptibly; it was time to give his future a practical ...
— The She Boss - A Western Story • Arthur Preston Hankins
... was ajar. She pushed it softly. It creaked and let her through into the silent street. There were no lights in the hotel, no lights in any ...
— The Incomplete Amorist • E. Nesbit
... time in her life the door of her heart had been opened in response to another. It was, perhaps, open only a crack. Possibly it had been fast so long that it would not remain open. None the less, at the moment it stood ajar. ...
— Elsie Marley, Honey • Joslyn Gray
... her family. At first she kept a tolerable guard over herself. Once she saw her father and sister whispering, and did not, though she longed much to do it, hold her breath that she might hear what they were saying. Another time she passed Charles's door when it was ajar and the little study open, and she had so much self-command that she passed by without peeping in, and she began to think she was cured of her faults. But in reality this was far from being the case, and whenever she recollected Mrs. Arden's mysterious note she ...
— Young Folks Treasury, Volume 3 (of 12) - Classic Tales And Old-Fashioned Stories • Various
... short just within the threshold. Through a door slightly ajar came the sound of stertorous breathing, intermittent in its volume, now barely audible, again rising to a labored harshness. He listened, a look of dismayed concern gathering on his face. He had heard men in the ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... moment hesitated. "We'll send for the bird later," he told the landlady, who, still mildly expostulating as she followed them downstairs, failed to notice that the captain of the detectives had carelessly left the door to Daughtry's rooms ajar. ...
— Michael, Brother of Jerry • Jack London
... reached the pretty suburb in which Isaura dwelt, it seemed to him as if all the wheels of the loud busy life were suddenly smitten still. The hour was yet early; he felt sure that he should find Isaura at home. The garden-gate stood unfastened and ajar; he pushed it aside and entered. I think I have before said that the garden of the villa was shut out from the road and the gaze of neighbours by a wall and thick belts of evergreens; it stretched behind the house somewhat far for the garden of a suburban villa. ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... hallway, leaving the door ajar behind her. It was late in the afternoon of a September day. The air was soft and hazy, tempered with just the chill of evening that comes at this time ...
— The Loyalist - A Story of the American Revolution • James Francis Barrett
... and I knew everything that was going on, though I didn't seem to—that was the curious part of it. I had been asleep for a bit, and I woke up all of a sudden, and heard some one talking to grandmother in the next room—the door wasn't wide open, only ajar. I shouldn't have known who it was, for I'm not quick at telling voices, like other folks; but I heard grandmother call her Mrs. Darrell; and I heard the lady say that when one was sick and tired of life, and had no one left to live for, it ...
— Milly Darrell and Other Tales • M. E. Braddon
... found the street door ajar. He pushed it open, went in, and having fastened the latch, threw himself on the floor and gave ...
— Pinocchio - The Tale of a Puppet • C. Collodi
... Mr. Lichtenstein caused the ornamental cast-iron back of the fireplace to swing outward upon a hinge. Reaching a long arm into the disclosed opening, he unfastened and pushed ajar the iron back of a fireplace in the ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris
... at twelve of the night, When the graves give up their dead. And still, from the City, no light Yellows the clouds overhead. Where the Admiral stands there's a star, But his column is lost in the gloom; For the brazen doors are ajar, And the Lion awakes, and ...
— The New Morning - Poems • Alfred Noyes
... from the spot where I gazed upon her, and was lost to my sight. I fancy I missed my way, and made a round in spite of the landlord's directions; for by the time I had reached Bridget's cottage she was there, with no semblance of hurried walk or discomposure of any kind. The door was slightly ajar. I knocked, and the majestic figure stood before me, silently awaiting the explanation of my errand. Her teeth were all gone, so the nose and chin were brought near together; the grey eyebrows were straight, and almost hung over her deep, cavernous ...
— Curious, if True - Strange Tales • Elizabeth Gaskell
... not been there long before I heard some one enter with the landlord. The two rooms, like many we find in French hotels, could easily be made one, as a doorway led from one to the other. I had arranged my door to be slightly ajar, so was ...
— Weapons of Mystery • Joseph Hocking
... not be out in the parlor," I thought; "it can be lighted there." I ran against the hatstand in the hall, knocking a cane down, which fell with a loud noise. The parlor door was ajar; the fire was not out, and Desmond was before ...
— The Morgesons • Elizabeth Stoddard
... a push to the door of the house bearing the number 18, which stood ajar, discovered a gloomy-looking staircase, ascended three flights, perceived a door, then a second door, came upon the string of a bell, and pulled it. The ringing, which resounded in the apartment before which he stood, sent a shiver through his frame. ...
— A Comedy of Marriage & Other Tales • Guy De Maupassant
... room in its proportions and in its colour," I said, and seeing another door ajar I went through it and discovered a bedroom likewise in red with two beds facing each other. The beds were high, it is true, and a phrase from a letter I had written to Doris, "aggressively virtuous," rose up in my mind as I looked upon them. But the curtains hung well ...
— Memoirs of My Dead Life • George Moore
... President, under an impulse I could not resist. Mr. Stoddard, your third Secretary, is my friend. He told me this morning that all night the sound of your footfall came from this room. He heard it at nine, at ten, at eleven. At midnight the Secretary of War left the door ajar and the steady tramp came with heavier sound. The last thing he heard at three was the muffled beat upstairs. The guard said it had not stopped at daylight. I saw you staggering alone under a Nation's sorrow and I wondered if you had been given the vision to see the dawn of a new life ...
— A Man of the People - A Drama of Abraham Lincoln • Thomas Dixon
... the wreck should sink nearer the surface of the water. Settling rapidly as it was, I was convinced I should not have long to wait. I closed the inner door of the room, and turned the bolt. The outer one I held slightly ajar, my hand firmly clutching ...
— The Quadroon - Adventures in the Far West • Mayne Reid
... voice of Ann Sidley, as she held the door ajar, without presuming to look into the room; "Miss Eve— ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... held its place. And this I watched as if fascinated. I was alone in the empty courtyard, standing a little aside, sheltered by one of the stone pillars from which the gates hung. Behind me the door of the house stood ajar. Candles, which the daylight rendered garish, still burned in the rooms on the first floor, of which the tall narrow windows were open. On the wide stone sill of one of these stood Croisette, a ...
— The House of the Wolf - A Romance • Stanley Weyman
... mounted to the studio, the new lodger's door, at the back of the hall, was a little ajar, and Hedger caught the warm perfume of lilacs just brought in out of the sun. He was used to the musty smell of the old hall carpet. (The nurse-lessee had once knocked at his studio door and complained that Caesar must be somewhat responsible for the particular ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... was ajar, and Charlie seemed to have just entered, for Mac heard a familiar voice call out in a jovial tone: "Come, Prince! You're just in time to help us drink Steve's health with all ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... mother, it fell to me to take the head of the table. It was truly a stimulating conversation, intellectual, and, like all clerical conversations, vivaciously amusing; and it swept me in, unconsciously. I think this occurred after I had written "The Gates Ajar." ...
— McClure's Magazine, January, 1896, Vol. VI. No. 2 • Various
... struck eleven he climbed over it and jumped on to the ground on the other side, and looked about him carefully; then he went up to the small, white-washed summer-house, where the Princess had promised to meet him, on tiptoe. He found the door ajar, went in, and at the same moment he felt two soft arms thrown round him. "Is it you, Princess?" he asked, in a whisper, for the pavilion was in total darkness, as the venetian blinds were drawn. "Yes, Count, it is ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume IV (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... the churchyard where the old captain was buried sixty years ago. —Confound him! why wouldn't he lie still? He made some effort to be polite to the old hag, as he called her, in that not very secret chamber of his soul, whose door was but too ready to fall ajar, and allow its evil things to issue. He searched his lumber-room for old stories to tell, but found it difficult to lay hold on any fit for the ears present, though one of the ladies was an old woman—old enough, he judged, not ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... see you," said the Italian. "Now, you lay still little while; I be back t'rectly." He went out into the yard again, pushing the heavy door after him till it stood only slightly ajar, sauntered easily around till he caught sight of the captain of the yard, and was presently standing before him in the same immovable way in which he had stood before Richling in Tchoupitoulas street, on ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... the door and drove it inches ajar, driving back their barricade. One taloned paw slid in and slashed viciously at random. Jeff ducked and strained his weight against the bunk, momentarily pinning ...
— Traders Risk • Roger Dee
... house till he came to Mr. Maxwell's room at the back. It opened on the veranda by a glass door, and the door stood ajar. The rabbit squeezed himself in, and the hen stayed out. She watched for a while, and when he didn't come back, she flew upon the back of a chair that stood near the door, and put her head under ...
— Beautiful Joe • Marshall Saunders
... landing, outside a door that was ajar. Near them burned a gas jet, and beneath the bracket was a large framed photograph of the bridal party at Alicia's wedding. Farther along the landing were other similar records of the weddings of Marion, Tom, ...
— Clayhanger • Arnold Bennett
... of logs, a mere shack scarcely fit for shelter, stood on a slight eminence, giving wide view in every direction, but it was unoccupied, the door ajar. Barbeau, in advance, stared at it in surprise, gave utterance to an oath, and ran forward to peer within. Close behind him I caught a glimpse of the interior, my own heart ...
— Beyond the Frontier • Randall Parrish
... just committed an act of sacrilege. We listened, and heard, through the door, the noise of chairs dragged over the stone floor; then a light footstep approaching, a sound of keys and bolts, and the door was gently opened and held ajar. ...
— In the Field (1914-1915) - The Impressions of an Officer of Light Cavalry • Marcel Dupont
... were to send his name resounding down the halls of fame. (The newspapers have already caught an echo or two.) On his way back from his experiments, he daily stopped at the shop of Eberling the Florist, where, besides chaste and elegant set pieces inscribed "Gates Ajar" and "Gone But Not Forgotten," one may, if expert and insistent, obtain really fresh roses. What connection these visits had with the matutinal arrival of deep pink blossoms addressed to nobody, but delivered regularly at ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... burst from some person or persons when the door was thrust ajar, followed by the scrape of chairs on a stone floor, as if pushed back by their occupiers in rising from a table. The door was closed again, and nothing could now be heard from within, save a lively chatter and the rattle ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy
... sat up in bed and listened. She could hear by their breathing that the other children were asleep, but she was not sure about Mrs. Ellis. Very stealthily, therefore, she slipped out of bed, and pulled off the clothes. She could only just clasp them in both arms, but the nursery door was ajar, and she managed to open it with her foot. It creaked noisily, and Beth waited, listening in suspense; but nobody moved; so she slipped out into the passage. It was quite dark there, and the floor felt very cold to her bare feet. She stumbled down the ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... covering half the floor. The walls were decorated chiefly with miscellaneous clothing suspended from nails, a few maps and blue prints tacked up askew. Straight across from the entering door another stood ajar, and she could see further vistas of bare board wall, small, dusty window-panes, and a bed whereon gray blankets were tumbled as they fell when a waking sleeper cast ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... kind of vehicle having disappeared, the house-doors are left ajar; the inmates like to fraternise in the street. On fine evenings the footpath gets strewed with chairs and benches, occupied by men smoking—women chatting al fresco unreservedly—laughing that loud laugh which says, "I don't care who ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... your rest," exclaimed Edith, "or you will lose your reason. Come;" and she half carried the poor creature to her room. "Now, leave the door ajar," she said, "for if mother is ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... into the house, and closed the door. But, a few minutes later, when her back chanced to be turned, and when a maid came into the room leaving the door ajar, Bobby slipped out. ...
— Black Caesar's Clan • Albert Payson Terhune
... on his equipment and "took up the double time" to join his men. As he neared the trenches he raised his head to look for his company. Not a soldier was in sight. As he stood in wonderment it seemed that the gates of the infernal regions were standing ajar and the inmates escaping toward him. Two hundred black devils, every imp of them screaming and yelling at each leap forward, were coming for him, armed with bolos and other death-dealing weapons, to mince him in ...
— Bamboo Tales • Ira L. Reeves
... character of my fellow-guests on board that craft was such that my suspicion was constantly on the alert, therefore curiosity tempted me to creep along and peep in at the crack of the door standing ajar. A closer view revealed the fact that the stranger was a high Russian official to whom I had once been introduced at the Government Palace at Helsingfors, the Privy-Councillor and Senator Paul Polovstoff. They were smoking together, and were discussing ...
— The Czar's Spy - The Mystery of a Silent Love • William Le Queux
... parlour the party had hired, so that both could come out and meet Sir Amyas with the door ajar, without relaxing their watch upon the sleeper. The poor young man looked pale, shocked, and sorrowful. "Well," said he, after having read in their looks that there was no change, "he knows the worst." Then on a further token of interrogation, "It may ...
— Love and Life • Charlotte M. Yonge |
