"Blankly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... too much drugged by hours in the open air to make any reply. In fact every one of the party was sound asleep within ten minutes or so of each other, with the exception of Susan Warrington. She lay for a considerable time looking blankly at the wall opposite, her hands clasped above her heart, and her light burning by her side. All articulate thought had long ago deserted her; her heart seemed to have grown to the size of a sun, and to illuminate her entire body, shedding ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf
... her companion's help, on her feet, and, feeling withdrawal imposed on him, he had blankly found his hat and gloves and had reached the door. Yet he waited for her answer. "What was ...
— The Beast in the Jungle • Henry James
... looking blankly at the closed outbuilding trying to imagine the hidden rooms and passages beneath it. Tradition told us that they were for refuge from the Indians. That explanation seemed well enough at first. But before ...
— Virginia: The Old Dominion • Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins
... felt in my left-hand coat-pocket—'I had better be getting ready.' I felt in my right-hand coat-pocket. 'Ready,' I repeated blankly. A clammy coldness took possession of me. My voice trailed off into nothingness. For in neither pocket was There a single one of the shells with which I had fancied that I was abundantly provided. In moments of excitement man is apt to make ...
— The Little Nugget • P.G. Wodehouse
... she said to Buster Bumblebee, who gasped at her blankly. "I've really two pairs of wings, because my polka dot wing covers are actually wings too—only folks don't usually call them ...
— The Tale of Mrs. Ladybug • Arthur Scott Bailey
... the ominous words, and looked blankly in each other's faces. They heard no more. The baronet caught his wife's wrist in a grasp of iron, drew her into the dressing-room, and closed the door. He stood with his back to it, gazing at her, his blue eyes filled with ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming
... Blankly, and with fear in his eyes, Ned gazed at Tom. The young inventor was frantically working at the levers, trying to loosen the jammed rudder—the rudder that enabled the sky racer ...
— Tom Swift in the City of Gold, or, Marvelous Adventures Underground • Victor Appleton
... all be lucky, mother," said the girl, watching the revelry before her blankly as she reflected upon ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... little blankly. Then as if to retrieve his blankness: "But why do you call her Nancy? Wasn't ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James
... to grasp this new phase of the tragedy in its proper bearings he stood stock still, and gazed blankly into the serious face of the detective. Furneaux knew he would do that. It was a mannerism. Some men can not think and move at the same moment, ...
— The Strange Case of Mortimer Fenley • Louis Tracy
... Nolan stared blankly for a moment, then aroused himself furiously from the strange spell that had enthralled his mind since first he had looked at the face of the girl lashed to the cross-trees. He swore violently, then flung himself full-length at the very edge of the ...
— The Harbor Master • Theodore Goodridge Roberts
... elevation down. He took the plan from her hands and seemed to study it. But he was really staring blankly at the whole situation. ...
— Soul of a Bishop • H. G. Wells
... down blankly into the water, it would be impossible to say; certainly for a good minute. I felt blank—just horribly blank. It was such a beastly confirmation of the unnaturalness of the thing I had concluded to be only a sort of brain fancy. I seemed, for that little time, ...
— The Ghost Pirates • William Hope Hodgson
... two large, exceedingly brilliant hazel eyes. For a moment he gazed rather blankly at the brown-curled young lady who was embracing him. Then a most delightful smile broke over his face; he sprang up and caught her to ...
— The Golden Road • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... Mr. Thornton when he comes to-night, for I have a splitting headache and I'm going to bed." Her mother stared at her blankly. Was this the end of all her hopes? "To-day is Tuesday—tell him that I will give him my answer Friday night. And, mother"—her voice dropped in a half-ashamed way—"the answer ...
— Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905 • Various
... irresolute from surprise. Yet Winston was by nature a gentleman; almost before he had grasped the full significance of it all he stepped silently backward, and gently closed the door. For an uncertain moment he remained there staring blankly at the wood, that haunting memory once again mocking every vain attempt to associate this girl-face with some other he had known before. Finally, leaving valise and overcoat lying in the hall, he retraced his way slowly ...
— Beth Norvell - A Romance of the West • Randall Parrish
... picturesque. Whatever charm of form it may have possessed in the past had been ruthlessly extirpated by the modernisation of the windows, which were now all of one size and form—a long gaunt range of unsheltered casements staring blankly out upon the spectator. There were no flower-beds, no terraced walks, or graceful flights of steps before the house; only a bare grassplot, with a stiff line of tall elms on each side, and a wide dry moat dividing it from the ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... quietly in my berth for a long time, staring blankly up at the dark deck above, unable to sleep, and endeavoring to figure out the true meaning of all these occurrences. It began to rain, torrents sweeping the planks overhead, while vivid flashes of lightning illumined the open hatch, before it could ...
— Wolves of the Sea • Randall Parrish
... terrible with their command that the weakling should break and confess, were upon Dexter Sprague. But Sprague did not break. He stared back blankly.... ...
— Murder at Bridge • Anne Austin
... her stubby finger-tips prodded deep into every jaded facial muscle that she could compass, she staggered towards the air, and dropping down into the first friendly chair that bumped against her knees, sat staring blankly out across the monotonous city roofs that flanked her open window,—trying very, very hard for the first time in her ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... he probably considered a weakness, Sweetwater approached the door staring somewhat blankly from the flat front of the primitive old house whose privacy they were about to invade, and rapped on its weather-beaten panels, first gently and then with ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... one would have been the wiser. That is what she would have done if she had wished to shield the criminal. But if she does not wish to shield him she would give his name. There is a tangle here which needs straightening out." He had been talking in a high, quick voice, staring blankly up over the garden fence, but now he sprang briskly to his feet and walked ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 25, January 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... blankly. He was suddenly aware of Aten in the background, smiling triumphantly and very happily at him. There was something like a roar of approval from the men of ...
— The Fifth-Dimension Tube • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... still for some seconds, staring blankly at the very simple, direct advertisement under my eyes. There was not the slightest doubt in my mind that it had a direct reference to my pretty patient in Sark. I had a reason for recollecting the date of Tardif's return ...
— The Doctor's Dilemma • Hesba Stretton
... to in the gray dawn, the driver shaking him savagely and howling into his ear that the Athenian was gone. Churchill looked blankly at the ...
— Brown Wolf and Other Jack London Stories - Chosen and Edited By Franklin K. Mathiews • Jack London
... this, and by the appearance of the hidden, laughing girls, Gladys stood for a moment staring blankly around her, then she asked, singling Kate Underwood out ...
— Miss Ashton's New Pupil - A School Girl's Story • Mrs. S. S. Robbins
... put out of business," muttered Garrick, as he worked over Dillon. Dillon opened his eyes blankly at last, then struggled up to his feet. "You got it worst, commissioner," remarked Garrick to him. "You ...
— Guy Garrick • Arthur B. Reeve
... book of many who would sooner pick oakum than read 'Frederick the Great' all through; whilst the mere student of belles lettres may attach importance to the essays on Johnson, Burns, and Scott, on Voltaire and Diderot, on Goethe and Novalis, and yet remain blankly indifferent to 'Sartor Resartus' ...
— Obiter Dicta • Augustine Birrell
... blankly at each other, and then the spokesman smiled. "Oh, well," he said, "if you have prohibited both of them, I don't see that we ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... that the Emperor had given me, and began to memorize its contents. Amazement must have shown on my face. A blow with a feather would have knocked me down. So wonder Wilhelm II was staring blankly, no wonder this message had to be delivered verbally. Hurriedly I began to memorize it. Presently, I saw Count Wedel come in and he and the Kaiser began to talk in whispers. Then Wilhelm ...
— The Secrets of the German War Office • Dr. Armgaard Karl Graves
... began to write immediately; some of them leaned back and stared at the ceiling; some of them chewed their pencils nervously; some of them leaned forward mercilessly pounding a knee; some of them kept running one or both hands through their hair; some of them wrote a little and then paused to gaze blankly before them or to tap their teeth with a pen or pencil: all of them were concentrating with an intensity that made ...
— The Plastic Age • Percy Marks
... a desk and began to write feverishly. A half-hour later he read what he had written and tore it up. Another half-hour and he repeated the performance. Three times he wrote the tale and destroyed it, then paused, realizing blankly that as a newspaper story it was impossible. Every atom of interest surrounding the suicide of the girl grew out of his own efforts to solve the mystery. Nothing had happened, no new clues had been uncovered, no one had been implicated in the girl's death, ...
— Laughing Bill Hyde and Other Stories • Rex Beach
... to all that Tom's view was the correct one, and that the position was much more serious than they had anticipated. For some time the governor and the four young men looked at each other, blankly. The destruction of the reinforcements, which would be followed no doubt by the capture of the ship by the war canoes, and the massacre of all on board, would indeed be fatal to their hopes. After what they had seen of the determination with which ...
— Under Drake's Flag - A Tale of the Spanish Main • G. A. Henty
... perceived that the man had come back. He might have been there some time with his effect of fussing and his pathetic sense of unwelcome. I had not noticed; I only knew that he stood at the half-open door with the knob of it in his hand looking into the room blankly. ...
— The Daughter of the Storage - And Other Things in Prose and Verse • William Dean Howells
... letter and stared blankly at the dark wall opposite. What it revealed did not come to her with shock, because she had always felt sure that it had been so. What startled her was the realization for the first time how much the experience had meant to both,—the examination of the picture and the silence of death enabled ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... faces showed that they wondered where the parallel came in. Then they said, blankly: "Of course not. He is only ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... say "wolf" to a person, the image of that wild creature comes instantly to his mind, but if you ask him why it is called a wolf, a hundred chances to one he will look blankly at you. It is the old fault, so common among us human beings, of ignoring the things which lie nearest us. Or perhaps your friend shares the state of mind of the puzzled old lady, who, after looking over a collection ...
— The Log of the Sun - A Chronicle of Nature's Year • William Beebe
... of the hill she breathed a sigh of relief. Her judgment and decision were amply proved. Nor in any uncertain fashion. The woods ceased in a clean cut, such as is so frequently the case where the pine world reigns. And rearing blankly before her gaze stood a dense barrier of low and heavy green bush. It needed small enough imagination to realize the security which lay in its depths for so small a creature ...
— The Forfeit • Ridgwell Cullum
... Martin blankly. "You idiot, what good would safety-razors be for getting people up twenty floors ...
— The Grammar School Boys in Summer Athletics • H. Irving Hancock
... save for my water-soaked trousers and socks, scalded, and my face and shoulders blackened by the smoke. His face was a fair weakness, his chin retreated, and his hair lay in crisp, almost flaxen curls on his low forehead; his eyes were rather large, pale blue, and blankly staring. He spoke abruptly, ...
— The War of the Worlds • H. G. Wells
... years spent with Dowson, she learned gradually that life was a better thing than she had known in the dreary gloom of the third floor Day and Night Nurseries. She was no longer left to spend hours alone, nor was she taken below stairs to listen blankly to servants talking to each other of mysterious things with which she herself and the Lady Downstairs and "him" were somehow connected, her discovery of this fact being based on the dropping of voices and sidelong glances ...
— The Head of the House of Coombe • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... communication blankly. Was Harry, who had always jumped at the chance of a tete-a-tete, dodging her? In her astonishment she let the other envelope fall. She stooped, and then for a moment remained thus, bent above it. The superscription was ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... dazed at the unexpected turn of affairs, had risen to his feet, and stood blankly gazing at the open door, not comprehending what had occurred. A movement made by the pseudo tramp, caused him to turn around, and he was gazing straight into the open barrel of a dangerous-looking revolver, held by a steady ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... with its set sneer, and moving but stiffly, she put forth another hand upon its side and thrust it farther backward until it lay stretched beneath the great broad seat, its glazed and open eyes seeming to stare upward blankly at the low roof of its strange prison; she thrust it farther backward still, and letting the draperies fall, steadily and with care so rearranged them that all was safe and hid ...
— A Lady of Quality • Frances Hodgson Burnett
... stepped down from the stand, Astro lunged toward him, blind with anger and shouting his fury. It took six Space Marines to force him back to his chair. Roger merely sat, staring blankly into space, a wry smile curling his lips. He clearly saw the trap into which he and his unit mate had fallen, and there was ...
— Sabotage in Space • Carey Rockwell
... stared at him blankly. "Time machine? Impossible. Of course not. After the tractor killed you, and you were buried, what good would such fantasies be, even if they existed? No, we simply reincarnated you by pooling ...
— The Sky Is Falling • Lester del Rey
... was quelled. She was awed as by the sight of some dead face, wronged grievously in life, but which now only revenges itself by the hopelessness of its mute perpetual smile. She remained staring blankly into the fire, plaiting and unplaiting the sash of her dress with heedless ...
— Agatha's Husband - A Novel • Dinah Maria Craik (AKA: Dinah Maria Mulock)
... enough to make it roll not more than twenty feet into a clump of tall grass. He looked blankly at it, but did not say a word. Then he took a jack-knife from his pocket and cut two notches in the shaft of ...
— John Henry Smith - A Humorous Romance of Outdoor Life • Frederick Upham Adams
... disappeared, and we were left staring blankly at a dark opening into the heart of the woody maze. Then we heard the ...
— Tales of the Malayan Coast - From Penang to the Philippines • Rounsevelle Wildman
... said aloud, in a decided, clearly modulated voice, gazing blankly into the warm stillness of the room. It had come partly from his innate impatience with any inferior state whatever, and part from the old inability to identify himself with the practicalities of existence. He had always viewed ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... self-constituted dictator of that particular corner of the premises, came down a few feet from him, as if to inquire his business. The woodpecker acknowledged the courtesy by drawing himself up very straight and bowing. The bow impressed, not to say awed, the native bird. He stood staring blankly, till the new-comer proclaimed his errand by dropping into the bushes, helping himself to a berry, and returning to the fence to dispose of his plunder. This was too much; the outraged redbreast dashed suddenly ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... herself to plead; to look directly up into his perplexed eyes. He leaned an arm on the mantel, staggered. His eyes followed hers in every word she spoke, and when she ceased he stared blankly at ...
— The Daughter of a Magnate • Frank H. Spearman
... blankly. "That's a pretty silly statement, isn't it, Manning? Or did you decide to loosen up and pull a gag now ...
— Empire • Clifford Donald Simak
... Luella stared blankly at him a moment, then turned to the girl. But she, though she got up from her seat and going over to the young man seized his hand and pressed it between her own, did not lift her eyes to the woman's ...
— While Caroline Was Growing • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... are thus stretched out blankly, in a faint. Are they suffering? Hungry or thirsty? [23] I believe they are past troubling about such things. It is time to ...
— Alone • Norman Douglas
... it you were going to say to me?" Mathilde asked greedily. Farron looked at her blankly. Adelaide knew that he had quite forgotten the phrase, but he concealed the fact by not allowing the least illumination of his ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... for us or it'd pay us something," Gusterson sourly asserted, staring blankly at the tankless TV and kicking it lightly ...
— The Creature from Cleveland Depths • Fritz Reuter Leiber
... staring blankly at the curtains through which Mr. Aram's good angel, for whom he had lied and cheated in order to gain credit in her eyes, had disappeared. He pushed them aside with his stick. "We will let you know to-morrow morning," he repeated, ...
— Cinderella - And Other Stories • Richard Harding Davis
... which she wandered back most frequently—to stare blankly at it without comprehension—was her husband's appeal to her on his deathbed. To-night she had gone back to it again as to a tottering wall. She had worn a little pathway over heaps of miserable conjectures and twisted ...
— Prisoners - Fast Bound In Misery And Iron • Mary Cholmondeley
... On the second day, while he was gazing blankly at the post a groom brought two horses to the curb in front of the house opposite. One of the horses had a real cowboy's saddle. Johnnie's eyes gleamed. This was like a breath of honest-to-God Arizona. The door opened, and out of it came a man and a ...
— The Big-Town Round-Up • William MacLeod Raine
... Ibsen, man: Ibsen. (He goes out by the staircase door followed by Sylvia, who kisses her hand to the bust as she passes. Craven stares blankly after her, and then up at the bust. Giving the problem up as insoluble, he shakes his head and follows them. Near the door he ...
— The Philanderer • George Bernard Shaw
... so startling a sensation, though he'd read about it, that he simply stayed still and blankly submitted to it. Presently he felt himself gasp. Presently, again, he noticed that one of his feet was going to sleep. He tried to move it and succeeded only in stirring it feebly. The roaring went ...
— Operation: Outer Space • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... out of the courtyard, leaving Jean looking blankly at the mud that had been holly lately. Not his act of sacrilege was distressing her, but his news. Were these berries a love token? Had God let Rob Dow say they were a gypsy's love token, and ...
— The Little Minister • J.M. Barrie
... of them whether he had read some book that was exciting discussion among educated people at the moment, he would probably look at you blankly and, after remarking that he had never cared for economics or history—as the case might be—inquire whether you preferred a "Blossom" or a "Tornado." Poor vacuous old cocks! They might be having ...
— The "Goldfish" • Arthur Train
... of it is to come yet. He rushed oat into Flinders Street, found Sergeant Doyle and a policeman, and came back panting and furious, and pointing, to Charteris, told them to take him in charge. Doyle looked at us blankly, saw we were nearly dead with laughing, and then took Assheton aside, and said ...
— Chinkie's Flat and Other Stories - 1904 • Louis Becke
... felt my heart. I was quite aware that it was functioning normally. He shook me and called me by name. After repeated shakings I opened my eyes and stared at him blankly, but I said nothing. Presently he left me and returned with a stretcher. I lay inertly as I was placed thereon and borne out of the chamber. Other stretcher-bearers were walking ahead. We passed through the engine room where ...
— City of Endless Night • Milo Hastings
... Radna spoke seemed almost unearthly to him, and confused his senses for the moment as some potent drug might have done. He took her outstretched hand in awkward silence, and for an instant so far forgot himself as to gaze blankly ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith
... about equally of eternal wash-day, casual cow-shed, and passing feather-bed, it sustains a lank, middle-aged, gristly man to come out at the same hour every day and grunt unintelligibly at the stage-driver, an expressionless boy in a bandless straw-hat and no shoes to stare blankly from the doorway at the same old pole-horse he has mechanically thus inspected from infancy, and one speckled hen of mature years to poise observingly on single leg at the head of the shapeless black dog asleep ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 22, August 27, 1870 • Various
... fell away before her glance. He clanked forward a step or two, flung out a mailed arm, and with a hand that shook pointed to the Seigneur Davie, who stood blankly watching him. ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... A heavy, barred door was in front of him; turning his head he saw an iron-grated window behind him. Door and window were set in heavy stone walls; two other stone walls, with a narrow iron cot set against one of them, rose blankly on either side. ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer
... the silent house. Sarah Spencer sprang out of her doze in consternation, and gazed blankly at the shrieking child. Caroline came hurrying in with distended eyes. On the bed Naomi ...
— Further Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... to his room after luncheon I found him standing by the window, with his hands in his pockets, looking blankly out upon the ...
— The Golden Face - A Great 'Crook' Romance • William Le Queux
... limp form in his arms, calling out to her in the agony of fear, utterly oblivious to all else that was happening about him, his two friends were swiftly disarming the grovelling natives. Selim's knife severed the cords that bound Bobby Browne's hands; he was staring blankly, dizzily before him, and many minutes passed before he was able to comprehend ...
— The Man From Brodney's • George Barr McCutcheon
... spoken involuntarily. Certainly I had not intended telling him that. The speech had the effect of causing him to drop my arm and step back. He stared at me blankly. No doubt he ...
— Kent Knowles: Quahaug • Joseph C. Lincoln
... wrought upon his cloudy mood With reverent eyes mock-loyal, shaken voice, And flutter'd adoration, and at last With dark sweet hints of some who prized him more Than who should prize him most; at which the King Had gazed upon her blankly and gone by: But one had watch'd, and had not held his peace: It made the laughter of an afternoon That Vivien should attempt the blameless King. And after that, she set herself to gain Him, the most famous man of all those times, Merlin, who knew the range of all their arts, Had built the King ...
— Alfred Tennyson • Andrew Lang
... the truth of that; his whole face showed it, as he spoke through his set teeth, and launched a fiery glance at the unconscious captain. I could only hold my breath and stare blankly at him, wondering what mad act was coming next. I suppose I shook and turned white, as women have a foolish habit of doing when sudden danger daunts them; for Robert released my arm, sat down upon the bedside just in front of me, and said, with the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 12, No. 73, November, 1863 • Various
... the street, staring blankly at the missive, when I was startled beyond measure by feeling a hand on my shoulder, and a ...
— Boycotted - And Other Stories • Talbot Baines Reed
... keen appreciation of her physical freshness and mental strength, and manoeuvred patiently toward the point where he would dare ask blankly how many there were in her family, and on exactly how many acres her father paid tax. He decided it would not do for at least a week yet; possibly he could raise the subject casually with someone down town who ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... Pitman gazed blankly about the room; rage and despair seethed in his innocent spirit; thoughts of flight, thoughts even of suicide, came and went before him; and still the barrister patiently waited, and still the artist groped in vain for any form of ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 7 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... Garry stared blankly at the packing litter and the tall Irishman in the center of it wearily mopping his forehead. It was impossible to locate the crags he must have leaped to reach his spectacular decision. They were ...
— Kenny • Leona Dalrymple
... their work, but do it blankly, without communication. Openings into the being they may be, but the closed cheek is more communicative. From them the blood of Perdita never did look out. It ebbed and flowed in her face, her dance, her talk. It was hiding in her paleness, ...
— The Colour of Life • Alice Meynell
... asked Walter Harris, blankly. "Oh, the one we came in? Yes, I suppose it does. They're running all the time, anyway. Why, you are not sick, ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various
... said Annabel blankly, and fell to examining Aunt Plenty's lace while Rose went on with a happy smile in her eyes as she dived ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... said P. Sybarite blankly, experiencing a qualm at the thought of a soft-nosed bullet ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... old man to a sitting position, with his back supported by the stiff branches of the bush under the shadow of which he had been sleeping. And while he was making the poor old fellow as comfortable as he could he enquired solicitously how he felt; but Vilcamapata only looked at him blankly, and murmured a few words in a tongue that was quite unintelligible to his listener. Then, with gentle touch, Phil began to pass his hand cautiously over his patient's body, searching for possible fractured ribs or some similar injury; but the old man waved him impatiently ...
— Two Gallant Sons of Devon - A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess • Harry Collingwood
... figure in the door seemed not to have seen her. "Ovide! Ovide!" she called brokenly, staring blankly around ...
— A Lover in Homespun - And Other Stories • F. Clifford Smith
... for him, but, turning, he was amazed to see Richart outside with breathless eagerness draw shut the strong door that led to the passage from which he had entered, and a moment later, Herbert heard the ominous sound of stout bolts being shot into their sockets. He stood for a moment gazing blankly now at the bolted door, now at the barred window, and then slowly there came to him the knowledge which would have enlightened a more suspicious man long before—that he was a prisoner in the grim fortress of Gudenfels. Casting his mind backward over ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr
... As he turned his face toward the window Shirley observed the great drawn shadows under his squinting eyes. The sudden shock was telling on that weasel face. Taylor walked unsteadily toward the infernal machine, and he looked blankly toward Warren again. The other's blazing orbs were full upon him now. There was a frightful menace in their glittering depths as ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... her husband blankly. But he was already talking of something else, and she asked no more about the woman, though all the way along the road the face seemed to follow her. It might have been this that caused the tightening about her heart. For some way her vivacity ...
— A Mountain Woman and Others • (AKA Elia Wilkinson) Elia W. Peattie
... hale, active man of three-and-forty, of busy habits, and regular mind, suddenly thrown upon the world without occupation. What was he to do with himself? While he was asking this question and waiting blankly for an answer which did not come, his aunt, old Mrs. Massey, departed this life, leaving him heir to what she possessed, which might be three hundred a year in all. This, added to his pension and the little that he owned independently, put him beyond the necessity of seeking further employment. ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard
... blankly into space and remained silent for several minutes. Bisset watched his assistant with ...
— Simon • J. Storer Clouston
... into Waverly Place, and was walking westward toward Washington Square. At the corner he pulled himself up, saying half-aloud: "The office—I ought to be at the office." He drew out his watch and stared at it blankly. What the devil had he taken it out for? He had to go through a laborious process of readjustment to find out what it had to say.... Twelve o'clock.... Should he turn back to the office? It seemed easier to cross the square, go ...
— The Custom of the Country • Edith Wharton
... half fearfully up to their fugitive garments. There was no doubt about it, there were the two coats dangling from a low hanging branch, perfectly dry and in the pockets the spy-glass and the trusty compass. The two boys stared blankly ...
— Tom Slade with the Boys Over There • Percy K. Fitzhugh
... confessed Thornton, jingling some money in his trousers pockets and turning blankly upon the superintendent. "Do you think you'll be able to do it—to bring this crime home ...
— The Grell Mystery • Frank Froest
... young gentlemen," said the resident gravely; and the two youths went blankly off to ...
— Middy and Ensign • G. Manville Fenn
... blankly at each other, while Holroyd was still too absorbed to have the least suspicion that the future happiness or misery of himself and others was trembling just then ...
— The Giant's Robe • F. Anstey
... go! eh, Bullen?" remarked Ensign Christie, as the two men stared blankly at the door just closed in ...
— At War with Pontiac - The Totem of the Bear • Kirk Munroe and J. Finnemore
... at her blankly, too bewildered even to wonder how she knew he was in Genoa; and she continued, with the kind of shy imperiousness that always made him feel, in her presence, like a member of an orchestra under a masterful baton; "Now please get right into this carriage, ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton
... girl's eyes turn towards Mr. Jones's secretary and rest blankly on his face. Ricardo, however, looked vaguely into space, and, with faint flickers of a smile about his lips, made conversation indefatigably against the silence of his entertainers. He boasted largely of his long association with Mr. Jones—over four years now, he said. ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... country, were airs from home. I stood on the platform by the hour; and, as I saw, one after another, pleasant villages, carts upon the highway and fishers by the stream, and heard cockcrows and cheery voices in the distance, and beheld the sun no longer shining blankly on the plains of ocean, but striking among shapely hills and his light dispersed and coloured by a thousand accidents of form and surface, I began to exult with myself upon this rise in life like a man who had come into a rich estate. And ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 2 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... yourself, I am a widow. I don't know whether you've ever heard my name—Ebbsmith. [GERTRUDE stares at her blankly.] I beg your pardon sincerely. I never meant to conceal my true position; such a course is opposed to every true principle of mind. But I grew so attached to you in Florence and—well, it was contemptibly weak; I'll never do such a thing again. [She goes back ...
— The Notorious Mrs. Ebbsmith • Arthur Wing Pinero
... terror-stricken girl, no pallid runaway of the harems, but a still, dark-shrouded form, swathed in the tight bandages of the ancient embalmer, a dry, dusty little mummy creature blankly and inscrutably confronting this ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley
... intelligence clinging helplessly to the thing he had just heard. "The Council," he repeated blankly, and then snatched at a name that had struck him. "But who ...
— When the Sleeper Wakes • Herbert George Wells
... remained seated, his hands still clutching his bushy hair, while his large brown eyes stared blankly from a face ...
— Abe and Mawruss - Being Further Adventures of Potash and Perlmutter • Montague Glass
... cottage, followed by Gerald, and seated himself on the turf dyke with his chin resting on his hands. For a long time he gazed blankly in front of him, and ...
— The Adventure League • Hilda T. Skae
... The coward!" was all Eileen's bloodless lips allowed to pass, as she sat staring blankly ahead of her, her face pale and her hands ...
— The Spoilers of the Valley • Robert Watson
... them. They stared blankly. "Say, my Gawd, that's tough," the girl murmured. "Your birthday too. Tommy listen, we ...
— The World Beyond • Raymond King Cummings
... stood gazing blankly while the unchewed bunch of moss hung from her mouth, then roused to go on to the front as before; but the spells of vacant stare and the hankering to be alone grew stronger. She turned downward to seek the birch woods, but the whole band turned with her. She stood stock-still, ...
— Animal Heroes • Ernest Thompson Seton
... but, save Hans the confiding, none other of the many interested observers were deceived. No man merely indolent sleeps neither by night nor by day; and it seemed the little man never slept. No man merely indolent sits wide-eyed hour after hour, gazing blankly at the earth beneath his feet—and uttering never a word. Brooding, not dreaming, was Asa Arnold; brooding over the eternal problem of right and wrong. And, as passed the slow weeks, he moved back—back on the trail of civilization, back until Passion and ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge
... agree with you!" Evadne exclaimed; then stopped, colouring crimson. She had forgotten in her interest that she was a stranger to these people; and only remembered it when they all looked at her—rather blankly, as she imagined. "I beg your pardon," she said, addressing Mrs. Malcomson. "I could not help overhearing the discussion, and I am deeply interested. I am—Mrs. Colquhoun," she broke off, covered ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand
... did not hear him—she sat huddled up on the seat with her eyes staring blankly before her. For the first time in her life she was conscious that ...
— Werwolves • Elliott O'Donnell
... tea-table standing in this inner room proclaimed that it was open to inspection, and I wandered in. A bleu poudre vase first attracted me; then I turned to examine a slender bronze Ganymede, and in so doing found myself face to face with Mrs. Grancy's portrait. I stared up at her blankly and she smiled back at me in all the recovered radiance of youth. The artist had effaced every trace of his later touches and the original picture had reappeared. It throned alone on the panelled wall, asserting a brilliant ...
— Crucial Instances • Edith Wharton
... mean," said Mr. Moss, looking blankly before him, "we'd better be sold up, and ha' done with it; I must part wi' every head o' stock I've got, to pay you and ...
— The Mill on the Floss • George Eliot
... She stood staring blankly. She had not been aware of any movement. It was as if the earth had suddenly and silently gaped and swallowed him while her back ...
— The Swindler and Other Stories • Ethel M. Dell
... with nothing to do but do nothing. Our barber is a delightful fellow; he looks benign and does not prattle; he respects the lobes of our ears and other vulnerabilia. But for some inscrutable reason we feel strangely ill at ease in his chair. We can't think of anything to think about. Blankly we brood in the hope of catching the hem of some intimation of immortality. But no, there is nothing to do but sit there, useless as an incubator with no eggs in it. The processes of wasting and decay are hurrying us rapidly to a pauperish grave, every instant brings us closer ...
— Mince Pie • Christopher Darlington Morley
... little strangled cry she sank into a chair, clasping her hands tightly together. She sat there, very still and quiet, staring blankly into space. . ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... we quarrel determinately. He speaks of this most popular (and, we venture to add, most wise and beneficial) maxim, which arms men's suspicions against all that is merely speculative, on the ground that it is continually at war with the truth of practical results, as though it were merely and blankly a vulgar error, as though sans phrase it might be dismissed for nonsense. But, because there is a casual inaccuracy in the wording of a great truth, we are not at liberty to deny that truth, to evade it, to 'ignore' it, or to confound ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey
... him blankly and my mind swept back. No more than a few short weeks ago Detective-Colonel Halsey of Divisional Headquarters here in Greater New York had sent for us, and we had been precipitated into the Grantline affair. "Halsey!" ...
— Wandl the Invader • Raymond King Cummings
... She stared blankly at him, and it was clear that it was all as if it had not been with her. He insisted, and then she said: "Perhaps I thought I knew him, and was afraid I should hurt his feelings if I didn't recognize him. But I don't remember it at all." The curves of her mouth drooped, and her ...
— Between The Dark And The Daylight • William Dean Howells
... hours of our confinement on the bed, for the room was very small and the one window stared blankly at the window of an unused room in the Peggs' house, which blankly returned ...
— Explorers of the Dawn • Mazo de la Roche
... played a sinister smile. The professor cast. upon his wife a glance expressing weariness. It was as if he said " There you go again. You can't keep your foot out of it." She understood the glance, and so she asked blankly: "Why, What's the matter? Oh." Her belated mind grasped that it waw an aftermath of the quarrel of Coleman and Coke. Marjory looked as if she was distressed in the belief that her mother had been stupid. Coleman was outwardly serene. It was Peter Tounley who ...
— Active Service • Stephen Crane
... only regarded him blankly, as if there had been no interruption, and then she proceeded. "And you will note what she was eating. Curds and whey—perfectly simple yet nutritious fare. There were other instances showing that the wasteful dinner table must ...
— Everychild - A Story Which The Old May Interpret to the Young and Which the Young May Interpret to the Old • Louis Dodge
... I blankly indicated the thing to my friend. How long had it been there, that horrible, long, high frontage of grey stone? It must surely have been there before either of us was born. It seemed to be a very perfect specimen of 1860—1870 architecture—perfect ...
— And Even Now - Essays • Max Beerbohm
... greater part of his life. I tried him with the Chicago Exposition, and ranching as a business for younger sons; did it delicately, of course, and with any amount of deference, but he only looked at me blankly, and began talking about the Bank-rate. After that, I settled with myself I wouldn't talk to any more of them about things that they might be expected ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, February 11, 1893 • Various
... contingency we had not provided for: we looked at each other blankly, and, though loath to do so, we both came to the conclusion that they were telling ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - Vol. XI, No. 27, June, 1873 • Various
... blankly and coldly at the ceiling; their patient expression no longer bore a trace of life or suffering, and their calm repose was undisturbed by the song of ...
— The Ape, the Idiot & Other People • W. C. Morrow
... almost perpetual darkness; here we had eternal daylight, which, with absolutely nothing to do or even to think about, was even more trying. Almost our sole occupation was to sit on the beach and gaze blankly at the frozen ocean, which seemed at times as though it would never break up and admit of our release from this natural prison. Every day, however, fresh patches of brown earth appeared through their white and wintry ...
— From Paris to New York by Land • Harry de Windt
... and, with lights extinguished, the careful, silent watch was kept till the midnight hour. As eight bells rang out upon the darkness, and the unsuspecting sailor keeping the midnight watch looked blankly into the night, several rowboats, with occupants armed to the teeth, would be lowered, and without a splash ride the waters, over which they glided, carrying the sea-robbers to the grim sides of ...
— Pirates and Piracy • Oscar Herrmann
... many uncomplimentary words applied to husbands, most of which she had been unable to comprehend; and she speculated blankly on them in her mother's connection. On the whole the women agreed that they were remarkably stupid and transparent, they protested that they understood and guided every move husbands made; and this surely gave her father no opportunity for independent crime. She ...
— Linda Condon • Joseph Hergesheimer
... looked in the direction indicated cheerfully and blankly. "'The samphire by the ocean's brim,'" he said lightly. "I attach no importance to it whatever, but it's very like you to lift one into your privacy at a moment's notice. I'm all for the formalities myself, so I observe that I haven't seen you for years. Years! Not ...
— Rest Harrow - A Comedy of Resolution • Maurice Hewlett
... said, and shut the door in his face. He stared blankly at the door for a moment, then turned round and stood looking down into the road, with the pitcher in his hand. The milkman's little boy, Maxime, came running round the corner of the house. "Maxime," he said ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... Thure stared blankly at the paper for a moment after he had read the words that appeared to close their last avenue of escape. He saw clearly the force of their meaning. It had, indeed, now become a battle for life between him and Bud ...
— The Cave of Gold - A Tale of California in '49 • Everett McNeil
... unusual effort of thought, with the endeavour to penetrate a momentary mystery, which she instinctively felt lay somewhere, and which she looked to him to explain; and he could not give her a careless, mocking answer; he sat staring blankly at her for a few ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... new-found manliness, to eat with our hats on, shout and sing, and speak of our food as "tapeworm," "hemorrhage," and the like. I remember how we sat that night, silent, not a word from the crowd—one starting to eat, then seeing it wasn't the thing to do, and staring blankly like the rest. They were terrible, those stares into reality. That clutching pain of grief was real, so real it blotted everything out. Later some of us in my room began to talk in low voices of what a good fellow he had been. Then some chap from the Y. M. C. A. proposed timidly to ...
— The Harbor • Ernest Poole
... understood the wonderful things he was telling her. She would lie upon her back with her eyes fixed upon him, her little red fists doubled over his bow, or a thumb thrust into her mouth. And the longer she lay like this, gazing at him blankly, the more convinced Jan became that she was understanding him; and his voice grew soft and low, and his eyes shone with a soft mist as he told her those things which John Cummins would have ...
— The Honor of the Big Snows • James Oliver Curwood
... Tom!" echoed Dan blankly. It seemed so terrible to think of going home and finding no mother or ...
— The Gap in the Fence • Frederica J. Turle
... clean-cut in the moon-beams. And a great sweat lay heavy on the vast upper-lip. In the same moment of time, the whistling had burst into a mad screaming note, that seemed to stun me, even where I stood, outside of the window. And then, the following moment, I was staring blankly at the solid, undisturbed floor of the room—smooth, polished stone flooring, from wall to wall; and there was an ...
— Carnacki, The Ghost Finder • William Hope Hodgson
... Grace rather blankly. "That part of it hadn't occurred to me. Still, Overton is only a small city, and there won't be many incoming passengers. It's a case of outgoing passengers this week. I have an idea that we shall ...
— Grace Harlowe's Third Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower
... understand any sensible Englishman entertaining such an insane idea. As manager of one of the largest concerns in Cork I have made many visits to England, and I found the supporters of Mr. Gladstone so utterly misinformed, so credulous, so blankly ignorant of the matter, that I forbore to debate the thing at all. And their assumption was on a level with their ignorance, which is saying a ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)
... Blankly they surveyed each other and the empty beach. Then they gazed at their pretty toy boat, that had borne so staunchly the vicissitudes of its dangerous voyage. It was almost night. The shipwrecked mariners were very tired and the ...
— Madge Morton's Secret • Amy D. V. Chalmers
... innocent creature was quite changed. It was not crying—this disease has no characteristic cry, but so much the more dreadful is the suffering. How terrible, a child who can not complain, whom men can not help! Noemi looked blankly at her mother as if to ask, "And have you no cure for this?" Therese could hardly bear this look. "So many miserable sick and dying people have been helped by you, and for this one ...
— Timar's Two Worlds • Mr Jkai
... along the Cowgate after every one was abed but the policeman, and stopped by hazard before a tall land. The moon touched upon its chimneys, and shone blankly on the upper windows; there was no light anywhere in the great bulk of building; but as I stood there it seemed to me that I could hear quite a body of quiet sounds from the interior; doubtless there were many ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition - Vol. 1 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... back and stared blankly through the open door. With the same unconscious instinct which had moved him to conceal his face from the old man, he fumbled in one pocket and drew forth papers and tobacco sack. It spoke well for his self-control ...
— Shoe-Bar Stratton • Joseph Bushnell Ames
... the escalator at full speed. A spray of passageways met him. He did not hesitate. He chose the one farthest to the left and dashed along its winding length until he came to a dead end. The vita-crystal gleamed blankly back at him. ...
— Slaves of Mercury • Nat Schachner
... silent—gazing blankly before her, with such perplexity and sorrow in her face that her faithful gouvernante grew anxious ...
— The Master-Christian • Marie Corelli
... of three silvery harvest fields sloped down to Peter Penhallow's brook—a wide, shallow stream bridged over in the olden days by the mossy trunk of an ancient fallen tree. When Lucinda and Romney arrived at the brook they gazed at the brawling water blankly. Lucinda remembered that she must not speak to Romney just in time to prevent an exclamation of dismay. There was no tree! There was no bridge of any kind over ...
— Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... him that this was only the light of his fire thrown through his open door, and that the figure was probably that of a servant before it, who had been arranging his room. He started forward again, but at the sound of his advancing footsteps the figure and the luminous glow vanished, and he arrived blankly face to face with his own closed door. He looked around the dim bay; it was absolutely vacant. It was equally impossible for any one to have escaped without passing him. There was only his room left. A half-nervous, half-superstitious thrill crept over him as ...
— The Bell-Ringer of Angel's and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... looked blankly at him, with eyes that seemed watching for something—something that never came. Billy dared not trust himself to say another word. He finally set the ...
— The Shagganappi • E. Pauline Johnson
... blankly expressionless. He might have been gazing through my head. His eyes neither twinkled with fun nor sent a message of warning; but somehow I knew that he saw me, that he had been watching me for a long time. "You see the one I mean, don't you?" asked Monny. "Well, that's ...
— It Happened in Egypt • C. N. Williamson & A. M. Williamson
... matter, Katharine?" he asked kindly. "Have you a headache this evening?" She was just then staring rather blankly into space. ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... her soul by her own free will and choice—she had selected evil as her good—she had crowned herself with shame willingly, nay—joyfully; she had preferred it to honor. What should be done? I tortured myself occasionally with this question. I stared blankly on the ground—would some demon spring from it and give me the answer I sought? What should be done with HER—with HIM, my treacherous friend, my smiling betrayer? Suddenly my eyes lighted on the fallen rose-leaves—those that had dropped when Guido's embrace had crushed the flower she wore. There ...
— Vendetta - A Story of One Forgotten • Marie Corelli
... come in," echoes Eleanor feebly, pleased and yet awed by Giddy's suggestion. She is looking somewhat blankly at those delicate pink toes, and the dark mane falling over ...
— When the Birds Begin to Sing • Winifred Graham
... to give him this higher teaching and training; go on, as so many mothers have done, blankly ignoring the whole subject, because it is so difficult to speak to one's boys,—as if everything worth having in this life were not difficult!—leave him to the teaching of dirty gossip, of unclean classical allusions in his school-books, of scraps of newspaper intelligence, possibly ...
— The Power of Womanhood, or Mothers and Sons - A Book For Parents, And Those In Loco Parentis • Ellice Hopkins
... voices rose in protest against such an unhappy fate. Nevertheless, when Peace waded in to their rescue, they fought and bit like wild-cats, till she dragged them howling back to the sidewalk and safety. Then abruptly the wails ceased, two pair of round gray eyes stared blankly up at their rescuer, and two voices ...
— The Lilac Lady • Ruth Alberta Brown
... "Why?" asked Bastin blankly. "I only said what I thought to be the truth. The truth is better than what you call ...
— When the World Shook - Being an Account of the Great Adventure of Bastin, Bickley and Arbuthnot • H. Rider Haggard
... see some kind of treasure chamber. He stared blankly at the big object in the centre of the room—a complex object that somehow reminded him of his laboratory experiments in college. A step nearer, with his own and Carmena's candles upraised, gave him a clear view of the bulging copper boiler, the tubes and worm and fermenting vats. The air ...
— Bloom of Cactus • Robert Ames Bennet
... at him blankly; then, with a bitter laugh, I (1) stood in position illustrated, (2) raised arms above head in manner indicated by the instructions, (3) straightened right arm and lowered right hand so that handkerchief (still taut) sloped to right, and (4) ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, July 22, 1914 • Various
... blankly. She shook her head. "Oh, no, Mr. Jadwin. I should be only an encumbrance. Don't misunderstand me. I approve of the work with all my heart, but I am not fitted—I feel no call. I should be so inapt that I know I should do no good. My training has been so ...
— The Pit • Frank Norris
... Damocles de Warrenne sat on the verandah of the Grand Imperial Hotel Royal of Kot Ghazi, which has five rooms and five million cockroaches, and stared blankly into the moonlit compound, beyond which stretched the bare rocky plain that was bounded on the north and west by mighty mountains, on the east by a mighty river, and on the south by the more mighty ocean, many ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... the while the interrogation had been going on, had now both gone out again. The lawyers, too, looked very tired. It was a wretched morning, the whole sky was overcast, and the rain streamed down in bucketfuls. Mitya gazed blankly out ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... father stared at each other blankly, almost with despair. They were trapped, cut off from all help; in the power of a man who was going mad. Mr. Clifford said nothing. He was old and growing feeble; for years, although he did not know it, Meyer ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... Pelhams. George had sense enough to despise the two brothers, and sense enough also to see when he could not do without them. During the February of 1746, while the Stuart rebellion was still aflame, a ministerial crisis came on. The Pelhams wished to bring Pitt into the Ministry; the King blankly refused. But the King did more than that: he began to negotiate privately with Lord Granville and Lord Bath. The Pelhams knew their strength. They at once threw up their offices; the whole Ministry resigned in a body. ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy |
