"Absently" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... spading in the orchard, and if Miss Lydia wanted to carry up the towels! there was the dusting, too. Lydia, at the open door, stopped, for Jeff was sitting at his writing table, paper before him. He flicked a look at her, absently, as at an intruder as insignificant as undesired, and because the sacredness of his task was plain to her she took it humbly. But Jeff, then actually seeing her, rose ...
— The Prisoner • Alice Brown
... lawyer, absently. He was obviously preoccupied with some other topic. "Very good," he repeated with racking deliberation; "quite good. How ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling
... gazing absently at the Assistant Commissioner, left alone with her on the private side of the screen, seemed to be rearranging her mental impressions behind her thoughtful immobility of a handsome old face. Men with grey moustaches and full, healthy, vaguely ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad
... confides to him that he only half wants him. He says deliberately and out loud before everybody, so that everybody knows and the people of other nations, "Here is the man I would a little rather have than not." That is all. Then he coops him up in the White House, drops away absently, softly into ten thousand cities, forgets him, and sets him ...
— The Ghost in the White House • Gerald Stanley Lee
... was annoyed that her daughter said nothing of the events of the morning, and soon went out again; Rosine and her father sat dreamily, he by the window, smoking, and she with an unread magazine before her. She looked absently about the room, with happy eyes, trying to recall the details of the scene between her and Daniel; her glance fell on her father's weary face, and its melancholy expression struck her sharply. She got up, and standing behind him, laid her hand on ...
— Clerambault - The Story Of An Independent Spirit During The War • Rolland, Romain
... tragic tone that Rose took another peep and did sympathize with Dandy, for Mac's elegance was quite gone. His tie was under one ear, his posy hung upside down, his gloves were rolled into a ball, which he absently squeezed and pounded as he talked, and his hair looked as if a whirlwind had passed over it, for his ten fingers set it on end now and then, as they had a habit of doing when he studied or talked earnestly. But he looked so happy and wide awake, ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... embarrassment. They were not unkind—they were curious concerning death and the power of parsons. He laid a kind hand on Judith's head, shook hands with the women, and upon each bestowed a whispered blessing, being absently said; and the wives of Whisper Cove sat down and smoothed their skirts and folded their hands, all flushed and shaking with expectation. They wondered, no doubt, what he would accomplish—salvation or not: Parson ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan
... kept 'is room. Was it?—would there be—? "Well, an' therr's an 'arvest bug; 'tis some earrly for they!" Wonderful how she pounces on all such creatures, when I can't even see them. She pressed it absently between finger and thumb, and began manoeuvring round another way. Long before she had reached her point, we had gulped down our coffee, and departed. But as we rode out she came at a run, holding her skirts high with either hand, raised her old eyes bright and anxious in their ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... of ants, straggled out on the stage. Sylvia was astonished at their numbers—sixteen first violins, she saw by the program! She commented to her father on the difficulty of keeping them all in tune. He smiled at her absently, bade her, with an air of suppressed excitement, wait until she had heard them, and fell to biting his nails nervously. She re-read the program and all the advertisements, hypnotized, like every one else in the audience, by the sight of printed matter. She noticed that ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... to-morrow for Sunday," replied Jem Agar's stepmother absently. She was thinking of her own son, and therefore did not hear the quick sigh which was almost a gasp; did not note the sudden ...
— From One Generation to Another • Henry Seton Merriman
... I mused, absently. 'Yesterday—' I stopped, suddenly. Yesterday! There was no yesterday. The yesterday of which I spoke had been swallowed up in the abyss of years, ages gone. I ...
— The House on the Borderland • William Hope Hodgson
... She moved absently a spray of goldenrod which hid a Fra Angelico angel over the mantel and noted with dramatic self-pity that her hand was trembling. She sat down suddenly, and lost herself in a vain attempt to recall ...
— The Squirrel-Cage • Dorothy Canfield
... glass on the table and resumed his smoking as though oblivious of the other's presence. Momentarily disconcerted, the landlord devoted himself once more to the fire. After readjusting a trunk of old hickory on the great andirons and gazing absently for a moment at the huge crane supporting an iron kettle of boiling water, mine host tipped back in his chair, braced his feet against the wall, lighted a vile-smelling pipe and again returned valiantly to the attack, resolved to learn more ...
— The Strollers • Frederic S. Isham
... and while the father talked on the drive home of the sermon, the son answered absently; his thoughts were all with the piece of good luck which had come his way by such ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... sitting, stolidly immobile in their stiff, Sunday clothes, shuffled to their feet, and the pewful of school children, in clamorous chorus, intoned the final hymn. Anthony stood near the organ, absently contemplating, while the rude melody resounded through the church, Rosa's deft manipulation of the key-board. The rugged lines of his face were relaxed to a vacant, thoughtful limpness, that aged his expression not a little: now and ...
— Victorian Short Stories • Various
... assented absently; she was bracing her will, and steeling her nerves to endure without flinching. Not for worlds would she—even by the quivering of an eyelash—let Norma see the torture she was inflicting. She felt ...
— Princess • Mary Greenway McClelland
... said, half-absently twisting and arranging Dooley's little tan ears, in order to express, on Dooley's behalf, with them, various emotions, "it seems to me that all these political revolutions that you are so anxious to start, for the good of Ireland, are like putting ...
— Mount Music • E. Oe. Somerville and Martin Ross
... The Mackhai absently, as he took up his paper, and the breakfast went on to the end, but to Max it was anything but a ...
— Three Boys - or the Chiefs of the Clan Mackhai • George Manville Fenn
... said Eleanor absently, sorting over the pages of a theme she had just finished copying. "I helped wind the balcony railings with yellow cheese-cloth all the morning, and I thought I'd better finish this before I went back. I'm bound not to get behind ...
— Betty Wales, Sophomore • Margaret Warde
... enveloped in a similar apron, was dusting his room as he entered it. She nodded absently, with a casual "Good-morning, Mr. Smith," as she continued at her work. Even the placing of the two big trunks, which the shuffling men brought in, won from her only a listless glance or two. Then, without speaking again, she left the room, as ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... a good thing," admitted Bob absently. "I want Aunt Faith to get one. A runabout would be handy for them—one like Doctor ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson
... [Footnote: Garibaldi: a jacket which took its name from its likeness in shape to the red shirt worn by the Italian patriot Garibaldi.] To me she was always very amiable; confidently she laid her wrinkled hand in mine and absently she accepted the little attentions I was able to offer her. She was very fond of sweetmeats, and burnt almonds were, in her opinion, the most delectable thing ...
— Short Stories and Selections for Use in the Secondary Schools • Emilie Kip Baker
... midst of them. The reflection of the cliffs in the never still current, of the pines on their summits, of the changing sky growing deeper and deeper, till its amber tint, erstwhile so crystalline, became of a dull tawny opaqueness, she marked absently for a while as ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... joy of sinking to the floor in front of that warm blaze! Ben consulted with the girl at the door of the cabin, and the strange father, rubbing his hands and smiling absently, remarked with an accent that was very different from Mr. Lupo's or any ...
— The Motor Maids at Sunrise Camp • Katherine Stokes
... wish it, I read his correspondence, while he absently twirled the poker in his hands, and gnashed ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 103, December 17, 1892 • Various
... the wub said absently, staring around the room. "A nice apartment you have here, Captain. You keep it quite neat. I respect life-forms that are tidy. Some Martian birds are quite tidy. They throw things out of their ...
— Beyond Lies the Wub • Philip Kindred Dick
... to greet him, yet had barely a word for "his millions," him to whom the Board of Trade bowed humbly at home. A great war secretary, whom they had recently dined at the Grand Pacific and whose dictum as to the purchase of supplies meant much to Chicago, but vaguely remembered and absently greeted the man of wealth, yet beamed with pleasure at sight of his small-salaried soldier companion. The secretary drew Hazzard off to one side, in fact, and left the man of stocks and the ...
— To The Front - A Sequel to Cadet Days • Charles King
... "Well?" he queried absently, looking up from a book, one of the latest untranslated treatises on the new psychology from the pen of the eminent scientist, Dr. Freud of Vienna, "what brings ...
— The Dream Doctor • Arthur B. Reeve
... Red Cloud! the Song of the Acorn!" Dick glanced half absently to her from the pamphlet folded on his finger, and then, with equal pitch ...
— The Little Lady of the Big House • Jack London
... bent and plucked a sprig of mint from the patch next to the house and chewed it absently. "But we'll be able to show motive and method once they're in jail and Tyler can talk. And with Captain Killian's evidence, that will clear Tyler anyway. Why should we worry whether the Kelsos get caught ...
— Smugglers' Reef • John Blaine
... Ole stood staring absently, and then took Fris by the sleeve and drew him up to the dead body. "He's rowed well!" he said. "The blood's come out at his finger-ends, look!" And he raised his son's hands to the light. "And there's a wrist, Fris! He could take up an old man like me and ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo
... toying absently with the ice cream, "he painted Dorothy's face with stripes of red and green enamel, and goodness only knows how we can ...
— My Lady Caprice • Jeffrey Farnol
... absently. His slender fingers were patting the velvet nose of the stallion and he was talking to it in an affectionate undertone—meaningless words, perhaps, such as a mother uses to soothe a child. When Strann set his foot in the stirrup and gathered up the reins the black horse cringed ...
— The Night Horseman • Max Brand
... come and gone. I hope there has been no accident,' said Mr. Macrae nervously. 'But where are those thieves?' He absently pressed his repeater, it tingled ...
— The Disentanglers • Andrew Lang
... absently with the knife. Then, from sheer exuberance of spirits, he began tossing it aloft; watching with sparkling eyes the glittering blade as it turned over and over in the air and catching it deftly by the hilt in his right hand as it descended. His hand and wrist were ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown
... your saying something of the kind," murmured Challis absently. "We are going to have more rain. It will be a ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford
... should," she said slowly, with something very like a sigh. "He was the only man I ever knew who made me do what I did not want to do and made me wish to be something better than I was," she added absently. ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... slowly and absently like a woman in a dream. When she came to the gap in the fence where the lane ran into the orchard she lifted her wan, drooping face and saw Eric, sitting in the shadow of the wood at the other side of the orchard with his bowed head in his hands. She stopped quickly ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... have talked after that, but she did not. When I spoke to her once or twice she answered absently; and presently she forgot me altogether, and began ...
— Ideala • Sarah Grand
... Cairn began to speak, staring absently the while after the fortune-teller, as he descended the carpeted steps and rejoined the throng on the sidewalk below—"you know, if a man—anyone, could take advantage of such a wave of thought as this ...
— Brood of the Witch-Queen • Sax Rohmer
... but took the paper absently and thrust it into his coat pocket. It had fallen from Wambush's pocket. He was very white and leaned heavily ...
— Westerfelt • Will N. Harben
... apace over the sky and outer landscape—but something heavier than the mild obscurity of approaching night seemed weighing on the air around him, which oppressed his nerves and saddened his soul. He stood absently turning over the papers on his desk, in a frame of mind which left him uncertain how to employ himself,—whether to read,—to write,—to finish a sketch of the flowering reeds on the river which he had yesterday begun,—or to combat with his own mood, fathom its meaning, and conquer its ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli
... with folded arms, was gazing regretfully at the bean pole. "It has been a brave quest," he sighed, "but now, I take it, our adventures are over!" Absently, the Knight felt in his boot-top and drawing out a small red bean popped it into his mouth. Just before reaching the top of the tube, he had pulled a handful of them from the beanstalk, but the others had fallen out when he dove ...
— The Royal Book of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... one in the center scratched absently at its stomach with a furry paw and he lowered the bow, feeling a little foolish at having bothered to raise it against animals ...
— Space Prison • Tom Godwin
... sensitivity of that old audion tube, that's what it did," replied Bob, absently, his mind already busy with inventive thoughts. "I can't see yet just how it accomplished it, but the connection with the station was certainly clearer ...
— The Radio Boys Trailing a Voice - or, Solving a Wireless Mystery • Allen Chapman
... prince?" said Rogojin, absently, but a little surprised all the same "Still in your gaiters, eh?" He sighed, and forgot the prince next moment, and his wild eyes wandered over to Nastasia again, as though attracted in that direction by ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... Rosa looked absently toward the old building, inside a window of which was visible the head of the Chinese doctor, who wore black goggles, and who was indeed measuring his window for some reason. Rosa had small hope of the Chinese doctor as a future customer. She ...
— Out of the Triangle • Mary E. Bamford
... and absently put the note in a little rack over the mantelpiece. Then, recollecting that a prying servant or landlady might misinterpret it, he transferred it to his pocket. After breakfast, having satisfied himself before the mirror that his dress was faultless, and his expression ...
— The Irrational Knot - Being the Second Novel of His Nonage • George Bernard Shaw
... running on the woman he had seen upon the deck, he advanced to the packing-case again, and was beginning absently to kick aside the heap of shavings and cotton-wool, when his foot encountered some hard object. He bent down and ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... bushmen one morning rode up to an inn, And one of them called for the drinks with a grin; They'd only returned from a trip to the North, And, eager to greet them, the landlord came forth. He absently poured out a glass of Three Star. And set down that drink with ...
— In the Days When the World Was Wide and Other Verses • Henry Lawson
... Lida smiled absently, and slowly re-arranged her hair. Sanine handed her the parasol and glove. To find the other glove was missing at first surprised her, but instantly recollecting the reason, she felt greatly amused at the absurd importance which she had given ...
— Sanine • Michael Artzibashef
... Stanley returned to the veranda. It was unoccupied for chilly evening breezes had driven the loungers indoors. Absently he paced the creaking boards and, having reached a corner of the building, continued his promenade along what seemed to be the rear of the building. Here a line of doors opened on the veranda like the upper staterooms of ...
— Port O' Gold • Louis John Stellman
... fellow he is," said Marilla absently. "I saw him in church last Sunday and he seemed so tall and manly. He looks a lot like his father did at the same age. John Blythe was a nice boy. We used to be real good friends, he and I. People called him ...
— Anne Of Green Gables • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... the ground his half-full condensed milk can with which he had been absently toying, and kissed the fingers of his one ...
— The Red One • Jack London
... said the girl, absently viewing the steadily rising roof of her home. "Our ideas of humor were ever alien. I wonder if Prince Koltsoff ...
— Prince or Chauffeur? - A Story of Newport • Lawrence Perry
... absently. The Currycomb outfit! That charming aggregation of gunfighters had borne the hardest reputation extant in a neighbouring territory. Regarding the Currycomb men had been accustomed to speak behind their hands and under their breaths. For the Currycomb ...
— The Heart of the Range • William Patterson White
... "Yeah." Cash meditated, absently eyeing the burros. "Where it's green." He looked at the near hills, and at the desert, and at the dreary march of the starved animals. "It's a long way to green country," ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... thousand pardons," he said to the hostess absently. "It is a great pleasure to be here,—somehow I thought I knew that man. I am sure ...
— Darkwater - Voices From Within The Veil • W. E. B. Du Bois
... subsided quickly in her characteristic manner. She sat absently nibbling the handle of the obliging pan, while staring after the receding figure, its girlish slenderness stiffened as if to warn away all friendliness. "She's stubborner than ever. I ...
— Beatrice Leigh at College - A Story for Girls • Julia Augusta Schwartz
... this information, though for the life of her she could not see how it could interest him. At last, eyeing her trunk absently and tapping his chin as if in thought, he ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... she resumed her seat behind the tea-table. She sat looking absently at the floor and musing on the words she had just spoken. Not in all the seven or eight years since Norrie Ford went away had she acknowledged to her own heart what, within the last few minutes, she had declared aloud. The utmost she had ever owned to herself was that she "could have loved ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... absently at the back of his head, murmuring, "I'm afraid, I'm afraid that man is too innocent. I say, Elliott," he said, at last, "Hastings,—you know the chap that old Tabby Byram came around here to tell us about—the day you had to ...
— The King In Yellow • Robert W. Chambers
... Harry, to whom he threw the rein. Christina did not attempt to bar his passage, and he and Managan passed into the house. Chris stood by the door jamb, facing Harry, erect and pale; Harry leant against the big galvanised-iron tank, absently fondling the head of the trooper's horse. Suddenly, a moment after the troopers had entered the house, he heard right at his elbow the sound of something striking upon the iron of the tank inside. He started forward ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... Lidgerwood, staring absently at the passing panorama of shifting hill shoulders framing itself in the open side-door of the tool-car, missed a point. If he had been less absorbed in the personal problem he could scarcely have failed ...
— The Taming of Red Butte Western • Francis Lynde
... D'Arc stood looking at her the same way, sort of absently scratching his head; but had to give it up, and said he didn't know—"must have been something that happened when we ...
— Personal Recollections of Joan of Arc Volume 2 • Mark Twain
... Belwether, pink skinned, snowy chop whiskers brushed rabbit fashion, very voluble with Sylvia Landis, who listened absently, head partly averted. Quarrier in tweeds and gaiters, his morning cigar delicately balanced in his gloved fingers, strolled near enough to be within ear-shot; and when Sylvia's inattention to Major Belwether's observations became marked to the verge of rudeness, he came ...
— The Fighting Chance • Robert W. Chambers
... slipped from him absently. He had no wish for the concert, no wish to hear Berlinese trulls and bubonic bassi bleat. But, for the tolerably delicate enterprise that he had in hand, there were the preliminary steps which could only be hastened slowly and anything slower than the Metropolitan on a ...
— The Paliser case • Edgar Saltus
... had made any concessions in her appearance in deference to the committee, for she looked as though she had come straight from her kitchen, a suspicion strengthened by the strand of grass she carried in her fingers and played with absently throughout. She appeared quite at home as she settled herself in the chair, scanning with the greatest interest the faces of the committeemen as if she were memorizing each feature ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore
... asked her brother, absently, conscious always, through all the swaying of talk, of the slight childish form of Nelly Sarratt beneath him, in her deep chair; and of the eyes and mouth, which after the few passing smiles he had struck from them, ...
— Missing • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... speaking to me, but to the thought. He sat down again and covered his face with his hands. The minute which passed seemed very long. He flung away his hands from his eyes with a movement which expressed despair and resignation. "Yes, I will get them. It is years and years ago," he mused absently; "so long ago that I had thought it gone and forgotten. But it was not to be. I will get the proofs," turning to me as he left the chair. "Wait here." He unbolted the door and passed forth. . . . It was a full confession of the deception, written by the mother herself, and witnessed by her ...
— Arms and the Woman • Harold MacGrath
... ranging the Night, From its big circling ever absently Returns, thou large low Star, to fix on thee. 'Maria!' Star? No star: a Light, a Light! Wouldst leap ashore, Heart? Yonder burns — a Light. Pedro Gutierrez, wake! come up to me. I prithee stand and gaze about the sea: What seest? ...
— The Poems of Sidney Lanier • Sidney Lanier
... the hospital directors' meeting at two. Really," Olive spoke a little absently, herself; "I almost wish ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... gaze wandered out towards the currant-bushes and came to rest absently on Thomas Jefferson's big, white bulk—"I wonder if it hurts very much." She meant, to starve. A long vista of food-less days opened before her, and in their contemplation the weight in her heart ...
— Rebecca Mary • Annie Hamilton Donnell
... "Yes'm," Miller said absently. He lifted one of Wolf's fore legs and examined the foot-pads, pressing them and denting them with his thumb. "Kind of soft," he remarked. "He ain't been on ...
— Love of Life - and Other Stories • Jack London
... to understand the scheme of the loan; but he takes the money, and is quite stunned by his good fortune. He thanks me absently, and goes and shows the piece to the guards, with a smile that illumines and transfigures his whole person. At Bologna, he has come to his senses; he loads me with blessings, he is ready to weep; he reverences me, he wishes me a good voyage, ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells
... carefully on a projecting beam and looked about him, smiling. A cat leaped down from the turkey-red lounge and came across, rubbing his legs. He bent and stroked her absently. ...
— Uncle William - The Man Who Was Shif'less • Jennette Lee
... Hanks just looked absently at Rosy weeping in the hollow of her blue gingham arm, then went over to the blackboard and began writing, in fair, large characters, "A rolling stone gathers no moss," for the scholars to copy in their copy-books. The temptation and the opportunity were too ...
— Comfort Pease and her Gold Ring • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... the band. And back of all this, pointing upward in mute protest, rose a solemn church spire, white and majestic against a vast panorama of blue, moonlit hills, that encircled the whole lurid picture. Jim's eyes turned absently toward the church as he sat fumbling with the lock of the ...
— Polly of the Circus • Margaret Mayo
... Hammond more graciously than last night; but still with a carelessness which was not complimentary, looking at him absently, as if she hardly knew that he was there, and hugging Angelina all ...
— Phantom Fortune, A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... Marcia returned almost absently. She opened the door for herself, because I had forgotten it, and stood looking at the lighted living room at the end of the passage by the front door. "But the wolves have been round for a week—that was what I meant when I said I was going to ...
— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones
... a soldier and a sailor." Chauvel explained that he had walked from Falaise that afternoon, and that in order to get off, he had pretended to his chiefs that private business took him to Bayonne. The false Delaitre immediately handed him Mme. de Combray's two letters which Chauvel read absently. ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... Kardelj said, humorously impatient. He took up a folder from his desk and shook it absently in Josip's general direction. "I've studied your dossier thoroughly." He flicked his eyes up at a wall clock. "Come along. Comrade Jankez is expecting us. ...
— Expediter • Dallas McCord Reynolds
... "Yes," replied Donald, absently, "but there are several things about the fellow that I don't understand. To begin with, he is talking to those other chaps through an interpreter. Then he does not gesticulate, while most Indian orators ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... with another sigh, and began slowly unhooking her collar. Then she sat down on the edge of the couch and stared absently out ...
— When Patty Went to College • Jean Webster
... cuisine of Fleeter's Rents, might choose to wander thither. Philip, with the lamp in one hand and the tumbler of flowers in the other, put out his head and looked into the squalid depths below him, and having gazed there a while absently and with no object, drew back with a vague touch of pity upon him for the people who dwelt in so much squalor so near to healthy effort and reasonable competence. He could hardly have told as much, perhaps, but one pallid countenance, shining very dimly at an open window, ...
— Young Mr. Barter's Repentance - From "Schwartz" by David Christie Murray • David Christie Murray
... there wanted another half-hour to the carrier's time, she turned into a little lane to escape the inspection of the numerous passers-by. Here all was quite lonely and still, and she sat down under a willow-tree, absently regarding the landscape, which had begun to put on the rich tones of declining summer, but which to her was as hollow and faded as a theatre by day. She could hold out no longer; burying her face in her ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... trotted aft, after having administered another lesson to the wild-dog, and found Skipper seated on the deck, back against the low rail, knees drawn up, and gazing absently off to leeward. Jerry sniffed his bare calf—not that he needed to identify it, but just because he liked to, and in a sort of friendly greeting. But Van Horn took no notice, continuing to stare out across the sea. Nor was he aware ...
— Jerry of the Islands • Jack London
... been more or less talk during the meal, but nothing of special moment. John sat back in his chair, absently twirling the stem of his glass between thumb and fingers. Presently he said, looking straight before him at the table: "I have been thinking a good deal of late—more than ever before, positively, in fact—that whatever my prospects ...
— David Harum - A Story of American Life • Edward Noyes Westcott
... David replied absently. He was thinking hard. Where was that big stone gateway? He strained his eyes in a vain endeavor to ...
— Polly of Lady Gay Cottage • Emma C. Dowd
... at the rooms of Naroumoff, of the Horse Guards. The long winter night passed away imperceptibly, and it was five o'clock in the morning before the company sat down to supper. Those who had won ate with a good appetite; the others sat staring absently at their empty plates. When the champagne appeared, however, the conversation became more animated, and all ...
— The Most Interesting Stories of All Nations • Julian Hawthorne
... his feet as he spoke. He was still absently mopping his face with the scrap of lace he had taken ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... near the dressing-table, where she had been absently attending to the candles. She wheeled round and looked at Maggie, who was hospitably sitting on a low chair near the fire. She was sorry for the loneliness of this girl's life. She did not want her to go away just yet. There was another chair by the fire, inviting Catrina to indulge in those ...
— The Sowers • Henry Seton Merriman
... give my sword to Death," said Ferne, absently. "Ay, lad, when I give my sword to Death.... There again, do you not hear the singing? It is the wind, I think, and not the people of the sea. It hath a mocking sound.... When I ...
— Sir Mortimer • Mary Johnston
... Amy, absently, her attention now engrossed by the excitement about her. Girls were hurrying to take their places before the long frames filled with reels, on which fine woollen threads were being wound by the ...
— Reels and Spindles - A Story of Mill Life • Evelyn Raymond
... answered the mother absently; "but if he is a Jew, what does it matter? He has a title, and they say that he is enormously rich. I expect there will be plenty going on at Outram soon. By the way, my dear Ida, I do wish you would cure yourself of the habit of calling young men by their Christian names—not ...
— The People Of The Mist • H. Rider Haggard
... some black material was standing at one of these windows, her arms crossed behind her back, and absently gazing out of it. At the sound of the opening door she turned swiftly, her whole delicate and lovely face lighting up like a flower in a ray of sunshine, the lips slightly parted, and a deep and happy light shining in her violet eyes. Then, all in ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... he had absently uttered these words, Maskull wondered why he had done so, as they now appeared ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... picked up the cheque-book—and absently fingered the leaves—then my eye caught a counterfoil where I had chanced to open it. It was not in Miss Sharp's handwriting, although this was the house cheque-book which Burton usually keeps, but in my own and there was written, just casually ...
— Man and Maid • Elinor Glyn
... first to clap on the head-receiver this morning and he sat silently for a while absently clicking out calls, to none of which he obtained an answer. Suddenly, however, ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... but absently doled out the last cabbage leaf to the rabbits in such small morsels, that they nibbled at his fingers as if they thought those part of the provender. Jessie was lost in a calculation of whether if Frances and she were to have no new frocks for a twelvemonth, and to save up all their pocket-money, ...
— Holiday Tales • Florence Wilford
... bell jangled. "Five thousand dollars," she kept repeating to herself, greeting the teachers absently—"five thousand dollars." And then on the porch she was suddenly aware of the awaiting boy. She eyed him critically: black, ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... rather absently, giving a perfunctory glance to the woods sloping away on her right towards a little stream winding in the hollow. Sir Henry felt a slight annoyance. He was a good fellow, and no more touchy as to personal dignity than the majority of men of his ...
— Elizabeth's Campaign • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... of milk from the doors, first thing, as they're delivered. There's been an extra lot of it lately. My mate who relieves me has got special instructions to keep his eye open in the mornings!" The man grinned. "It wouldn't be a very big case even if he caught anybody!" "No," said Smith absently; "perhaps not. Your business must be a dry ...
— The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu • Sax Rohmer
... way to where Greenstream village lay somnolent beneath the refulgent day. The chairs before the office of the Bugle were unoccupied, from within came the monotonous, sliding rattle of the small footpress. Gordon sat absently revolving the possibilities held out by the near future. Hay, he knew was still being made in the valley, but the prospect of long, arduous, days in the open fields, in the hot, dry chaff of the sere ...
— Mountain Blood - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... flask. When he returned, he had a glass, into which he had poured some of the liquor. The canteen he handed back to the trooper, who without a word replaced it in his pocket. Murguia lingered. He sipped his toddy absently. ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... tightness of her brow dissolved in a carefree radiance. At work, she mixed up her faultless card catalogues and laughed at her mistakes. Once, during our busy hours of distribution, we caught her blithely granting the request of fat Mere Copillet for a cook stove and thereupon absently presenting that jovial dame with a pair of sabots, much too small for her portly foot, to the amusement of all the good wives gathered in the Red Cross office. They laughed loudly in a sympathetic crowd, and Mademoiselle Gaston laughed also, and they loved her ...
— Where the Sabots Clatter Again • Katherine Shortall
... isn't he, Grid?" Pargeter was fingering absently a yellowing packet of Vanderlyn's letters: "Fancy keeping your old letters! What a queer ...
— The Uttermost Farthing • Marie Belloc Lowndes
... absently, and her fingers idly toyed with a jingling ornament in her belt. In an idle moment I had sketched the head, as I remembered it, on a sheet of paper, and now I took it from my pocket and handed it to her. We were standing near a port-hole of the music saloon, from which ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... very delightful beech wood which formed a pleasant place of encampment for tea-parties, Canon Wrottesley could only smile absently at the picnic-baskets, and appear wrapped in thought when addressed; he might have been mentally preparing his next Sunday's sermon. Miss Abingdon thought that he was doing so and respected him for it; she even tried to attune her mind to ...
— Peter and Jane - or The Missing Heir • S. (Sarah) Macnaughtan
... (absently). What should I say? The Prince is kind. I scarcely heard your words. I listened to your ...
— The Poems of Emma Lazarus - Vol. I (of II.), Narrative, Lyric, and Dramatic • Emma Lazarus
... stood in her dressing-room absently before the mirror. She touched the hard, unyielding stone of the ring under the thin bodice of her gown. She recalled the morning when she had gone to get it, before anything had happened and the lure of life had been so exquisite. Now that it had come near—if this indeed were ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... Dan repeated, rather absently; "How did I like Geof? Oh, I should say he was turning out very well. But I thought you girls had the best of it"; whence it may be gathered that Mrs. Daymond had not only borrowed the two girls, but had offered her son as compensation to ...
— A Venetian June • Anna Fuller
... it was almost time to set out if they were to go to the club that afternoon, and Lady Alice went to her room for her cloak. She was before the looking-glass, apparently studying the reflection of her own face, when a knock at the door, to which she absently said "Come in," was followed by Caspar's entrance. She, thinking that it was her maid, did not look round, and he came behind her without being perceived. The first token of his presence was received by her when his arm was slipped round her waist, and his voice said caressingly and almost playfully ...
— Brooke's Daughter - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... Waver. I mean—er—(absently takes from his pocket a kodak made like a large turnip watch, and fumbling nervously with it) I mean I've been ...
— Oh! Susannah! - A Farcical Comedy in Three Acts • Mark Ambient
... energy. He could not find strength to write a letter and he came to me at a day when he did not see any way but suicide open for himself. He complained that, as soon as he began to grasp a thought, it was evaporating. He stared absently about the room and felt sure that he would never again achieve anything. He had not even the energy to read the newspaper. I hypnotized him three times, each time waking in him the pleasure in a definite ...
— Psychotherapy • Hugo Muensterberg
... had a little way of appearing to listen while her brother expatiated on any of his favorite topics. It had grown to be a loving habit with her, and she had a way of answering absently. ...
— Kit of Greenacre Farm • Izola Forrester
... "Good-bye," replied Withers absently, but looked up suddenly. "By the way, I might like to know something about the disposition of that thousand dollars. Could you tell me anything ...
— The Winning Clue • James Hay, Jr.
... the direction of her sleepy eyes, and saw that both Miss Lee and Hilda appeared to be put out. The former was talking absently to Mr. Bellamy, and glancing continually in the direction of that gentleman's wife. The latter, too, whilst appearing to listen to some compliment from George, was gazing at Mrs. Bellamy with a curious look of dislike and apprehension in ...
— Dawn • H. Rider Haggard
... ache in her feet born of thirty-six hours' encasement in leather. She gained the door without a sound. It was wide open, and in the middle of the big room Jack Fyfe stood with hands thrust deep in his pockets, staring absently ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair
... what a pity!" sighed Mrs. Dalziel absently. She was thinking of our sight-seeing expedition for which we were already late. Milly remarked that somebody was always throwing an ultimatum at somebody else's head, and asked for jam. Tony said intelligently that it was just what he had expected, after the murder of the archduke ...
— Secret History Revealed By Lady Peggy O'Malley • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... perplexed. Addison was turning over leaves in the book; and Theodora sat looking at the birds, absently. ...
— When Life Was Young - At the Old Farm in Maine • C. A. Stephens
... attractive. They really definitely had faces. How different life would be for them if they made the most of themselves instead of the least. And yet—Scrap was suddenly bored, and turned away her thoughts and absently ate toast. What did it matter? If you did make the most of yourself, you only collected people round you who ended by wanting ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim
... no further remark, but sat a long time, absently gazing over the low-lying sweep of country which gradually melted into a greyness that looked ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... the girl, absently. There were so many "points" upon which the old gentlewoman insisted that some of them fell on unheeding ears. At present, she was conscious only of two things: she must either remain alone behind in a dark room or she must go with her mistress and face ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... closed behind her, he walked over to the window and looked out, drumming absently with his ...
— When God Laughs and Other Stories • Jack London
... a warning that he'll have to respect, cad or no cad," said Bazelhurst, absently spreading butter upon his fingers instead of ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... her slender hand the ball at the end of the carved arm of the chair in which she was sitting, looking absently at the rings which adorned her fingers. She possessed to perfection the art of being serious, and the air with which she now spoke was admirably calculated to imply a deep interest in the subject under ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... absently, looking out with unseeing eyes at the lengthening woodland shadows, "a church or two more, some brick sidewalk, and a few stores and homes—just added on, not improved. I miss Jim Shirley everywhere. The older folks seem ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter
... "Um," assented Ethel absently. "I'm glad you could tell me all this, Betty. I shouldn't have asked you, perhaps; it's rather taking advantage of our private friendship. But I really needed to know. Ah, here ...
— Betty Wales Freshman • Edith K. Dunton
... innumerable thoughts within himself, but unable in a moment to resolve from which particular one to begin, he too absently looked at Tai-y. Thus it was that the two cousins remained for a long time under the spell of a ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book II • Cao Xueqin
... coil of her shining black hair and wound it round and round her hand meditatively, looking out absently over the ...
— The Ebbing Of The Tide - South Sea Stories - 1896 • Louis Becke
... sitting in her favorite chair reading a magazine, looked up absently, then, staring incredulously at the newcomers, trotted across the room, both hands outstretched in welcome. "Why, Miss Harlowe and Miss Nesbit, I had given you up for to-night. Here are Miss Pierson and Miss Briggs, too. I'm so glad to see you. When did you arrive? I thought there ...
— Grace Harlowe's Second Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... tissue paper, material, furs, and fashion books, while maids scurried about and dealers and dressmakers awaited her pleasure. She was, perhaps, happier than she had been for years, visited her father, absently and with pins stuck in her bosom, and looked dowdier and busier than the lowliest of the seamstresses who, by her thrifty order, were making countless undergarments in a room on an ...
— Long Live the King • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... doubt it was the truth. Those eyes did not seem to be in the habit of lying. After all, the medicine could not hurt him. His nurse was at a little distance gazing absently at the sea. I sat down on a bench, and dropped a few of the pellets into his palm. He ate them seriously, and then turned around and backed—after the well-known appealing fashion of childhood—against my knees. I understood the movement—although it was unlike my idea of Johnnyboy. However, I raised ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... absently. He was gazing about the room. Then he walked to the library table, on which lay the revolver. He stooped over it ...
— Death Points a Finger • Will Levinrew
... a quaint little house uptown, a great bronzed-faced man sat at a piano, a dead pipe between his teeth, and absently played the most difficult of Beethoven's sonatas. Though he played it divinely, the three men who sat smoking and talking in a near-by corner paid not the least attention to him. The player, it seemed, did not expect them to: he ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... wasn't my fault," replied she absently. "It was the fault of my training. Ever since I can remember I've been taught to be on my guard, lest the men shouldn't like me." In her new freedom she looked back tranquilly upon the struggle she was at last emancipated from, and philosophized ...
— The Fashionable Adventures of Joshua Craig • David Graham Phillips
... Soleil nodded, absently, looking at Charley. The moondog gave a strange, electronic whimper. There was an odd expression on the girl's face. A flash of ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... his teeth together, which was a symptom it were well for the other to recognize but did not. Then Andy smiled, which was another symptom. He fingered the spur absently, laid it down and reached, with the gesture that betrays the act as having become second nature, for his papers ...
— The Happy Family • Bertha Muzzy Bower
... tone. The angry gleam faded from his eyes, and a dreamy look came into them as he let the heavy lids droop a little, and remained silent, apparently lost in thought. The women ceased sobbing, and watched his altered face, while Gianbattista sank down into a chair and absently fingered the pencil that had fallen ...
— Marzio's Crucifix and Zoroaster • F. Marion Crawford
... "Yes," she replied absently to Molly's observation. "I suppose you learned that from Judy's new friend," she added, coming back to her present beautifying occupation. "She'll be introducing rouge to us next," Nance went on in ...
— Molly Brown's Senior Days • Nell Speed
... through his mind, James had been absently watching while the cook turned his treasures out upon his bunk, and pawed them over with trembling hands. There were innumerable little things, besides a stiff white shirt, a cheap shiny Bible, a stuffed parrot and several wads ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... wedding," repeated Anne, absently. "Oh, yes; I remember, it was to be early. No fear! I will be ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... kind, cousin! Now I must be gone. (She puts on her mask and veil quickly; then, absently): You have not told me of your last night's fray. Ah, but it must have been a hero-fight!. . . —Bid him to write. (She sends him a kiss with her fingers): ...
— Cyrano de Bergerac • Edmond Rostand
... down again and caressed his bruised knuckles absently. "Well, then, I guess this is the finish," he ...
— The Lookout Man • B. M. Bower
... no such thing. He bowed, a trifle absently, and passed within a few feet of them—near enough for them to hear ...
— The Cricket • Marjorie Cooke
... immediately forthcoming from the rancher; he sat staring absently at the backs of his roughened hands, now and again rubbing one or the other, and enveloped in a gloom that Bryant could both see and feel. Then all at once Stevenson began to talk, in a voice ...
— The Iron Furrow • George C. Shedd
... forenoon, everyone had gone, this way or that, to hunt, or fish, or swim, or loiter about the city. There were left only a man with a broken leg and a man with a sprained shoulder, throwing dice on a bench in the sun; Alwin, whistling absently as he swept out the sleeping-house; and Rolf the Wrestler sitting cross-legged under a tree, sharpening his sword and humming snatches of ...
— The Thrall of Leif the Lucky • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... smoking and absently humming To anyone there who could play— (We'd finished our tea in the Mess hut Awaiting an ambulance train—) Roasting chestnuts some were, while the rest, Cut up toffee or sang a refrain. Outside was a bitter wind ...
— Fanny Goes to War • Pat Beauchamp
... sight of her. Unconsciously, he had been seeking her in every square yard which his eye could reach, and here she was close to him all the time. The discovery awoke a throb of pleasure within him, and with a flush upon his dark face he rose and made his way towards her. She was absently turning over the leaves of her little Welsh hymn-book as he approached, and smiling unconsciously at a toddling child who was making journeys of discovery around the furze bushes. A quick, short "Oh!" escaped her as she saw him approach, her face brightened ...
— By Berwen Banks • Allen Raine
... absently. Miss Thorley was studying Mary Rose from behind half shut eyes. Just how ...
— Mary Rose of Mifflin • Frances R. Sterrett
... theventy-theven; theven timeth eight ith thixty-thix." While Dorothy nodded absently and plaited the edges of her lace apron, and looked at me under lowered lashes. And Benny lisped on: "Theven timeth nine ith ...
— The Maid-At-Arms • Robert W. Chambers
... trunks fell to the late recruit; and when he had set it down at the door of the designated state-room, he did half-absently what John Gavitt might have done without blame: read the tacked-on card, which bore the owner's name and address, written in a firm round hand: "Charlotte ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... From absently picking and choosing among the forks, and trying to drink his bouillon out of the cup in which it was served, to upsetting his glass of iced tea, he stumbled on in a dream of awkwardness; and when, to cover the tea mishap, Ardea, emulating the lady hostess who broke one of her priceless tea-cups ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... into the room and he had shut the door, I absently selected the only comfortable chair and we sat down next to each other. A long and quelling silence followed the lighting of my cigarette. Feeling rather at a loose end, I thought out a few stage directions—"here business with ...
— Margot Asquith, An Autobiography: Volumes I & II • Margot Asquith
... to know is if Aunt Olivia is going to be married," said the Story Girl absently. "I can hardly believe it. But now that I think of it—Uncle Roger has been teasing her ever since she was in ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... there were many thing? she should have said and at the same time there was a strange surety that sometime she would see him again and say them. She walked absently to the window which opened on the vacant lot to the rear of ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... he absently, "fixes his mind not on making friends or defeating enemies, not on elections or on history, but just on avoiding from day to day, from act to act, the condemnation of his own self-respect—" The blinds closed as suddenly as ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... that time, but far more collected than he was. She sat, absently tapping the shelf with a nail ...
— The Breaking Point • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... are happy and well," she replied absently; "but we can talk of them on some other occasion. I want us to speak of something else ...
— Roger Trewinion • Joseph Hocking
... of view passed a figure that caught his eye. Absently he followed it as it enlarged with approach. He realized that it was Prof. Martha Binley, Ph.D., who taught Greek over ...
— In a Little Town • Rupert Hughes
... after dinner he and father would take a walk amongst the deserted shafts of Sapling Gully or along Quartz Ridge, and criticize old ground, and talk of past diggers' mistakes, and second bottoms, and feelers, and dips, and leads—also outcrops—and absently pick up pieces of quartz and slate, rub them on their sleeves, look at them in an abstracted manner, and drop them again; and they would talk of some old lead they had worked on: "Hogan's party was here on one side of us, Macintosh was here ...
— While the Billy Boils • Henry Lawson
... be a word or two that might be changed," she answered, rather absently. "I shall have to think it over, to live with it a little. But I like it, and that's all I ...
— Sir Dominick Ferrand • Henry James
... between the leaves of the book he held, to mark the place where he was reading, nodded somewhat absently and started to turn away. Then ...
— Mary Louise in the Country • L. Frank Baum (AKA Edith Van Dyne) |
