"Noncommittal" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... as was his wont; with deadly directness, as was his nature. The blacksmith shop was silent, closed—as grimly noncommittal as a vault. You might guess whatever you pleased about its inmate; it was like trying to imagine the emotions pictured upon the face behind a smooth, black mask. Slim stopped before the closed door and listened. The rusty, iron hasp attracted his slow gaze, at first puzzling him a little, making ...
— Flying U Ranch • B. M. Bower
... Over these noncommittal summits the bright eye of the bookseller, as he tacked up the freshly ironed muslin curtains Mrs. Mifflin had allotted, could discern a glimpse of the bay and the leviathan ferries that link Staten Island ...
— The Haunted Bookshop • Christopher Morley
... Darrah chatted on, affably noncommittal, and after a time Winton began to upbraid himself for suspecting the ulterior motive. And when he finally rose to excuse himself on a letter-writing plea, his leave-taking was that of the genial host reluctant to part company ...
— A Fool For Love • Francis Lynde
... A noncommittal man-servant informed her that Mr. Farwell was still away (he had gone to Cincinnati on business for several days), and that the other gentleman had left unexpectedly the night before. He did not add that the household ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... which were intercepted yesterday, were decoded this morning by a team of government scientists and cryptographers who had been at the task all night. While officials were noncommittal about the nature of the message contained in the signals, they declared, 'We are authorized to state that the received message was friendly and appears to represent a sincere attempt by another race of intelligent beings to contact the people of Earth. A reply message ...
— Master of None • Lloyd Neil Goble
... upon the platform of his bunting-draped car, his chosen allies grouped foolishly around him. It was the first time men had turned from his presence with his gracious, flatteringly noncommittal speech unuttered, his hand unshaken, his smiling, bowing departure unmarked by cheers growing fainter as he receded. Only Arline tarried, her thin fingers gripping the arm of her "breed girl," lest she catch the panic and run ...
— Lonesome Land • B. M. Bower
... was doing now, and what she would like sent up for dinner, but he had not the courage. The aghast countenance which Mrs. Forbes had exhibited at the moment when the enormity of Jewel's conduct transpired remained in his memory. The housekeeper's appearance at present was noncommittal. Mrs. Evringham sent her piercing and questioning ...
— Jewel - A Chapter In Her Life • Clara Louise Burnham
... most noncommittal voice, since he did not have the slightest intention of continuing the trip, no matter ...
— The Ethical Engineer • Henry Maxwell Dempsey
... religious and evangelical view of Luther, which, indeed, would account for his later synergistic deviations as well as for the charges of Stoicism he preferred against Luther. After abandoning his former doctrine, he, as a rule, was noncommittal as to his exact views on election. But whenever he ventured an opinion, it savored of synergism. September 30, 1531, he wrote to Brenz: "But in the entire Apology I have avoided that long and inexplicable disputation concerning predestination. Everywhere I speak as though ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... want of the ranch?" Sudden's tone was noncommittal. Here was the fellow that had caused all this trouble and worry and loss. Sudden meant to deal with him as he deserved, but that did not mean he would fly into a passion and handicap ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... With a noncommittal grunt, the detective stooped and retrieved this damning bit of evidence, while the manager moved quickly to his side, to inspect the find. And P. Sybarite looked up with blank eyes in a pallid, wizened face in time to see Shaynon bare his teeth—his ...
— The Day of Days - An Extravaganza • Louis Joseph Vance
... Not a word of what the note contained had leaked from any source and there had been no hint of a break in the Wilson cabinet. Supposedly, all was harmony. Yet this correspondent, judging from the excited manner of the Secretary of State, the sharpness of his noncommittal replies, and his preoccupied air as he emerged from the cabinet room, scented the trouble and published the following story hours before other correspondents had their eyes opened to the history-making ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... Mathewson replied in the noncommittal manner of the professional man's confidential assistant. "But he has gone out for a ...
— Red Pepper Burns • Grace S. Richmond
... outside and for a moment he could see nothing. Then objects one by one asserted themselves, the orderly rows of vegetable plants in the garden, the wood-box by the door, the shrubbery at the end of the portico, the blue spruce tree opposite, the loom of the dark and noncommittal garage. He knew that one of his men was in the trees opposite the side porch and another around the corner of the kitchen, in the hedge, but he did not want to raise a hue and cry unless it was necessary. What was this Thing that created terror at sight? ...
— The Vagrant Duke • George Gibbs
... of our splendid fellows, a private of the 102nd Infantry, came frequently into our station at Rimaucourt where I was a hut secretary during the first month of my stay in France. I felt instinctively that he had a story which he might tell, although he had the noncommittal way of an officer on the Intelligence Staff. Through several days of quiet ...
— The Fight for the Argonne - Personal Experiences of a 'Y' Man • William Benjamin West
... back two weeks' food supply, the freight from the Dean and letters from Ernest. They were very noncommittal but cheerful. He had cleared up the misunderstanding with the Smithsonian Institution, but as yet had no money and did not know when he ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie
... main lounge, and the captain introduced us to Mr. Glenn Murell. He was fairly tall, with light gray hair, prematurely so, I thought, and a pleasant, noncommittal face. I'd have pegged him for a businessman. Well, I suppose authoring is a business, if that was his business. He shook hands with us, ...
— Four-Day Planet • Henry Beam Piper
... of your reputation you are surprisingly noncommittal," she said. "Will you tell me this: So far as you know is there a ...
— The Short Cut • Jackson Gregory
... the day he was unable to see her alone for a moment, or to obtain any further reason to believe that the ice was in reality broken between them. But his course was no longer noncommittal, even to the most careless observer. The other guests of the house smiled; and Mr. Merriweather and Mr. Hackley looked askance at one who threw their assiduous attentions quite into the shade. Miss Madison maintained her composure, was oblivious as far as possible, and ...
— Taken Alive • E. P. Roe
... majority of the delegates preferred to rely upon legal-tender paper to furnish the ample supply of money desired. General Butler was at this time acting with the Democrats in Massachusetts, and his first response was noncommittal. Although he subsequently accepted both nominations, he did not make an active campaign, and his total popular vote was only 175,370. Butler's personal popularity and his labor affiliations brought increased votes in some of the Eastern States and in Michigan, ...
— The Agrarian Crusade - A Chronicle of the Farmer in Politics • Solon J. Buck
... to Sequoia. Sexton related to him in detail the events which had transpired since his departure, but elicited nothing more than a noncommittal grunt. ...
— The Valley of the Giants • Peter B. Kyne
... and work over one bearing half a dozen postmarks—a letter from his mother, conveyed across the lines by some sleight-of-hand of influence or pay, and mailed and remailed from place to place, till weeks had grown into months since it was written. Noncommittal as it had need to be—filled with home items to the last page—there his heart stood still, to bound again furiously back, and his breath came sharp and hot. He rose blinded and staggering. Jim Murphy, seeing how white and rigid his face ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol 6, No 5, November 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various
... never a sentimentalist, and I therefore answered, cannily, that that would depend on who she was. He parried this, and announced that, anyway, a new mamma was coming; I was sure to like her. Still in a noncommittal mood, I asked: 'Will she go with me to the back of the lime-kiln?' This question caused my Father a great bewilderment. I had to explain that the ambition of my life was to go up behind the lime-kiln on the top of the hill ...
— Father and Son • Edmund Gosse
... came on an occasion when Senator Gruff was in a confidential mood. Commonly, as a chief Hanway manager, he lay as blandly close and noncommittal as a clam. ...
— The President - A novel • Alfred Henry Lewis
... noncommittal voice, prepared to claim that he was merely a stranger answering the phone because it was ringing ...
— The Man Who Staked the Stars • Charles Dye
... With a noncommittal rejoinder he started down the road, and the sheriff put the spurs to his horse and plunged by at a full gallop, flinging the dust back into the face of the big man. Bull wiped it out of his eyes and went on gloomily. He had been trodden upon in spirit once more. But, ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand
... fell a profound silence, and Regina could think of nothing but her guardian's flushed confused countenance, when Olga taxed him with his love for Mrs. Carew. How deeply his heart must be engaged, when his stem, cold, noncommittal ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... "He may," was the noncommittal answer. "His recovery would be hastened, however, if his mind could be relieved. He keeps worrying about the loss of his papers that proved his share in the Texas oil wells. Until they can be given back to him he is bound to suffer mentally, and of ...
— Tom Swift and his Undersea Search - or, The Treasure on the Floor of the Atlantic • Victor Appleton
... casual eye for sympathy before he would give an inch of rope to his enthusiasm. He found it as hard as ever to understand that the public interest should be otherwise preoccupied, as it plainly was, that the party organ, terrified of Quebec, should shuffle away from the subject with perfunctory and noncommittal reference, that among the men he met in the street, nobody's blood seemed stirred, whatever the day's news was from England. He subscribed to the Toronto Post, the leading organ of the Tories, because of its fuller reports and more sympathetic treatment of the Idea, due to the fact ...
— The Imperialist • (a.k.a. Mrs. Everard Cotes) Sara Jeannette Duncan
... evidently at a loss whether to ascribe Maitland's exclamation as due to surprise, regret, or relief. Which pleased Maitland, who had been at pains to make his tone noncommittal. In point of fact he ...
— The Brass Bowl • Louis Joseph Vance
... us practice?" asked the captain. "We're not afraid you'll size up our weaknesses. As a matter of fact, we don't look forward to any hitting stunts tomorrow, eh, Burns? Burns, here, is our leading hitter, and he's been unusually noncommittal since he heard who was ...
— The Redheaded Outfield and Other Baseball Stories • Zane Grey
... to a hill of beans, I'll warrant," continued the Colonel, with a watchful eye on Noah for denial or confirmation, but Noah was noncommittal. "When a fellow gets to be twenty-three years old and can't find anything better to do than to run around the country spending his money, and playing with the girls, there's a screw loose somewhere. What does he know ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... not just what Charming Billy most wanted to say, but that much was perfectly safe, and noncommittal to say. ...
— The Long Shadow • B. M. Bower
... the Vistula, in the region of Walwarga, southwest of Kolno, near Przasnysz and south of Mlawa, our troops have achieved some local successes." The Russian report referring to the beginning of the same action was equally noncommittal, though possibly more misleading. This states: "Considerable enemy forces between the Orczy and the Lidynja adopted the offensive and the Russians declining a decisive engagement retreated during the night of the 13th to the second line of ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 12) - Neuve Chapelle, Battle of Ypres, Przemysl, Mazurian Lakes • Francis J. Reynolds, Allen L. Churchill, and Francis Trevelyan
... in a way which was more noncommittal than negative. He wanted to ascertain what the lawyer thought, but he was not prepared to reveal all his own ...
— The Moon Rock • Arthur J. Rees
... between many another pair of friends, between brothers, between fathers and sons, husbands and wives. I do not know of another civil war that made as many breaks in families. Meanwhile, the local authorities—those of local election, not of royal appointment—were yet outwardly noncommittal. When Colonel Washington, the general-in-chief appointed by the congress of the colonies at Philadelphia, was to pass through New York on his way to Cambridge, where the New England rebels were surrounding the king's ...
— Philip Winwood • Robert Neilson Stephens
... the big man were noncommittal. The pale, undersized man was a mere onlooker whose sympathies were with the accused. Miss Bransford would have been quite willing to have this young man escape punishment, but she could not deny that the cattle in question belonged ...
— Square Deal Sanderson • Charles Alden Seltzer
... interest. MacDonald retained his whole-souled benevolence, though it seemed to take on a slightly exaggerated tone. Kearns was coolly dispassionate and noncommittal, while Elam Harnish appeared as quizzical and jocular as ever. Eleven thousand dollars were already in the pot, and the markers were heaped in a confused pile in ...
— Burning Daylight • Jack London
... her seamstress instinct marveled at the wonder of their making. Miss Asenath was more quiet in her approval, but her eyes sparkled at the brightness of their various colors all around her. Miss Eliza was noncommittal, though it was very evident that she found much to displease. When Arethusa tried on the Green Frock which she so dearly loved, she ...
— The Heart of Arethusa • Francis Barton Fox
... heard at once, and coming quickly to the door, admitted me, with a cordial smile and a hearty grasp of the hand that reminded me of her son, and was totally unlike the clammy and noncommittal touch of so many of the country folk, bred evidently of their ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... raise a second wave of adulation, even a ripple, in fact. Instead it was received oddly with scarcely any comment at all. Even the papers had but little to say, and that little noncommittal. For there were rumors. Devereau and Pig-iron Dunham had done some preliminary work in anticipation of the worst. And after the worst had come to be they ...
— Winner Take All • Larry Evans
... is," I answered. "I never saw a nice, fat, blonde girl who took a million-dollar offer as a practical joke. What is it you've said to her? 'I love you, darling,' or something about as foxy and noncommittal." ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer
... noncommittal fashion, not caring at the moment to take issue with Miss Primleigh. Arguments I detest. If she chose to misinterpret my sentiments, so be it then. I shall, however, add here that while my own opinion of the matter was not absolutely in accord with the burden of Miss Primleigh's criticisms, ...
— Fibble, D. D. • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... of increasing civilization compelled some sort of distant recognition. Accordingly, compromises with objectionable personality were effected by circumlocutions promoted to a pronoun's office, becoming thus pro-pronouns, as it were. Very noncommittal expressions they are, most of them, such as: "the augustness," meaning you; "that honorable side," or "that corner," denoting some third person, the exact term employed in any given instance scrupulously betokening the relative respect in which the individual spoken of is held; while ...
— The Soul of the Far East • Percival Lowell
... in all likelihood be here to-morrow, he listened without batting an eyelash. But he asked if I'd mind handing him a cigarette, and he studied my face long and intently. I don't know what he saw there, or what he concluded, for I did my best to keep it as noncommittal as possible. If there is any move, it must be from him. That sour-inked Irishman called Shaw has said that women are the wooers in this world. A lot he knows about it!... Yet something has happened, in the last half-hour, which both disturbs and puzzles ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer |
