"Uncertainly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... into a compact little budget and slipped them into her pocket, and as she rose and looked about uncertainly, she heard her aunt Minerva calling to her from the house that it was high time to go and drive up ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... not know me," Tignonville muttered. But he spoke uncertainly; and his gaze, shifting hither and thither, belied the boldness of ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... then let parental love triumph over pride of dynasty: advise your boy to abdicate at the earliest possible moment. A great king—what better? But it is ill that a throne be sat on by one whose legs dangle uncertainly towards the dais, and ill that a crown settle down over the tip of the nose. And the very fact that for quite inadequate kings men's hands do leap to the salute, instinctively, does but make us, on reflection, the more conscious ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... says the Apostle, 'so run not as uncertainly.' If the runner is now heading that way and now this, making all manner of loops upon his path, of course he will be left hopelessly in the rear. It is the old fable of the Grecian mythology transplanted into Christian soil. The runner who turned aside to pick up the golden apple was disappointed ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture: Romans Corinthians (To II Corinthians, Chap. V) • Alexander Maclaren
... but murdered, and Betty never drew rein until she reached Thicket Point. As she galloped into the yard Bruce Carrington came from the house. At sight of the girl, with her wind-blown halo of bright hair, he paused uncertainly. By a gesture Betty ...
— The Prodigal Judge • Vaughan Kester
... towering trees, began to loom up uncertainly in the darkness, and Henry knew that the boat was slipping into the harbor. Presently he became aware of a dark spot ahead of them on the water, then another, and another; and straining his eyes, he saw that before them lay a great company of motor-boats and sailing ...
— The Secret Wireless - or, The Spy Hunt of the Camp Brady Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... off the abyss and fixed on the opposing hill, and as the long curve before me was diminished by successive sharp advances, still my heart was caught half-way in every breath, and whatever it is that moves a man went uncertainly within me, mechanical and half-paralysed. The great height with that narrow unprotected ribbon across it was ...
— The Path to Rome • Hilaire Belloc
... of Titus, two of the legionaries simultaneously let fly their javelins. But the mute, hobbling uncertainly, was not a steady mark and under the whistle of arrows received and sent, he blundered up the causeway leading to the Gate of the Old Wall, and the portal slowly and ponderously ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller
... are lastly given to understand that his life was so strange that its details would be incredible. What these incredible details may have been, I have no means of knowing. It is enough that he was a strange unsubstantial being, flitting uncertainly about in the twilight regions of society, emerging by fits and starts into visibility, afflicted with a general vagueness as to the ordinary duties of mankind, and generally taking much more opium than was good for him. He tells us, indeed, that he broke off his over-mastering ...
— Hours in a Library, Volume I. (of III.) • Leslie Stephen
... right," hazarded St. John rather uncertainly. "We may have been too ready to assume Nan won't be happy ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... catch the breath and quicken the pulses—that surging sea of black heads, uncovered in token of mourning; that forest of arms beating the air to a deafening chorus of orthodox lamentation; while a portrait of Ghandi, on a black banner, swayed uncertainly in the midst. ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... meant the cathedral," she said, a little uncertainly, recollecting the tone in which Mr. Clare had just been spoken of, and thinking that perhaps Miss Keith might be a curatolatress, "I am afraid it is not of much benefit to people living at this distance, and there is not much to be ...
— The Clever Woman of the Family • Charlotte M. Yonge
... of the path darkness closed in rapidly; the outlines of objects loomed uncertainly distant through the forest. Gradually I became aware that at the end of a dim vista down which I was hurrying, something white had formed itself in the path. I stopped to look, but could make out nothing clearly. It remained dimly ahead, and I approached, ...
— Shapes that Haunt the Dusk • Various
... just a mild forerunner of the heights before you," he said laughingly, as he carefully helped her mount the high step before which she had stood uncertainly. ...
— The Boy from Hollow Hut - A Story of the Kentucky Mountains • Isla May Mullins
... into the little cracked glass. Just then she was pretty, with the glow on her cheeks and the sparkle in her eyes. Her uncertainly tinted hair and an all-too-certain little tilt of her nose no longer troubled her. Such things did not matter; nobody would mind them in a successful artist. And Mr. Stephens had said that she had talent enough to ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1905 to 1906 • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... He rapped uncertainly on the window, and then, as the waiter did not immediately appear, he threw some silver on the table, and aimed himself in the direction of the cab. I got in. ...
— Sacred And Profane Love • E. Arnold Bennett
... have his head so that he could pick his way among submerged boulders. There came a spot where the banks sloped gently again, and here he rode out upon a bit of springy sward, ringed with alder and willow. As he dismounted Gloria looked uncertainly about her. Damp underfoot and a paradise for mosquitoes, was her thought. He caught her look ...
— The Everlasting Whisper • Jackson Gregory
... uncertainly round the circle of faces staring at her. The lips opened and made the motions of speech, but no sound came from them. Without ...
— The Fighting Edge • William MacLeod Raine
... uncertainly before Lancelot's eyes, but he got through them all at last. He felt chilled and numbed. He averted his face as he handed the letter back to ...
— The Grey Wig: Stories and Novelettes • Israel Zangwill
... long breath. Her eager thumb was almost under the flap of the envelope when she hesitated, eyed the letter uncertainly, and thrust it into the pocket of her calico gown. All day it lay there, save at times— which, indeed, were of frequent occurrence—when she took it from its hiding-place, pressed it to her cheek, or gloried in every curve of the boldly ...
— Across the Years • Eleanor H. Porter
... Donald uncertainly. "I can't understand it at all. He said he was coming in to his old shanty on this fork of the Beaver when ...
— The Wilderness Trail • Frank Williams
... wrappers was a pocket memorandum book, a simple thing of cheap red leather. Some one laughed uncertainly. Satherwaite, very red, ran his finger over the edges of the leaves, examined it long, as though he had never seen anything like it before, and placed it in ...
— The New Boy at Hilltop • Ralph Henry Barbour
... a curious sinking feeling of being shoved into a discard. And then Miss Susie came hurrying back into the room. In her hand she carried a small bundle of red flannel cloth freshly cut from the bolt. Zenie eyed her uncertainly. ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... man, looking with some astonishment at the small figure before him, with its tumbled red curls. "I don't suppose you are the owner of a—" he broke off uncertainly. ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton
... you'll have it all your way to-night. It's pouring hogsheads. Your deal, Sharp. (They play in silence. Poe enters, rear, walks uncertainly across the room and takes a seat, right, front. There seems to be life only in his eyes, their burning light revealing a soul struggling free from a corpse. He sits unnoticed for ...
— Semiramis and Other Plays - Semiramis, Carlotta And The Poet • Olive Tilford Dargan
... his vest pocket, but he replaced the cigar uncertainly: it seemed not quite the thing to smoke. Ought he to go to Peter? In his mind's eye he saw the poor fellow haunting the landing by Caddy's door; he had an idea that in some way he kept things quiet by doing this. And how could one be sure that ...
— In The Valley Of The Shadow • Josephine Daskam
... and he was a man of his word. He walked straight out of the Casino; but uncertainly, feebly, as a man who has received a staggering blow between the eyes, as a man who has been pitched into a mountain-pool in January, as a somnambulist who has wakened to find himself on the edge of ...
— A Great Man - A Frolic • Arnold Bennett
... he; but it was not the Father Damaso of heretofore, so vigorous and alert. He walked uncertainly, and ...
— An Eagle Flight - A Filipino Novel Adapted from Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... ringing that called me, and I could not listen to more. My brain was whirling uncertainly, and I doubted if I ought to believe my ears. I went back to my work more dazed and bewildered than ever in my youthful days. I forgot the wonder of the morning. It was quite outshone by the wonder of the afternoon. I longed for my ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... unexpected that my knees almost gave way. The people were still standing, wavering, looking uncertainly toward us. I raised my voice again, and if it sounded unnatural my hearers probably thought it was because I ...
— The Story of a Pioneer - With The Collaboration Of Elizabeth Jordan • Anna Howard Shaw
... a bang. Dan pulled Bonfire's head into position and lightly laid the whip over the all too obvious ribs. Bonfire, his head bobbing ludicrously on his thin neck and his stubby tail keeping time at the other end of him, moved uncertainly up the ...
— Horses Nine - Stories of Harness and Saddle • Sewell Ford
... it bores you. I mean you needn't do it as a favor." The words tumbled out in haste, and though he tried to keep his face casual it screwed up uncertainly. Anthony was compelled to protest: "Bore me? I should ...
— The Beautiful and Damned • F. Scott Fitzgerald
... train at Torquay station, Ashurst wandered uncertainly along the front, for he did not know this particular queen of English watering places. Having little sense of what he had on, he was quite unconscious of being remarkable among its inhabitants, and strode along ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... that but for her the tutor would not have been there. Then 'Sink you! I wish he had flogged you all!' she shrieked, and, turning stiffly, she went mumbling and cursing down the stairs, the lace lappets of her head trembling, and her gold-headed cane now thumping the floor, now waving uncertainly ...
— The Castle Inn • Stanley John Weyman
... Driscoll gazed uncertainly at the Empress, as though she had somehow arrested his thoughts. Then, as a strong man rushing from danger, he comprehended that here was a frail woman ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... interruption. But Winsome went across and pulled the heavy plaid gently off her grandfather's shoulder. Then she stood quietly by him with one hand upon his head and with the other she gently stroked his brow. A milder light grew in his dull eye, and he put up his hand uncertainly as if to ...
— The Lilac Sunbonnet • S.R. Crockett
... for this hour. Indirectly he owed to Claridge Pasha all that he had become. The day in which David knocked him down saw the depths of his degradation reached, and, when he got up, it was to start on a new life uncertainly, vaguely at first, but a new life for all that. He knew, from a true source, of Eglington's personal hatred of Claridge Pasha, though he did not guess their relationship; and all his interest was enlisted for the man who had, as he knew, urged ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... the game scout; but his voice was drowned by the howling and barking of the savage dogs as they made their charge. In a moment all was confusion among the buffalo. Some started this way, others that, and the great mass swayed to and fro uncertainly. A few were ready to fight, but the snow was too deep for a countercharge upon the dogs, save on the ice just in front of them, where the wind had always full sweep. There all was slippery and shining! In their excitement and confusion ...
— Indian Child Life • Charles A. Eastman
... backward, listening to the voices droning on the stage, but there remained still a moment of liberty, and she glanced uncertainly about at Winston. ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... That will do." Herrick watched him as he hesitated, uncertainly. "Don't let me detain you." He held the door ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... there were ten planes flying about uncertainly. Suddenly one of these turned, heading for the ground far below, its wings screaming their protest as the motors roared, ever faster, with the gravity of the planet aiding them. There was a rending, crackling crash as the wings suddenly bent back along the ...
— The Black Star Passes • John W Campbell
... hand more particularly, it was thought, on ourselves, as we stood a few yards apart from the rest. "Willie is worse," were the only words she said, as we hastened back together; and on entering the room, we found the old man uncertainly pacing the floor by himself, but with a composed countenance. "He expressed a wish to see you—but he is gone!" We followed into Willie's small bedroom and study, and beheld him already laid out, and his mother sitting as calmly beside him as if she were watching his sleep. ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... to the post of third assistant foreign teller, and who no longer deemed it proper to associate with his erstwhile companions in the "galleys," emerged from his cage and, coming abruptly upon the shivering bookkeeper, blinked uncertainly for a moment and then said in what was unmistakably a ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... He peered uncertainly at Bolden. The microscreen distorted his vision, too. "We're making progress though it may not seem so to you. When a mixture of a calcium salt plus two antihistamines is added to a certain neobiotic, the result is that the ...
— Bolden's Pets • F. L. Wallace
... She began to search her mind for an answer. Then she smiled uncertainly, a wan, small smile. It was very clear; what she had lost was all interest in life and all hope for the brave tomorrow. Nothing remained of all those lovely dreams which she had built up by day and night about the figure of Pierre le Rouge. He was gone, and ...
— Riders of the Silences • Max Brand
... death,—his bonny Margaret! She was like a dead thing now: what need to torture her longer? Let him be manly and go out to his solitary life, taking the remembrance of what he had done with him for company. He rose uncertainly,—then came to her: was that the way to ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. IX., March, 1862., No. LIII. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics, • Various
... that which before she had uncertainly experienced, the immodest character of that mother's beauty. With the pearls in her fair hair, with neck and arms bare in a corsage the delicate green tint of which showed to advantage the incomparable ...
— Cosmopolis, Complete • Paul Bourget
... house was still so quiet, Deborah was still upstairs. At last, one night upon leaving his study, he stopped uncertainly in the hall. He took more time than was his wont in closing up the house for the night, in trying all the windows, in turning out the various lights. Room after room he left in the dark. Then he went slowly up the stairs, his hand gratefully feeling those guiding points grown ...
— His Family • Ernest Poole
... course by the Professors, who were still staying in the house. My father remembered Mrs. Humdrum's good honest face, but could not bring Dr. Downie to his recollection till the Doctor told him when and where they had met, and then he could only very uncertainly recall him, though he vowed that he could now ...
— Erewhon Revisited • Samuel Butler
... held him fast. At sight of the weapon, their own gas projector, still clutched in the flyer's hand, the pursuers halted. Their long arms pointed and their shrill calls joined in a chorus that quavered and fell uncertainly. ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, December 1930 • Various
... As he went uncertainly up one of these narrow lanes and down another, leading north or south out of Cheapside, as the case might be, the rabble began to gather about him and to bait him with jeers of ...
— A Boy's Ride • Gulielma Zollinger
... distress were too visible to be disregarded, by Mr. Copley at least. Her hand was trembling too. His still held the glass, but he looked uncertainly at Dolly, and asked her why it should not be good for him? Every gentleman in the land drank wine—that ...
— The End of a Coil • Susan Warner
... frank and superior cynicism, but this affected me quite not at all and I took pains to point my indifference, chatting with increased urbanity with the two cow-persons, Hank and Buck, who had entered rather uncertainly, not in evening dress, to be sure, but in decent black as befitted their stations. When I had prevailed upon them to surrender their hats to the vestiare and had seated them at a table for two, they informed me in hoarse undertones that they were ...
— Ruggles of Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... warm," he said, in explanation. "I have been trying to get things to rights. I—" He was speaking in some obvious embarrassment, and looked uncertainly toward the intruder for help. But Holcombe made no explanation, and gave him no greeting. "I heard in the hotel that you were here," the other continued, still striving to cover up the difficulty of the situation, "and I am sorry to hear that ...
— The Exiles and Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... swayed uncertainly, dazed and gasping, while her hair, shaken loose from its knot, slowly cascaded over one shoulder. Then stumbling, groping, with a hand on a chair, against the frame of the door, she went out of ...
— Cytherea • Joseph Hergesheimer
... very long ago at the beginning of all wonders. Sun, moon and stars were new; they wandered about in the clouds uncertainly, calling to one another like ships in a fog. It was the same on earth; neither trees, nor rivers, nor animals were quite sure why they had been created or what was expected of them. They were terribly afraid of doing wrong and they had good reason, for the Man and Woman had done ...
— Christmas Outside of Eden • Coningsby Dawson
... not answer at once. He looked closer at her. "You look a bit fagged," he said, uncertainly. Perhaps he felt a softer appeal about her which took him back ...
— Suzanna Stirs the Fire • Emily Calvin Blake
... we'd better let father see it,' Mrs Griffith said, a little uncertainly; 'it'll do no good and it'll only ...
— Orientations • William Somerset Maugham
... his shadow later, moving uncertainly across the shades in the upper chamber where Sympathy Gibbs lay with her baby, his hand lifted once with the fingers crooked in mysterious agony. Some one started a hymn in the street below and people took it up, bawling desperately for comfort to their souls. Mate Snow didn't ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1917 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... man, the tilted chair tipped uncertainly, he clutched wildly at the smooth wall, and landed in an undignified heap in the middle of the kitchen floor, rapping his head ...
— Tabitha at Ivy Hall • Ruth Alberta Brown
... no avail to resist," came the girl's choking voice. She stretched out her little hand, and then, looking up at him, said, uncertainly: "I—may never speak with you again alone, senor, and I must pray to—cease loving you; but will you—kiss me once so that I ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach
... nights lay as black, dreary, and desolate as a mountain track. Soon after the frost began, a gentleman had been set upon in this lane as he picked his way between the corner where the bus had set him down, and his home where the fire was blazing, and his wife watched the clock. He was stumbling uncertainly through the gloom, growing a little nervous because the walk seemed so long, and peering anxiously for the lamp at the end of his street, when the two footpads rushed at him out of the fog. One caught him from behind, the other struck him with a heavy bludgeon, ...
— The Hill of Dreams • Arthur Machen
... fingers together spoke of some agitation. He tried to master himself; but he was under the empire of an emotion of which he himself had not exactly grasped the meaning nor estimated the power. He walked to the window and back again somewhat uncertainly; then paused at about two yards' distance from her kneeling figure, and addressed her in a voice which he kept carefully free ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... to produce, and he would produce that effect. When the shot struck plump in the Turkish lines, and we could see the earth leap up into the air like geysers of muddy water, and each gunner would wave his cap and cheer, Frantzis would only smile uncertainly, and begin again, with the aid of his field-glasses, to puzzle ...
— Notes of a War Correspondent • Richard Harding Davis
... Princess sighed and came down from her golden throne and wandered out into the garden. She walked uncertainly, for now that she was no longer blind she did not know where she was going. And there, under the trees where she had been sleeping a few hours back, stood a man with his face ...
— All the Way to Fairyland - Fairy Stories • Evelyn Sharp
... strife goes on to the last syllable of recorded time—not between mother and child, as you are prone to imagine, but between the two great principles of Good and Evil, so widely allegorised and personified, yet so uncertainly grasped, and so loosely defined. The result is sad enough: physically, not one in ten of us is what the doctor ordered, and, of course, brought; mentally, we are mostly fools; morally, we are, in a sense, little better than we ought to be. And such ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... vague rumors, and rumors not so vague, began to float through the town that, financially, all was not well with Mrs. Polly Chilton. Certain railroad stocks, in which it was known that the Harrington estate had been heavily interested, wavered uncertainly, then tumbled into ruin and disaster. Other investments, according to report, were in a most precarious condition. From the doctor's estate, little could be expected. He had not been a rich man, and his expenses had been heavy ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter
... moment she found herself on the platform, and the train soon went on. Everything about the station looked unfamiliar, and glancing up, she saw by a large sign that she was at Newark! She had never before been in Newark, though she knew in a general way where it was. She went uncertainly into the station, and looked at the clock. It was after five. Marjorie knew she could take another train, and proceed to Jersey City, and so to New York, but her courage had failed her, and she couldn't bear the thought of travelling ...
— Marjorie at Seacote • Carolyn Wells
... and at once bumped against a low, iron fence. At first I believed this to be an area railing, but, on following it, I found that it stretched for a long distance, and that it was pierced at regular intervals with gates. I was standing, uncertainly, with my hand on one of these, when a square of light suddenly opened in the night, and in it I saw, as you see a picture thrown by a biograph in a darkened theatre, a young gentleman in evening dress, and, back of him, the lights of a hall. I guessed, from its elevation ...
— Ranson's Folly • Richard Harding Davis
... at her then, uncertainly, brokenly, but he laughed. "Oh, no you don't, my lady," he said. "You've got to keep strong and well to take care of me. You want to get sick so ...
— Sunny Slopes • Ethel Hueston
... doesn't know her own, of course." Ryder paused uncertainly. "She's in Cairo," he began again vaguely. "She'd be just about the right age—eighteen or so. She—she's had awf'ly hard luck." ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... listened in motionless amazement But he had now paused, almost choking with his rush of emotion, his excitement, his sense of triumph, and straight ensued a certain reluctance, a dull negation, a prophetic recoil from responsibility that clogged his resolve. His eyes roved uncertainly about the familiar domestic scene, darkening now, duskily purple beneath the luminous pearly and roseate tints of the twilight sky. The old woman was a-drowse on the porch of the rickety little log-cabin beneath the gourd vines, the paralytic grandfather came hirpling ...
— Una Of The Hill Country - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... and indirect guidance it was revealed to you that Fuh—that any Being of my superior race was, on the contrary—" The menace of Pe-lung's challenging eye, though less direct and assured than formerly, had the manner of being uncertainly restrained by a single much-frayed thread, but Chang Tao continued to meet it with ...
— Kai Lung's Golden Hours • Ernest Bramah
... ran from the room, into the hallway, out of the door, and down the stoop to Fortieth Street. He looked about uncertainly, then espied across the way a tailor shop, where the light of the late workman still burned. Monty hurried thither and asked the use of the telephone upon ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... slip! Move, if you dare and I’ll plug you with your own gun.” And he stood behind the man, using him as a shield while Morgan and the rest of the army hung near the boat-house uncertainly. ...
— The House of a Thousand Candles • Meredith Nicholson
... hesitated. His face flushed, and he looked up uncertainly at the goggles. "He used to teach, I told you," was the evasive answer, "until his ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... cloak around her shoulders, and then, as she fumbled with it uncertainly, he fastened ...
— The Odds - And Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... and she sprang lightly to the top of the steps. In a second he was by her side, both of them balancing somewhat uncertainly on the top of the stone wall. "I won't let you ...
— The Inn at the Red Oak • Latta Griswold
... never uncertain. Her progress was easy, and, although different, was quite as graceful as if she were promenading the piazza, proving that she was an adept in mountain-climbing. It was evident, however, that to Miss Wildmere a mountain was a terra incognita. She trod uncertainly, her feet turned on loose stones that hurt her, and before the first steep ascent was passed, she panted and was glad to sit down with others, more or ...
— A Young Girl's Wooing • E. P. Roe
... been hitherto drowned by a thorough-bass of snores, but now they became suddenly audible. Most of the sleepers started up with a cry, saw the cause of the disturbance on his feet, tottering uncertainly, and cursed him in concert for ...
— The Magic Skin • Honore de Balzac
... clear. The Judge had left no room for uncertainty or argument, and the boy did not attempt to argue or even to answer. He stood looking uncertainly down at the Judge, as if for the moment he could not see anything in the room quite distinctly, the Judge's face, with its near-sighted blue eyes and red-gold beard and thinning hair, or ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton
... of irregular conduct. Then the said "smith of calumny," [219] as the Italian says, takes the names of the plaintiffs and defendants, and a few facts; and then puts it all in the book from beginning to end [de pe a pa], without omitting one iota. And this is not to speak uncertainly; for in the archives of the court will be found the chart which was discovered in the possession of a certain rabula named Silva, who, in addition to this had skill in counterfeiting ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume 40 of 55 • Francisco Colin
... Fresno raised his finger uncertainly over the keyboard searching for a key from which to make a start. The group watched him expectantly. As he struck a note each member of his audience jumped back in surprise at the sound. Fresno ...
— The Round-up - A Romance of Arizona novelized from Edmund Day's melodrama • John Murray and Marion Mills Miller
... had come. Up, up we went. We seemed to hover uncertainly, tilted, hair-poised over a yawning gulf. Were we going to upset? Mental agony screamed in me. But, no! We righted. Dizzily we dipped over; steeply we plunged down. Oh! it was terrible! We were in a hornets' nest of angry waters ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... armchair near the fire, clasped her little granddaughter to her with the gesture of a drawing-room Niobe, and Anna, seated near them, had fallen into one of the attitudes of vivid calm which seemed to Darrow to express her inmost quality. Sophy Viner, after moving uncertainly about the room, had placed herself beyond Mrs. Leath, in a chair near the piano, where she sat with head thrown back and eyes attached to the musician, in the same rapt fixity of attention with which she had followed the players at the Francais. The accident of her having fallen ...
— The Reef • Edith Wharton
... was Watauga. The strings of brilliants that led from it were arc lights at switch crossings where the great railway lines rayed out. Near at hand was Cottonville with its vast bulks of lighted mills whose hum came faintly up to him even at this distance. MacPherson stood uncertainly in the middle of the road. Supper and bed were behind him. But he had not the heart to turn back to either. Somewhere down in that abyss of night, there was a clue—or there were many clues—to this strange absence ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... behind him, and he was out on the street once more. Came into view a figure which was clearly that of a stranger to Bellevale, and yet had an oddly familiar air to Brassfield, as it moved uncertainly along the darkening highway. It came to the point of meeting and ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... Ted—-oh, Ted, I know I do," she says uncertainly—and then Oliver, if he were there, would have stepped forward to bow like an elegant jack-knife at the applause most righteously due him for perfect staging, for he really could not have managed better about the kiss ...
— Young People's Pride • Stephen Vincent Benet
... my friend," she said uncertainly; "but I cannot—not now. Not until I know, M'sieu. Without many hands at the paddles how can ...
— The Maid of the Whispering Hills • Vingie E. Roe
... for a moment uncertainly. Then he threw up his head and barked twice, wagging his tail. She put out her hand and stroked his head. The great fellow whined with pleasure. Then he took her hand in his mouth and turned up the ...
— The Brother of Daphne • Dornford Yates
... his slow, difficult approach over the gravel. He came forward without making the slightest recognition of their presence. Stopping full in front of them, he took off his hat, applied a straggling red handkerchief uncertainly to his face, and stared ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1915 - And the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... his pencil through Stubby Abbott's name. Stubby's signature was rather liberally inscribed there, he thought. Betty looked at him a trifle uncertainly. ...
— Poor Man's Rock • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... tied her bonnet-strings in a firmer knot as she looked at him uncertainly, then, not deigning to cast another glance in the direction of her daughter, who was disappearing up the stairs, swept ...
— Mr. Opp • Alice Hegan Rice
... came out alone and paused within a few yards of him. She was almost the last to leave the hall, and she stood looking uncertainly about her as if wondering why he did not show himself. Then a man's figure approached, coming so close to her that under their formless wrappings they seemed ...
— Ethan Frome • Edith Wharton
... a taxi rattled up the street at a characteristic break-neck speed, stopping abruptly at the shop next door, a dingy jeweller's. From the taxi stepped a woman, young, smartly dressed. She paid the fare, then stood looking somewhat uncertainly at the name ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... the slow tone of one used to matters too serious for common speech. The boy cast a hurried glance at me, smiled uncertainly, and moved uneasily on his seat. His father turned away and made a remark to ...
— Wilfrid Cumbermede • George MacDonald
... and lunged again—and about his legs came the soft clasp of the drifting hyacinth roots. Higher, firmer; and he turned to kick free of them. He saw the man in the boat poling uncertainly in the tide not six feet beyond him. And now, in open water, Tedge plunged on in fierce exultance. One stroke—and the stars beyond the boatman became obscured; the swimmer struck the soft, yielding barrier of the floating islands. This time he did not lose time in drawing from them; he raised ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various
... I catch the tone from wondrous voices brimming, Which sensuous on the warm wind drifts to me, While, streaked with misty light uncertainly, The very heavens ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VII. • Various
... Jim smiled a little uncertainly. "I can't leave mama, and the money I'll get this summer will buy my clothes for a year and something for me to put in the bank. I'm all right. It's just that since—since you know I saw Dad——" and to his utter shame Jim began to sob. He dropped his head ...
— Still Jim • Honore Willsie Morrow
... dining-room, Dr. Robert Mackenzie was standing on the hearth-rug in a Napoleonic attitude, just as on the morning of their first interview. He looked up uncertainly ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... you grieve, once upon a time, for my woman died in childbirth, too. You remember? But my daughter lives, and she has brought sunshine into my old age. That is the purpose of children." He paused and shifted his weight uncertainly, digging his stiff black toes into the dirt. After a time he said, slowly: "Excellency! Now, ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach
... story of the streets was repeated. A dingy gas-jet shed a faint light, as though reluctantly awake; behind a small partition, half counter, half desk, a wan and sleepy—looking man was cowering over a stove. As the boy entered he looked up uncertainly, then he rose and smiled, for your Parisian is exhausted indeed when he fails ...
— Max • Katherine Cecil Thurston
... it. Our own fancy must fill up the story of the unrecorded patience of the workshop, into which we seem to peep through these scanty notices—the fatigue, the disappointments, the steps repeated, ending at last in that moment of success, which is all Pausanias records, somewhat uncertainly. ...
— Greek Studies: A Series of Essays • Walter Horatio Pater
... mean, John,' said Alan, a trifle uncertainly, 'that you are sorry you let go? That you ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... near the tower, which loomed uncertainly through the fog, and they strode down the slope to the stone pier. The mist lay low on the water, and only the wet stones of the jetty, and a boat or two floating in the angle between the jetty and the shore, were visible. The ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman
... Eddo enjoyed it very much for a while; then his head began to nod over his plate, his spoon waved uncertainly in the air, and Maggie had to be sent for to take him away ...
— Jimmy, Lucy, and All • Sophie May
... Lydia laughed uncertainly. "I see that you're a dear old blarney, Billy. And I know one thing I have got that not one girl in a thousand has and that is the friendship of some of the best men in the world. In lots of ways, I'm very lucky. Honestly, I am! Trot on home, Billy. I've got to get supper. ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow
... broken pauses—a procession which advanced, paused, halted, broke into groups; advanced, paused, stopped, and stooped; a procession which came with wailings and bitter cries, with wringing of hands, with heads now and then laid upon the shoulders of others for support; a procession which stooped uncertainly, horribly. It was the women of Louisburg coming to seek their slain—a sight most monstrous, most terrible, unknown upon any field of civilized war, and unfit to be tolerated even in the thought! It is for men, who sow the fields of battle, ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough
... hasty exclamation, an exclamation uttered as though the words had affrighted her. Whereafter, with quivering lips, she began hesitantly and uncertainly ...
— Through Russia • Maxim Gorky
... abstractions are beyond its range. Hence the more definite and concrete its presentation of facts, the better will be its effect. The reporter should never generalize or present his statements hazily and uncertainly—a fact is a fact and must be presented as such. He must try to avoid such expressions as "several," "many," "a few"—it is usually possible to give the exact number. He must continually ask himself "how many?" "what kind?" "exactly when?" "exactly what?" Expressions ...
— Newspaper Reporting and Correspondence - A Manual for Reporters, Correspondents, and Students of - Newspaper Writing • Grant Milnor Hyde
... but the eyes of the other two men were staring wide open towards the unexpected figure, which seemed to bring a taste of fresh pure air into the feverish atmosphere of the place. The girl stopped uncertainly when she saw the two strangers, and bowed her head slightly as the mistress of a house might welcome any one whom she found in her drawing-room. She was entirely above and apart from her surroundings. It was not ...
— Cinderella - And Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... uncertainly, but always running away from the howls of the wolves, and just before she reached the little creek, she stopped and looked back, as if for a sight of pursuers—and there were pursuers. Perhaps a hundred yards back of her I saw four or five slinking dark forms; for the ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick
... fantasy, friend and companion of my soul. You wonder at this dark language; blame me not. My spirit, like the denizen of another world, cannot bear the chill and frosty moonlight—it shakes off the dust of the grave; it soars away, and, like the moonlight, dimly discovers all things darkly and uncertainly. You know that it is to you alone that I write down the pictures which fall on the magic-glass of my heart, assured that you will guess, not with cold criticism, but with the heart, what I would describe. Besides, next August, your happy bridegroom will himself ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 53, No. 331, May, 1843 • Various
... binnacle lamps upon the helmsman's face and hands and the upper part of the wheel, and the ghostly image of some twelve feet of the mainmast, part of the fife rail round it, and such portions of the running gear as were belayed to the pins therein, all glimmering uncertainly in as much of the cabin light as made its way out on deck, through the door by which I had emerged. Beyond these patches of dim illumination, and the coming and going of a spark on the forecastle, where one of the watch sucked meditatively at his pipe, all ...
— Overdue - The Story of a Missing Ship • Harry Collingwood
... exalted in spirit, Dominic walked on rapidly across the Green between the iron railings, conscious of colour, of light, and of sound; but unobservant of the details of his immediate surroundings, until a drifting female figure barred his path, undulating uncertainly before him. He moved to the right to let it pass. It moved to the right also. He moved to the ...
— The Far Horizon • Lucas Malet
... moments the five men sorted themselves among the ladies. Old Mr. Burnaby and young Donnington went and sat by Bubbles, the gloomy-looking James Tapster also finally sidling uncertainly towards her. Sir Lyon civilly devoted himself to Miss Burnaby; and Lionel Varick came over to where Blanche Farrow was sitting, and said something to her in ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes
... in Scotland were ones of hard work, and the chief joy I knew came with Dina's letters. The mails were slow in those days, and they came too uncertainly for me, you may be sure. But each brought me, in addition to a budget of news, just a bit of Dina's lovely personality. I saw her, in her letters, growing into sweet womanhood, and, as I sometimes stretched myself in meditation on Arthur's Seat, far above old Edinburgh, my thoughts were ...
— The Mermaid of Druid Lake and Other Stories • Charles Weathers Bump
... was setting as they climbed through a wide stretch of greasewood to the first rough rock heaps of the mountains. Then DeWitt paused uncertainly. ...
— The Heart of the Desert - Kut-Le of the Desert • Honore Willsie Morrow
... or, "A man of means . . . has a house of his own." When they passed the buffet Anna had a great longing for something sweet; she was fond of chocolate and apple cakes, but she had no money, and she did not like to ask her husband. He would take a pear, pinch it with his fingers, and ask uncertainly: ...
— The Party and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... uncertainly to himself, "they're no better off, except they've got weapons.... If that man from the Golden City hadn't ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... may have dragged at his legs, none sounded in the great bellowing command that flooded the room. At the compelling volume of the sound every man whirled and eight empty hands shot skyward. Their startled eyes beheld a man's squat body weaving uncertainly on the limbs of an insect, while in each hand shone a blue-black Colt that waved and circled ...
— Pardners • Rex Beach
... appeared just above the surface of the bunk between Trigger's pillow and the wall. It dropped with a small thump and stood balanced uncertainly. Trigger slept on. ...
— Legacy • James H Schmitz
... hat quickly. "Good-bye, Walter," he said quietly, and, ignoring his sister, fumbled a little uncertainly for the ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... one by one into the grave of the past. She had begun her song feebly and uncertainly; but when she really heard the sound of her own voice echoing through the lofty room, with a gush of melody that the old walls had not known for centuries, there came upon her an intoxication of enjoyment. It was that pure enjoyment ...
— Christian's Mistake • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... a while; it had grown quite dark in the room as he muttered to himself. He rose now, rather cumbrously and uncertainly, but with a ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... strange things that Graham came upon that night, none jarred more upon his habits of thought than this place. The spectacle of the little pink creatures, their feeble limbs swaying uncertainly in vague first movements, left alone, without embrace or endearment, was wholly repugnant to him. The attendant doctor was of a different opinion. His statistical evidence showed beyond dispute that in the Victorian times the most dangerous passage of life was the arms of the ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... to prevail. As its enemies remain mute, or only interchange their thoughts by stealth, they are themselves unaware for a long period that a great revolution has actually been effected; and in this state of uncertainly they take no steps—they observe each other and are silent. The majority have ceased to believe what they believed before; but they still affect to believe, and this empty phantom of public opinion in strong enough to chill innovators, ...
— Democracy In America, Volume 2 (of 2) • Alexis de Tocqueville
... Meetin', Saturday night! So you might as well pack your trunk! Here!" He laid his hand on Tillie's arm, but Fairchilds drew her to him and held his arm about her waist, while Absalom, darkly scowling, stood uncertainly by. ...
— Tillie: A Mennonite Maid - A Story of the Pennsylvania Dutch • Helen Reimensnyder Martin
... later they always stopped running, stopped laughing, and remembered why they were wandering the wood alone. Then they would call for Helma. Ivra's voice was shrill and sweet, and rang through the bare woods like a birdsong. Eric's wavered a little uncertainly, as though he doubted whether Helma knew it well enough to answer. "Helma, Helma, ...
— The Little House in the Fairy Wood • Ethel Cook Eliot
... Queen Ann, uncertainly; but just then she received a shove that almost pitched her forward on her head; so she decided to go. The officers who hesitated received several energetic kicks, but could not see who delivered them; therefore they also decided—very wisely—to go. The others followed ...
— Tik-Tok of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... They advanced uncertainly, looking closely for the red-marked trees of the hike. "This road looks as if it went somewhere," said Hinpoha. They stuck to the road for a while but soon saw a sign board reading, "Cambridge, ...
— The Camp Fire Girls in the Maine Woods - Or, The Winnebagos Go Camping • Hildegard G. Frey
... for a moment looking at me in silence with a half-angry frown, then opened his mouth as though to speak, and finally turned, without a word, and started for the door. There he turned again uncertainly, hesitating. ...
— Under the Andes • Rex Stout
... a bridge and lifting back, rimmed in moraine, far and away to the great white dome. And it was all wrapped in a fine Alpine splendor, so that she stopped beside me in a sort of hushed wonder to look. But I could hear her breath, laboring hard and quick, and she rocked uncertainly on her feet. I laid my hand on her arm to steady her. It was time we turned back. For half an hour I had been gathering courage to tell her so. While I hesitated, allowing her a few minutes to take in the glory, the setter ...
— The Rim of the Desert • Ada Woodruff Anderson
... of course, for your work, I'm sorry to say, has been rather poor so far. But I'll try you with the next customer who comes to place a large order. They are always so eager for new suggestions, and you have suggestions of a sort to make, I am sure. I can't quite tell," she concluded uncertainly, "whether or not your ideas have any practical value, but they sound well as you describe them, and to talk attractively helps; there is no ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow
... not understand and she stood there, just beyond the threshold, uncertainly. But if she did not understand why Mrs. Schuneman's daughters did not stay in the room with the red tug, she realized that ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... were to start I went with Mr. Stewart and Mr. Haynes to meet the train. We were expecting the professor. But the only passenger who got off was a slight, gray-eyed girl. She looked about her uncertainly for a moment and then went into the depot while we returned to the hotel. Just as I started up the steps my eyes were gladdened by the sight of Mrs. O'Shaughnessy in her buckboard trotting merrily up the street. ...
— Letters on an Elk Hunt • Elinore Pruitt Stewart
... behind the thick trunks in the cool dark of the mango-tope. Two little figures halted; the other two came forward uncertainly. They were the advance-party of a regiment on the march, sent out, as usual, to mark the camp. They bore five-foot sticks with fluttering flags, and called to each other as they ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... chamber. Its great eyes centered icily on Keith Wells, standing at the head of his cowering men; and its mighty tentacles waved slowly, gracefully, as if the creature stood in doubt. One of them tentatively reached out and hovered over their heads, moving uncertainly back and forth. Then, like a monstrous water snake, the tentacle poised, flicked out and plucked a man from ...
— Astounding Stories, February, 1931 • Various
... vast shining floor was covered with peasants, pressed, packed together. Peasants, men and women—he did not see a single member of the middle-class. In front of him under the altar there was a blaze of light, and figures moved in the blaze uncertainly, indistinctly. Now and then a sudden quiver passed across the throng, as wind blows through the corn. Here and there men and women knelt, but for the most part they stood steadfast, motionless, staring in front of them. ...
— The Secret City • Hugh Walpole
... Uncle Noah paused uncertainly, seeking a fit expression of his dilemma, and the girl, readily intuitive, glanced swiftly about to assure herself that the waiting-room was free from unsympathetic eavesdroppers. Then, strangely drawn by this quaint old vender of humanity, and warmly eager to put him more at his ease, she impulsively ...
— Uncle Noah's Christmas Inspiration • Leona Dalrymple
... uncertainly some distance in the rear. The sight of the charging lioness had been too much for him and he had bolted. He was not actually up a tree; but he stood very near one. He lost the gun and acquired ...
— African Camp Fires • Stewart Edward White
... for it? Do you think I might give him something?" she asked, looking uncertainly at the artist, who, on hands and knees and with tongue protruding, was putting a green head on a red bird, too absorbed ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... candle and entered the corridor. Uncertainly Katherine and Bobby followed him. He went straight to the bed and thrust the candle beneath the canopy. The others could see from the door the change that had taken place. The body of Howells was turned awkwardly ...
— The Abandoned Room • Wadsworth Camp
... an angle, up, up, until it grew indistinct against the void, then swung widely in a semicircle, hovered uncertainly for an instant, and flashed off to the west, straight as an arrow flies. Mr. Wynne watched it thoughtfully until it had disappeared; and Claflin's interest was so intense that he forgot the necessity of screening himself, the result being that when he turned again toward ...
— The Diamond Master • Jacques Futrelle
... and looked at it uncertainly. "I don't sign any paper till I know what I'm signing. I want time to—to ...
— Abe Lincoln Gets His Chance • Frances Cavanah
... to the third floor, where she arrived before a door upon the glass panels of which were blazoned his name and profession, and pushing it open, she asked for him uncertainly. A clerk said doubtfully: "Have you come about the typist's situation?" and looked at her in a summary fashion ...
— Married Life - The True Romance • May Edginton
... old. His hands, blanched to a yellowish whiteness, moved about loosely and uncertainly. Once the large diamond mourning ring which the widower always wore, "In memory of Catherine Harper," dropped off on the table-cloth. He did not perceive the loss until Agatha restored it, and then his fingers seemed unable to slip it on again, ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... drawing-room a clock tinkled out a tune, finishing with one sharp stroke; and Americo hovered uncertainly at the door-window of the big hall, seeing that his master was not with the ladies ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... comprehension dawned in the Frenchman's eyes. He struggled to his feet, where he stood uncertainly for a few moments, ...
— The Boy Allies Under Two Flags • Ensign Robert L. Drake
... out on deck and turned his head about uncertainly. His hand wandered an instant, and then met Martin's. His face wreathed in ...
— Fire Mountain - A Thrilling Sea Story • Norman Springer
... hidebound frame the most melancholy appeal, not to Beenie, at whom he would not even look again, but to the open door. But, when Beenie, in whom, as in most of us, curiosity had the start of service, stooped, and, peering more closely into the face of the girl, recognized, though uncertainly, a known face, she too uttered a kind of howl, and straightway raising Letty's head drew her into the house. It is the mark of an imperfect humanity, that personal knowledge should spur the sides of ...
— Mary Marston • George MacDonald |
