"Suspense" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... happened, and I began to think that the best thing we could do would be to go to sleep again, when suddenly I heard a sound more like a cough than a roar within about twenty yards of the skerm. We all looked out, but could see nothing; and then followed another period of suspense. It was very trying to the nerves, this waiting for an attack that might be developed from any quarter or might not be developed at all; and though I was an old hand at this sort of business I was anxious about Harry, for it is wonderful how the presence of anybody to whom one is attached ...
— A Tale of Three Lions • H. Rider Haggard
... the amiable with such a delicate young creature like Julia. Conceive him falling on his knees before her—pressing her delicate hand, and "popping the question," while his large round eyes shed tears of affection and suspense, and his huge sides shook with emotion! Conceive him enduring all the pangs of love-sickness, never telling his love; "concealment, like a worm in the bud, preying upon his damask cheek," while his hard-hearted mistress stood disdainfully by, "like pity on a monument, smiling at ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 13, No. 359, Saturday, March 7, 1829. • Various
... the scene which now presented itself was most awful, and the state of suspense most cruel. The undulating country around was covered with warriors—Griquas, Mantatees and Bechuanas, all in motion— so that it was impossible to say who were enemies and who were friends. Clouds of dust rose from the immense masses, some flying, ...
— The Mission; or Scenes in Africa • Captain Frederick Marryat
... seeming to hesitate. She watched him at first with a total suspension of thought. She held her thought as a person holds his breathing. Then she consented to recognise him. "He'll no be coming here, he canna be; it's no possible." And there began to grow upon her a subdued choking suspense. He WAS coming; his hesitations had quite ceased, his step grew firm and swift; no doubt remained; and the question loomed up before her instant: what was she to do? It was all very well to say that her brother was a laird himself: it was all very well to speak of casual ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... of blood. They thought there was some great mystery that so young a child should utter such weighty words, and that the fear of death should make such an impression on him that he should shed tears of blood. They were in suspense divining what it portended, whether that the child would become a great man. They revoked the sentence of death, calling the child Yahuar-huaccac, which means "weeper of blood," in allusion to what ...
— History of the Incas • Pedro Sarmiento de Gamboa
... that fear, she tried to open the windows, and found them fastened on the outside. Her heart sank within her; for she had resolved, in the last emergency, to leap out and be crushed on the pavement. Suspense became almost intolerable. She listened, and listened. There was no sound, except a loud snoring in the next apartment. Was it her tyrant, who was sleeping so near? She sat with her shoes in her hand, her eyes fastened on the door. At last it opened, ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. II, No. 8, June 1858 • Various
... here, at this moment, in a state of the most anxious and critical suspense, having heard nothing from Count d'Estaing, nor from America, since the 11th ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various
... to you. I fear everything, nor is there any misery which would not seem possible in my present unfortunate position. Miserable as I still am in the midst of my heavy trials and sorrows, now that this anxiety is added to them, I remain at Thessalonica in a state of suspense without venturing upon any ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... not kept long in suspense. The pack, as it chanced, was on the trail of a moose which, labouring heavily in the deep snow, had passed, at a distance of some thirty or forty yards, a few minutes before the carcajou's arrival. The wolves swept into view through the tall fir trunks—five in number, and running ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts
... by the ladies for so grand an occasion. The day arrives, and they have to travel in their full dress in second and third class carriages. They arrive a little late, but make their way to the Royal Pavilion. Here, while in great suspense, they meet the General, who says he was afraid he ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... more of this deathlike suspense, of this agonizing hope, and Jessie, who had again sunk on the ground, sprang to her feet, and cried in a voice so clear and piercing that it was heard along the whole line: "Will ye no believe it noo? The slogan has ceased, indeed, ...
— The Ontario Readers - Third Book • Ontario Ministry of Education
... understood the situation without explaining to each other their secret motives. There are times in life when such vagueness pleases youthful minds. Just because each had postponed speaking too long, they seemed to be playing a cruel game of suspense. He was trying to discover whether he was beloved, by the effort any confession would cost his haughty mistress; she every minute hoped that he would break ...
— The Ball at Sceaux • Honore de Balzac
... him, and she saw the strong, self-contained face, as he turned to the speaker. A moment's suspense followed; then the man who had accosted him went towards the station entrance, and Carew came slowly in her direction, with his helmet low over his eyes. Thus he did not see her until they were face to face, and in the first moment of recognition she saw him start, ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... the procession was at the gate, and in safety. One by one and two by two those in the fore did enter. Those at the rear scarcely could stand the suspense longer; their backs prickled, their feet quickened in spite of their firm resolve to show no fear; ...
— Boys' Book of Frontier Fighters • Edwin L. Sabin
... character just then, and one not incapable of desperate action had the climax only come at once. But he had more than an hour of it alone at his post; he had a whole hot forenoon of unmitigated suspense, of sickening alarms from tradesmen's carts, boys whistling past the house as though they were not in a wicked world at all, and then a piano-organ that redoubled his watchfulness, and spoilt some tunes for him for ever. Once he did hear shambling ...
— The Camera Fiend • E.W. Hornung
... the house, from room to room, with the lawyer's letter in my bosom (I was afraid by this time even to trust it under lock and key), till the oppression of my suspense half maddened me. There were no signs of Laura's return, and I thought of going out to look for her. But my strength was so exhausted by the trials and anxieties of the morning that the heat of the day quite overpowered me, and after an attempt to get to the door I was obliged to return ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins
... at his first face-to-face meeting with the Pirate Shark. He thought of a thousand things in that one moment—the uncanny cunning of the terrible fish in first cutting him off from all help by biting through his lines, poor Bob waiting up above in agonies of suspense, and above all, the awful fact that unless he conquered quickly, ...
— The Pirate Shark • Elliott Whitney
... the laws of hydrology. The rain which falls from the clouds originally comes from the waters of the earth, being absorbed into the atmosphere by the process of evaporation. The utmost quantity of water that can thus be held in suspense throughout the entire atmosphere is very small; in fact, if precipitated, it would only cover the ground to the depth of about five inches. After the first precipitation of rain, the process of evaporation would have to be repeated; that is, for every additional descent of ...
— Bible Romances - First Series • George W. Foote
... down Howe Street I glanced back at the building which we had left. There, dimly outlined at the top window, I could see the shadow of a head, a woman's head, gazing tensely, rigidly, out into the night, waiting with breathless suspense for the renewal of that interrupted message. At the doorway of the Howe Street flats a man, muffled in a cravat and greatcoat, was leaning against the railing. He started as the hall-light fell ...
— The Adventure of the Red Circle • Arthur Conan Doyle
... though with difficulty, with loss of road, with peril, and the mistakes of a night. In Quimper are Girondin friends, who perhaps will harbour the homeless, till a Bourdeaux ship weigh. Wayworn, heartworn, in agony of suspense, till Quimper friendship get warning, they lie there, squatted under the thick wet boscage; suspicious of the face of man. Some pity to the brave; to the unhappy! Unhappiest of all Legislators, O when ye packed your luggage, some score, or two-score months ago; and mounted this ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... he stood beside Your door in sad "Suspense."[B] We saw the turn in that dark tide With thankfulness intense, My ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, November 14th, 1891 • Various
... after their parting had come the astounding news of the sinking of the liner, followed, by Sherston, by a period of strange, painful suspense, filled with the eager scanning of lists, cables to and from America, finally terminated by an official intimation that poor Kitty had gone down in, ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy
... insensible before, when there appeared no cause for such attacks; but was it strange that at such a moment she should feel that she had caused it?—that her sin perchance had killed her father; he might never wake more to say he forgave, he blessed her,—or that in those agonized moments of suspense she vowed, if he might but speak again, that his will should be hers, even did it demand the annihilation of every former treasured thought! And the vow seemed heard. Gradually and, it appeared, painfully life returned. ...
— The Vale of Cedars • Grace Aguilar
... narrative, the skilled limner of character, the persuasive advocate of good, or other, causes, amounts to a transfer of government, to a change of dynasty, in the historic realm. For the critic is one who, when he lights on an interesting statement, begins by suspecting it. He remains in suspense until he has subjected his authority to three operations. First, he asks whether he has read the passage as the author wrote it. For the transcriber, and the editor, and the official or officious censor on the top of the editor, have played strange tricks, and have much ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton
... a little before you do, for the pleasure of the anxiety and agonising suspense of dreading you won't come and knowing you will." He got up. "If you would turn up at half-past ten—before the crush—we could sort of sit out, and laugh ...
— The Twelfth Hour • Ada Leverson
... the hills above White Slides, early and late, alone with his thoughts, his plans, more and more feeling the suspense of happenings to come. It was on a June day when Jack Belllounds rode to Kremmling that Wade met Columbine on the Buffalo Park trail. She needed to see him, to find comfort and strength. Wade far exceeded his ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey
... were hollow with suspense, and all but Shalah had the hunted look of men caught in a trap. Not till the sun had got above the tree-tops did we venture to leave our posts and think of food. It was now that Elspeth's spirit showed ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan
... their leader, and stood trembling near me; luckily I had left them saddled and bridled in anticipation of an early start, but the other pack was lying there in the dunes. And thus I awaited the abatement of the storm, a prey to the most awful suspense. ...
— A Rip Van Winkle Of The Kalahari - Seven Tales of South-West Africa • Frederick Cornell
... was the only course open to a man of honor. I maintain that his silence then binds him to silence for ever. He has no right to ruin my life and the happiness of my wife by subtle threats, to hold those foolish letters over our heads, like a thunderbolt held ever in suspense. You are ambitious, I believe, Mr. Aynesworth! Get me those letters, and I will make you my secretary, find you a seat in Parliament, and anything else in ...
— The Malefactor • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... fell in with it, realizing the wisdom of going within. But when she found herself in the full glare of the great hall, alone with those shining suits of armour that mounted guard on each side of the fireplace, the awful suspense came upon her with a force that nothing could alleviate. She turned with sick loathing from the tea-tray that David had placed for her so comfortingly close to the fire. Every moment that passed was an added torture. It was dark, it was late. The conviction was growing in her heart that ...
— The Bars of Iron • Ethel May Dell
... it to the Postmaster-General through the Secretary. Not being so addressed, his communication would take rank as gossip; neither meriting nor obtaining any serviceable notice. Two points are still in suspense: whether the people of England as a nation have taken any interest in the uproar caused by Lord John's letter; and secondly, whether the writer of that letter took much interest in it himself. Spite of all the noise and tumult kept up for three months by the Low-Church party, clerks and laymen, ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... sought corroboration of his host, and Faxon, in a cold anguish of suspense, continued to watch him as he turned his glance on Mr. Lavington. One could not look at Lavington without seeing the presence at his back, and it was clear that, the next minute, some change in Mr. Grisben's expression must give ...
— The Triumph Of Night - 1916 • Edith Wharton
... away disconsolate. So it was done. He was changed, another put in his place at Althausen. He had hoped for opposition, he had counted on objections from the Bishop, he thought, in short, that he would remain in suspense for some weeks, perhaps for some months, during which he would have the time to look before him and reflect; but no, all at once: "Go and tell the Abbe Ridoux that you have the cure." Well, and Suzanne? Could he leave Suzanne ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France
... resistance, very excellent redoubts having been erected, and several of the convents strongly fortified, especially that of Santa Clara de la Vega. All minds here are at present in a state of feverish anxiety and suspense, more especially as no intelligence at present arrives from Madrid, which by the last accounts was beleaguered by the bands of Cabrera, Palillos, and Orejita.—But I am interrupted, and I lay ...
— Letters of George Borrow - to the British and Foreign Bible Society • George Borrow
... to Justine's nerves, intolerably stretched, at times, on the rack of solitude, of suspense, of forebodings. She had been thankful when the Gaineses left—doubly thankful when a telegram from Bermuda declared Mrs. Carbury to be "in despair" at her inability to fly to Bessy's side—thankful even that Mr. Tredegar's ...
— The Fruit of the Tree • Edith Wharton
... hackney-coach, and directed the driver to the distant quarter of Berkeley Square. The snow balled under the hoofs of the horses—the groaning vehicle proceeded at the pace of a hearse. At length, and after a period of such suspense, and such emotion, as Sidney never in after- life could recall without a shudder, the coach stopped—the benumbed driver heavily descended—the sound of the knocker knelled loud through the muffled air—and the light from Mr. Beaufort's hall glared full upon the dizzy eyes of the ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 5 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... to tell you that I'm sorry I said those dreadful words when I learned he was dead. But suspense and the doubt that had begun to work had nearly driven me crazy. I don't mind saying, though, that I wish I had kept on meaning them, that I could do what I said I'd do, for I meant them then—I reckon I did! But I haven't any backbone, my will is a poor miserable weak thing that takes a spurt and ...
— Senator North • Gertrude Atherton
... crisp morning in the second week of January when the prolonged agony of suspense drove him to the mountain. His mother was sitting up, and was rapidly recovering her strength. His father had gone back to his work in the iron plant, and his uncle was preparing to return to his charge in South Tredegar. With Uncle Silas and the nurse both ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... breathless suspense. Miss Vilda never would fling away an opportunity of putting a nameless, homeless child under the roof of a minister of the Gospel, even if he was a Baptist, with ...
— Timothy's Quest - A Story for Anybody, Young or Old, Who Cares to Read It • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... in a fever of suspense and misery wondering whether Will's marriage will come off or if, at the last moment, it will be broken. He has been obsessing me these last days. He too—I am certain of it—dreads the Irrevocable, and regrets the rupture between us. I dream of him continually—such restless, tantalising dreams. ...
— Lady Bridget in the Never-Never Land • Rosa Praed
... and midnight was passed by Dick in a state of feverish suspense, that toward the end became almost unendurable, causing him to start and jump at every trivial sound that reached his ear. A dozen times at least he sprang to his feet with the joyous exclamation of "Here he is!" when the flutter of a dry leaf falling from ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... and manner made Frank think of a tiger about to pounce upon its prey, and he felt himself growing cold with suspense and dread as he watched his brother, ...
— Tracy Park • Mary Jane Holmes
... suspicion; but feeling herself hurried along at lightning speed to some dreadful shock, her witless imagination apprehended it in his voice: not what he might say, only the sound. She feared to hear him speak, as the shrinking ear fears a thunder at the cavity; yet suspense was worse ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... could give it them. Misfortune, moreover, had purified the army; all that remained of it could not fail to be its elite both in mind and body. In order to have got so far as they had done, what trials had they not withstood! Suspense, and disgust with miserable cantonments, were sufficient to agitate such men. To remain, appeared to them insupportable; to retreat, impossible; it was, ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... never been, in his observation of her, anything but a tragic figure, an unhappy girl, the farthest removed from serenity and poise. That characteristic capacity for agitation struck him as stronger in her this day. He attributed it, however, to the long strain, the suspense nearing an end. Yet sometimes when her eyes were on him she did not seem to be thinking of her freedom, of ...
— The Lone Star Ranger • Zane Grey
... delivered, by way of soliloquy, gradually rising higher and higher on tiptoe, in her impatience to hear the news, and making a corkscrew of her apron, and a bottle of her mouth. At last, arriving at a climax of suspense, and seeing the Doctor still engaged in the perusal of the letter, she came down flat upon the soles of her feet again, and cast her apron, as a veil, over her head, in a mute despair, and inability to bear ...
— The Battle of Life • Charles Dickens
... broadside-on to the sea, and, our people smartly hauling down our fore-staysail, the brigantine drew slowly ahead and clear of us, our bowsprit-end missing her mainboom by the merest hairbreadth, and the danger was over. But during that minute or so of frightful suspense, which the stranger's crew had spent in rushing madly and aimlessly about the decks, execrating us in voluble Spanish, an opportunity had been afforded us to ascertain that the brigantine was named the San ...
— A Middy in Command - A Tale of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... general handshaking and salutations which followed, the conversation took a different turn, for which Lorimer was devoutly thankful. His face was a tell-tale one,—and he was rather afraid of Philip's keen eyes. "I hope to Heaven he'll speak to her to-day," he thought, vexedly. "I hate being in suspense! My mind will be easier when I once know that he has gained his point,—and that there's not the ghost of a chance for any ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... been there. The Agricultural Bank, that was the place. An obliging hotel clerk—clerks were always obliging to Miss Jeffries—gave her the number and she slipped into the booth feeling a ridiculous amount of excitement and suspense. ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... was to show that a book might be crammed with the most wildly exciting incidents, and yet reveal profound and acute analysis of character, and be written with consummate art. His tales have all the fertility of invention and breathless suspense of Scott and Cooper, while in literary style they immeasurably surpass the finest work of these ...
— Essays of Robert Louis Stevenson • Robert Louis Stevenson
... hand, and with a look of displeasure that required little explanation, would have walked out of the room: when Mr Harrel, in a tone of bitterness and disappointment, called out "Is this lady-like tyranny then never to end?" And Sir Robert, impatiently following her, said "And is my suspense to endure for ever? After so ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... shadowily through the day, unwilling to tell her news to her mother, waiting for her father. Suspense and fear were strong upon her. She dreaded going to Kingston. Her easy dreams disappeared from the ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... said. 'I am; quite calm. Except that my heart is beating so fast that I can hardly breathe, that I have horrible kinds of shivers and a peculiar feeling in my throat, I'm quite all right. Now, just fancy if I had to pretend I wasn't in suspense! If I had no-one to confide in!... Do you think he's mistaken the day? Do you think he thinks it's ...
— Love's Shadow • Ada Leverson
... housekeeping, and also supplements Miss Brown's efforts, which are, to put it mildly, inadequate for the occasion. She does not seem to realise that when people are torn with anxiety they don't appreciate boiled mutton; and that when they sit up half the night, waiting in sickening suspense to hear the next temperature, a hot cup of chocolate can ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... come for her to offer herself to Owen. Whatever his desires might be, his honour would force him to say Yes. So there was no escape. Fate had decreed it so, she was to be his wife; but one thing she need not endure, and that was unnecessary suspense. She had decided to go to Lady Ascott's ball.... But she wouldn't see him there. He was kept indoors by the gout. He had written asking her to come and pass the evening with him.... She might call to see him on her way to the ball; yes, that is what she would do, and ...
— Evelyn Innes • George Moore
... shuffled to keep myself warm, and made frequent attempts to leave him, while with one hand he held the button of my coat, and with the other wiped the perspiration from his brow. I finally took advantage of a suspense while replacing his handkerchief; so abruptly wishing him "good-bye," I went on my way, leaving him to resume his discourse to himself. How long he stood talking after I left him ...
— Talkers - With Illustrations • John Bate
... a sad watcher has reckoned the flying moments as creeping hours, while sitting lonely, with heavy eyes, trembling frame, and heart almost bursting with its weight of suspense—waiting. ...
— Madeline Payne, the Detective's Daughter • Lawrence L. Lynch
... understood him now as never before; and the knowledge inspired a more resolute purpose, if this were possible. That afternoon he was on his way. There came two or three days of terrible suspense for Helen, relieved only by telegrams from Martine as he passed from point to point. The poor girl struggled as a swimmer breasts pitiless waves intervening between him and the shore. She scarcely allowed herself an idle moment; but her effort was feverish and in a measure the result of excitement. ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... she dressed herself in the dress Beaton admired the most, and sat up till a certain hour to receive him. She had fixed a day in her own mind before which, if he came, she would forgive him all he had made her suffer: the mortification, the suspense, the despair. Beyond this, she had the purpose of making her father go to Europe; she felt that she could no longer live in America, with the double disgrace that ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... that he had spoken aloud. In silence he let the girl cross the floor and sit down in the easy chair she called "hers." She dropped into it as if her knees had given way, and looked at Roger. When he did not speak, she could bear the suspense no longer. ...
— The Lion's Mouse • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... received a letter from Paul to say he should not come to Les Peuples as usual, the following day, as he had been invited to a party some of his college friends had got up. The whole of Sunday Jeanne was tortured by a presentiment of evil, and when Thursday came, she was unable to bear her suspense any longer, ...
— The works of Guy de Maupassant, Vol. 5 (of 8) - Une Vie and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant 1850-1893
... remembered him of old in the breathless crisis of some madcap escapade. He was holding up his finger; he was stealing to the window; he was peeping through the blind as though our side street were Scotland Yard itself; he was stealing back again, all revelry, excitement, and suspense. ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... bellowed the stern commandant. "Pay strict attention to what I am about to say. In time of war it sometimes becomes necessary to hoist a flag of truce. This means a suspense of hostilities. The flag of truce is hoisted in this house for all day. It will remain so until twelve o'clock to-night. Respect it. Now break ranks and we'll enjoy our Christmas presents. I hope my army hasn't forgotten its ...
— Marjorie Dean - High School Sophomore • Pauline Lester
... this time the man was gone; and my memory of his words was extraordinarily vague. But a dozen things contrived to keep me in suspense. Every one who came near Lady Turnour had something to say about the weather. Then, for the first time, it occurred to the Aigle to play a trick upon us. Just as the luggage was piled in, after numerous little delays, she cast a shoe; in other words, burst a tyre, apparently without any reason ...
— The Motor Maid • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson
... Joseph were deeply impressed by this powerful effect of the horror which violently agitated the old woman. Their painful suspense was soon ended by the sight of Philippe's convulsed and purple face, his staggering walk, and the horrible state of his eyes, which were deeply sunken, dull, and yet haggard; he had a strong chill upon him, ...
— The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... old Eta Bita Pie like a tornado convention and threaten to engulf the bright, beautiful world and turn it into a howling desert, peopled only by Delta Kappa Whoops and other undesirables. I'm far enough away, now, to forget the heart-bursting suspense and to see only the humor of it. Once I remember the Shi Delts, in spite of everything we could do, managed so to befog the brain of the Freshman class president that he cut a date with us and sequestered himself in the Shi Delt house in an upper back room, with the horrible intention of pledging ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch
... whose face reflects his patient's condition like a mirror may do well enough to examine people for a life-insurance office, but does not belong to the sickroom. The old Doctor did not keep people waiting in dread suspense, while he stayed talking about the case,—the patient all the time thinking that he and the friends are discussing some alarming symptom or formidable operation which he himself is by-and-by—to ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... footsteps muffled; the apartments of the countess were darkened, and nought was heard save the issued whisper, or the stealthy tread of the sick chamber. The Lady Adelaide was ill. Hours elapsed—hours of intolerable suspense to the Lord of Visinara; and then were heard deep, heartfelt congratulations; but they were spoken in a whisper, for the lady was still in danger, and had suffered almost unto death. There was born an heir to Visinara. And as Giovanni, Count of Visinara, ...
— The International Monthly Magazine - Volume V - No II • Various
... to the hospital with her eldest daughter, Bertha. Bart, very anxious and miserable, got the younger boys to bed and tried to cheer up his little sister Alice, who was in a transport of grief and suspense. ...
— Bart Stirling's Road to Success - Or; The Young Express Agent • Allen Chapman
... these difficulties, there remains this great question which we must discuss, and which, if possible, we must settle. I say, notwithstanding some observations to the contrary, that the people of the three kingdoms are looking with anxious suspense at the course which Parliament may take on this question. The right hon. Gentleman the Home Secretary on one occasion spoke of this question, of this proposition, as being something in the nature of a revolution. But, if it be a revolution, after all it is not so great a one as we ...
— Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1 • John Bright
... advance, recede, re-advance, halt. A time of suspense follows. Then they are seen in a state of irregular movement, even confusion; but in the end they carry the heights ...
— The Dynasts - An Epic-Drama Of The War With Napoleon, In Three Parts, - Nineteen Acts, And One Hundred And Thirty Scenes • Thomas Hardy
... narrative of the victim of so daring an outrage had kept every one in suspense; one thing was still expected to make the measure of sensation as full as it had ever been over any criminal case, and that was Mrs. Morton's evidence. She was called by the prosecuting counsel, and slowly, gracefully, she entered the witness-box. There was no doubt that she had felt keenly ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy
... uncle,-and many relations, and more friends, and his own native town, as well as soil ; and he will have the delight of presenting to that uncle, and those friends, his little pet Alex. With all this gratification to one whose endurance of such a length of suspense, and repetition of disappointment, I have observed with gratitude, and felt with sympathy-must not I, too, find pleasure ? Though, on my side, many are the drawbacks - but I ought not, and must not, listen to them. We shall arrange our affairs with all the speed in our power, after ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay
... at the Harsanyis before, she noticed that there was an intense suspense from the moment they took their places at the table until the master of the house had tasted the soup. He had a theory that if the soup went well, the dinner would go well; but if the soup was poor, all was lost. To-night he tasted his soup and smiled, and ...
— Song of the Lark • Willa Cather
... way of comfort, I must tell you, that persons who recover from madness are generally in this way before they are perfectly restored, but whether Bess's faculties will ever regain their former tone, time only will show. At present I am in suspense. Let me hear from you, or see you, and believe me ...
— Mary Wollstonecraft • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... "If anything more happens, I'll be wholly so. Come in, Force. Now, old chap, what's on YOUR mind?" They had entered the study. Mr. Bingle faced his visitor after closing the door carefully behind him. "Out with it? Don't keep me in suspense. Has—has the case ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... and then, startling in the suddenness with which it broke the immediate silence, another sound vibrated through the house, and brought madame to her feet, in a breathless mingling of hope and dread. Some one was knocking sharply on the door below. Followed moments of agonized suspense, culminating in the abrupt invasion of the room by the footman Jacques. He looked round, not ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... did not like ours. I knew that it would be best to show I was ready for her, so as soon as she was within range of my guns I hoisted my colours and fired a shot ahead of her. The next was a moment of suspense, and I believe my people were not a little disappointed when she hoisted an English ensign and fired a gun to leeward. Having sailed close past us and hailed, she brought up at a short distance from me. She then lowered a boat, and Lieutenant Butcher, whom I had before met, came on board, ...
— Hurricane Hurry • W.H.G. Kingston
... seemed to be almost alone in the street. At first there was something almost unfamiliar in her rather startled face, her coiffured hair, her bare neck with its collar of diamonds. There was a moment of suspense. Then he saw something flash into her eyes and he was glad ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... and released him amid the suppressed plaudits of the audience. His reasons for discharge contained severe strictures on the local police, and even suggested their prosecution. Thus, after weeks of agonising suspense and an expenditure on legal fees running into thousands of rupees, Kumodini Babu was declared innocent. He took the humiliation so much to heart, that he meditated retiring to that refuge for storm-tossed souls, Benares. But Ghaneshyam Babu strongly dissuaded him ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... destiny of an empire, while Ch'ung Cheng himself remained on his knees in prayer. At the conclusion of the sacrificial ceremony the tube containing the bamboo fortune-telling sticks was placed in the Emperor's hand by one of the priests. His courtiers and the attendant priests stood round in breathless suspense, watching him as he swayed the tube to and fro; at length one fell to the ground; there was dead silence as it was raised by a priest and handed to the Emperor. It was a short one! Dismay fell on every one present, no one daring to break the painful, horrible silence. After ...
— Myths and Legends of China • E. T. C. Werner
... to us: beyond that purpose of existence, we know not even if they exist. As Providence made the stars for the benefit of earth, so it made servants for the use of gentlemen; and, as neither stars nor servants appear except when we want them, so I suppose they are in a sort of suspense from being, except at those ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... Phaedra complains that I have suffer'd outrage. Who has betray'd me? Speak. Why was I not Avenged? Has Greece, to whom mine arm so oft Brought useful aid, shelter'd the criminal? You make no answer. Is my son, mine own Dear son, confederate with mine enemies? I'll enter. This suspense is overwhelming. I'll learn at once the culprit and the crime, And Phaedra ...
— Phaedra • Jean Baptiste Racine
... Under his banners alone we will fight and conquer." The shout of thousands, their menacing gestures, the fierce clashing of their arms, astonished and subdued the courage of Vetranio, who stood, amidst the defection of his followers, in anxious and silent suspense. Instead of embracing the last refuge of generous despair, he tamely submitted to his fate; and taking the diadem from his head, in the view of both armies fell prostrate at the feet of his conqueror. Constantius used his victory with prudence and moderation; and raising ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 2 • Edward Gibbon
... on a single point; all are watching the gradual birth of so important an event. The wider the influence of the executive power extends, the greater and the more necessary is its constant action, the more fatal is the term of suspense; and a nation which is accustomed to the government, or, still more, one used to the administrative protection of a powerful executive authority, would be infallibly convulsed by an election of this kind. In the United States the action of the government may be slackened ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al
... in quietness, in their excited and restless state. Some said the captain was frightened,— completely cowed by the dangers and difficulties that surrounded us, and was afraid to make sail; while others said that in his anxiety and suspense he had made a free use of brandy and opium, and was unfit for his duty. The carpenter, who was an intelligent man, and a thorough seaman, and had great influence with the crew, came down into the forecastle, and tried to induce them to go aft and ...
— Two Years Before the Mast • Richard Henry Dana
... path! I noted not (so busied was my thought) How much we now had circled of the mount, And of his course yet more the sun had spent, When he, who with still wakeful caution went, Admonish'd: "Raise thou up thy head: for know Time is not now for slow suspense. Behold That way an angel hasting towards us! Lo Where duly the sixth handmaid doth return From service on the day. Wear thou in look And gesture seemly grace of reverent awe, That gladly he may forward us aloft. Consider that this day ne'er dawns again." Time's loss he had so often warn'd ...
— The Divine Comedy • Dante
... and arrangements were being made in the usual manner for the drawing, a buzz of excitement arose among the Sisters. Suspense was written on every face, but no one showed any fear. Custom and habit, which govern so completely the feelings of people, prevented the Sisters from feeling wounded or alarmed at being disposed of in this business-like manner; and therefore they allowed the ceremony ...
— Sister Carmen • M. Corvus
... the rope, and stole along the rail toward the ladder. For a few moments, which seemed like a thousand years, he stood in anguished suspense waiting for Nancy. Then suddenly she came out of the mist and was at his side. They stood for a moment like disembodied spirits, creatures of the night and the fog. The next instant a hand shot out and ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold
... Suspense is perhaps the feeling of all others that is most difficult to be supported. When Deerslayer landed, he fully expected in the course of a few minutes to undergo the tortures of an Indian revenge, and he was prepared to meet ...
— The Deerslayer • James Fenimore Cooper
... from being crowded in narrow quarters in a moist and sultry climate, and partly from want of their accustomed food, for they could not habituate themselves to the vegetable diet of the Indians. Their maladies were rendered more insupportable by mental suffering, by that suspense which frets the spirit, and that hope deferred which corrodes the heart. Accustomed to a life of bustle and variety, they had now nothing to do but loiter about the dreary hulk, look out upon the sea, watch for ...
— The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (Vol. II) • Washington Irving
... were months of anxious suspense on the part of Judge Bigelow and his true friend, who was standing beside him, though invisible in this thing to all other eyes, firm as a rocky pillar. No more endorsements were given, and the paper bearing his name was by this time nearly ...
— The Allen House - or Twenty Years Ago and Now • T. S. Arthur
... and that was, that they developed them in so measured a way. If they were inspired by Roman theologians (and this was taken for granted), why did they not speak out at once? Why did they keep the world in such suspense and anxiety as to what was coming next, and what was to be the upshot of the whole? Why this reticence, and half-speaking, and apparent indecision? It was plain that the plan of operations had been carefully mapped out from ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman
... long in suspense. The swift consternation which made the cashier's color fade when he grasped the fact that the check was for the full amount of her deposit told her all she wished to know. The shadow of her enigmatic ...
— The Fighting Shepherdess • Caroline Lockhart
... Drabdump's knock—these things agitated me and disturbed my rest. I lay tossing on my bed, planning every detail of poor Constant's end. The hours dragged slowly and wretchedly on towards the misty dawn. I was racked with suspense. Was I to be disappointed after all? At last the welcome sound came—the rat-tat-tat of murder. The echoes of that knock are yet in my ear. 'Come over and kill him!' I put my night-capped head out ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... me this morning the draft of the memorial;—probably for nothing, and to receive nothing! so much time is already lost, and only to be kept in suspense by civil words! ...
— Beethoven's Letters 1790-1826, Volume 1 of 2 • Lady Wallace
... determination, however, if fortune favoured me through the night, never to tempt her more. For some hours I proceeded in the torture of suspense, alternately agitated by hope and fear—but by five o'clock in the morning I attained a state of certainty similar to that of a wretch ushered into the regions of the damned. I had lost L3500 guineas, which I had brought with me from the Hazard table, together with L2000 which the bank advanced ...
— The Gaming Table: Its Votaries and Victims - Volume I (of II) • Andrew Steinmetz
... methods of finding a missing man, would direct Mary to the police station at the earliest practicable hour. But time had shown that she had not done so. No, indeed! Mrs. Riley counted herself too benevolently shrewd for that. While she had made Mary's suspense of the night less frightful than it might have been, by surmises that Mr. Richling had found some form of night-work,—watching some pile of freight or some unfinished building,—she had come, secretly, to a different conviction, predicated on her own married experiences; and if Mr. Richling had, ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable
... of refuge I watched eagerly the course of events, until at last all mail facilities were cut off, and I was left to endure the horrors of suspense as well as the irritating consciousness that, although sojourning in the home of my childhood, I was an alien, an acknowledged "Rebel," and as such an object of suspicion and dislike to all save my immediate family. Even these, with the exception of my ...
— Memories - A Record of Personal Experience and Adventure During Four Years of War • Fannie A. (Mrs.) Beers
... without trouble. At the border station we lined up, immigrant fashion, and went through an inspection by a number of the businesslike German militariat attached to the Zollamt, or customs service. For ten minutes I stood in suspense while a fiery-looking officer, with a snapping blue eye, looked through my credentials in silence. He wrote my name in a notebook, looked through my eye as if he would read my very soul, and then, without a remark, passed me ...
— The Log of a Noncombatant • Horace Green
... time draw near, when he should be four months in the same town with his enchantress. This one did not trouble the doctors; he glowed with a steady fire; no heats and chills, and sad misgivings; for one thing, he was not a woman, a being tied to that stake, Suspense, and compelled to wait and wait for others' actions. To him, life's path seemed paved with roses, and himself to march in eternal ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... mounted aloft on the summit of the waves, he sank to rise no more. The swell was so tremendous, that the boats with difficulty reached the buoy; and some fears were entertained lest they should be unable to live in such a sea. After considerable suspense, they returned in safety to the ship, and we proceeded in our rapid course, as if nothing extraordinary had happened. The life-buoy is a most admirable invention. It hangs astern the tafrail, and is dropped by pulling a trigger, which is always done by the person next at hand on ...
— Journal of a Visit to Constantinople and Some of the Greek Islands in the Spring and Summer of 1833 • John Auldjo
... dealer. With the money thus procured they buy beer and drink it in little free-booter's groups sitting in the alley. From beginning to end they have the excitement of knowing that they may be seen and caught by the "coppers," and are at times quite breathless with suspense. It is not the least unlike, in motive and execution, the practice of country boys who go forth in squads to set traps for rabbits or to ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams
... that they do have a definite influence which requires some knowledge of them. Any or all of these facts, however, may be introduced later in the narrative when their need appears; or they may be left in abeyance to enhance the element of suspense ...
— Short Story Writing - A Practical Treatise on the Art of The Short Story • Charles Raymond Barrett
... hundred pairs of superstitious eyes peered into the horrible gloom—two hundred pairs of ears strained at the tomblike stillness. The suspense was awful, and none dared move. Occasionally some familiar sound came from the world outside: the clang of the Tenth Avenue car or the whistle of a tugboat out in the river, but these sounds were of another existence—they seemed distant and unfamiliar ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various
... fell to those who were asked not to write of the war but to practice the gentle art of cheering us all up—an art so easily lost in these days of sorrow, suspense and anxiety—yet we have received many delightful contributions in harmony with this request, and so the cheerful note, the finer optimism, recurs again and again, and is sustained to ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy
... great oath, exclaimed, "If you do not stab him, I will kill you on the spot!" Conceive, for one moment, the situation of the unfortunate Dongo, surrounded by the murdered and the murderers in his own house, at the dead of the night, and without a hope of assistance! The suspense was momentary. Thus adjured, Quintero stabbed ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... footway was overlaid with a strip of planks. These planks were embedded in ice or in liquid thaw, according to the momentary mood of the weather, and the advancing pedestrian traversed them in the attitude, and with a good deal of the suspense, of a rope-dancer. There was nothing in the house to speak of; nothing, to Olive's sense, but a smell of kerosene; though she had a consciousness of sitting down somewhere—the object creaked and rocked beneath her—and of the table at tea ...
— The Bostonians, Vol. I (of II) • Henry James
... I watched with painful suspense the indications of the battle raging there, and was dreadfully impatient at the slow progress of the relieving column, whose advance was marked by the smokes which were made according to orders, but about 2 p.m. I noticed with satisfaction that the smoke of battle about Allatoona grew ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... stood ready saddled in the barn. Effie was clad in her riding suit. As yet the moon had not risen to reduce the starlit magnificence of the velvet summer night sky. Nor was there any sound to warn them that the hours of suspense ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... detain him; at any rate the suspense will be bad for her," the doctors said, and as she did not fret, and seemed quite contented with the strange fancy that she crossed the sea at night to lie in his arms, there was no need to give her any anxiety with regard ...
— Daddy's Girl • L. T. Meade
... Katie. Go on and tell us of the plot," said Ishmael, while Judge Merlin's face grew sharp and peaked in his silent anguish of suspense. But both knew that it was best to let Katie tell her ...
— Self-Raised • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... house in the rue Lafitte, Lola, waiting there in an agony of suspense, heard the rumble of wheels. Rushing downstairs, she stepped back with a cry of terror, for three men were carrying a heavy burden into the hall. Instinctively, she realised that the worst had happened, that her ...
— The Magnificent Montez - From Courtesan to Convert • Horace Wyndham
... expressed in prose. This rule will hold both for characters of high station and for the most humble. In Act I, for example, Portia speaks in prose to her maid "obviously because Shakespeare would lower the pitch and reduce the suspense. In the following scene, the conversation between Shylock and Bassanio begins in prose. But as soon as Antonio appears, Shylock's emotions are roused to their highest pitch, and his speech turns ...
— An Essay Toward a History of Shakespeare in Norway • Martin Brown Ruud
... cool'd: That prompts his hand to draw the deadly sword, Force through the Greeks, and pierce their haughty lord; This whispers soft his vengeance to control, And calm the rising tempest of his soul. Just as in anguish of suspense he stay'd, While half unsheathed appear'd the glittering blade,(57) Minerva swift descended from above, Sent by the sister and the wife of Jove (For both the princes claim'd her equal care); Behind she stood, and by the golden hair Achilles seized; to him alone confess'd; ...
— The Iliad of Homer • Homer
... hamlets, effectually dispelling my visions of a quiet afternoon; and as the minutes passed without bringing any signs of the absentees, Mrs. Haldean became more and more restless and anxious. At length her suspense became unbearable; she rose suddenly, announcing her intention of cycling up the road to look for the defaulters, but as she was moving towards the door, it burst open, and Lucy Haldean staggered into ...
— John Thorndyke's Cases • R. Austin Freeman
... could hear his movements on the roof, moving higher and higher. The suspense was extreme. Then there was silence; even the myowling had ceased. Then a clap of thunder; and then, after that, a terrific clatter on the roof, a bounding downwards as of a great stone, a curse, ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett
... Albert made a furious drive against the Duke. There was a moment of suspense. The Duke did not give way. His arm shot out and the unfortunate Count turned completely round and fell. Charles de Morlay's sword had pierced beneath the right arm pit, entering the lung. The blood streamed from the wounded man's mouth. The ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... This suspense could not last long. The officials ordered the travelers to the carriages; doors were opened and slammed; the engine gave a snort, and only at that moment did Mr. Edward Severne tear the door open and bolt ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade
... straight for Montcalm himself, was half grenadiers, huge men with high-pointed hats, and half Highlanders, with swinging kilts and dancing plumes. The march was a short one; but it seemed long, for at every step the suspense became greater and greater. At last the leading officers suddenly waved their swords, the bugles rang out the CHARGE! and then, as if the four eager columns had been slipped from one single leash together, they dashed at the trees with an exultant roar ...
— The Passing of New France - A Chronicle of Montcalm • William Wood
... growing excitement as the dance progresses. At intervals, one and another of them, leaps to his feet and joins the dance. At the last, the CHISERA, whirling rapidly, falls to the ground. Instantly the rattles are stopped, and the people wait in suspense the word of the gods. The women are seen to steal up through the toyon bushes. The CHISERA lifts herself slowly on one elbow, as if waking from a drugged sleep. She stretches out her hand for the sacred sticks. She drops them with a quick turn of the wrist, gathers them up and drops ...
— The Arrow-Maker - A Drama in Three Acts • Mary Austin
... only drunken nations on the earth. The W. C. T. U. will certainly not claim that drunkenness elevates woman; indeed, its great work for our sex is a splendid protest against this idea. Throughout Christendom millions of wretched women wait in suspense and in terror for the return of drunken husbands, while in heathendom a drunkard's wife cannot be found unless a heathen husband is being Christianized by Christian whiskey. The Chinese women have their ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton |
