"Coyly" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... them, extended across the lower storey; two little jutting windows, also of the criss-cross pattern, looked like two eyes in the second storey; and high up in the third, the casement of the attic peered out coyly from under the eaves. At the top of a flight of immaculately white steps there was a squat little door painted green and adorned with a brass knocker burnished to the colour of fine gold. The railings of iron round the area were also coloured green, and the appearance ...
— The Bishop's Secret • Fergus Hume
... that everywhere and always the first advances were made by the men, the women being passive, and coyly reserved. This opinion—like many other notions regarding the relations of the sexes—rests on ignorance, pure ignorance. In collecting the scattered facts bearing on this subject I have been more and more surprised at the number of exceptions to the rule, if, indeed, rule it be. Not only are ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck
... was another elevation, a sort of knoll, and about a mile further south another knoll, about half the height of its neighbour. The cliffs were almost black in colour; but above them there were glimpses of most inviting grassy slopes peeping coyly out from between great masses of umbrageous trees, among which I felt it would be strange if we did not find fruit trees of some sort. Indeed, I detected certain palms that I was morally certain were coconut palms, while, unless my ...
— The First Mate - The Story of a Strange Cruise • Harry Collingwood
... the centuries of woman since sex began were eloquent in her eyes. And he measured her in a careless way, and knew, bold now, that she would begin to retreat, coyly and delicately, as he pursued, ever ready to reverse the game should he turn fainthearted. And, too, he was human, and could feel the draw of her, while his ego could not but appreciate the flattery of her kindness. Oh, he knew ...
— Martin Eden • Jack London
... surprised if she were told that it was once the custom for engaged young ladies to reveal their happiness by displaying a ring on the middle finger, while those who were free but prepared to wed might coyly announce the fact by a ring on the index finger. Be that as it may, Royson was dumfounded by the sight of the glistening diamonds. They winked at him ...
— The Wheel O' Fortune • Louis Tracy
... Italy, Austria and Switzerland meet near the Stelvio Pass, our course from Venice lay northwestward, across the dusty plains of Venetia, shimmering in the summer heat, the low, pleasant-looking villas of white or pink or sometimes pale blue stucco, set far back in blazing gardens, peering coyly out at us from between the ranks of stately cypresses which lined the highway, like daintily-gowned girls seeking an excuse for a flirtation. Dotting the Venetian plain are many quaint and charming towns of whose existence the tourist, traveling by train, never dreams, ...
— The New Frontiers of Freedom from the Alps to the AEgean • Edward Alexander Powell
... Professor Bury adds coyly in a footnote: "But there is another side to this picture which may be seen by studying Mommsen's volume on ...
— Hilaire Belloc - The Man and His Work • C. Creighton Mandell
... say that, Miss Pilgrim," he demurred coyly. He paused. Her mention of shipping offices disturbed him. He had much business with shipping offices; and he was picturing to himself, involuntarily and with distaste, that gentle courage bruising ...
— Those Who Smiled - And Eleven Other Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... out to fit the circumstances and character of the sitter. The lively Miss Bowles, as we see, is totally unlike the demure Miss Boothby. They are both charming children; but, while Penelope would love to nestle in her mother's arms, Miss Bowles would dance coyly away. While Penelope would sit in doors by the hour, contented with her sewing, Miss Bowles would be skipping about the park like a little hoyden. The picture of Miss Bowles is, therefore, full of action; both child and dog pause only an instant, caught, as it were, in the midst of their ...
— Sir Joshua Reynolds - A Collection of Fifteen Pictures and a Portrait of the - Painter with Introduction and Interpretation • Estelle M. Hurll
... LADY CAROLINE (coyly). Should we have noticed, dear? Might it be that old gent over there? (After the delightful manner of those happily wed she has already picked up many of her lover's ...
— Dear Brutus • J. M. Barrie
... entwine and draw us into the centre of a wondrous melody, laden with rich odors, odors that almost intoxicate. The figuration is tropical, and when the major is reached and those glancing thirty-seconds so coyly assail us we realize the seductive charm of Chopin. The reprise is still more festooned, and it is almost a relief when the little, tender unison begins with its positive chord assertions closing the period. Then ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker
... more soft than seasoned lute, Hast thou no sunlit word for me? Though long to me so coyly mute, Her heart ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... present moment. And I am not sure— Not gorged with certainty— That Mr. G. would be Inclined to make amends. He is old; he is aged. Prejudice lurks amid His scant white locks, And forbids the stretch- Ing forth of generous hand in whose Recesses coyly ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 103, Sep. 24, 1892 • Various
... Coyly shone down the bashful stars upon our adventurers, as, after a short nap behind the haystack, they stretched themselves, and looking at each other, burst into an involuntary and hilarious laugh at the prosperous termination of ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... that they are in some special sense the favorites of Heaven, and in assuring any body of clergy that they are endued from on high with some special and exceptional powers, will by and by make an impression on the mind. The flattering assurance may be coyly waived aside; it may even be indignantly repelled; but in the long run there will be a growing number of the brethren who become convinced that there is something in it. It was in harmony with human ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon
... rather spoiled his visit. Some of the people were extraordinarily good, especially one jolly old fellow who talked about English folk songs and dances, and wanted us to set up a Maypole. In the debates which generally followed I began to join, very coyly at first, but presently with some confidence. If my time at Biggleswick did nothing else it taught me to argue ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... a little of Delitzsch and his Babel-Bible addresses, brought up by Selmour, an amiable Presbyterian of shining bare pate and cheerful red beard, a man whom scandal had filliped ever so coyly with a repute ...
— The Seeker • Harry Leon Wilson
... the field and wood, Gypsy, whose roof is every spreading tree, June is the pearl of our New England year. Still a surprisal, though expected long. Her coming startles. Long she lies in wait, Makes many a feint, peeps forth, draws coyly back, Then, from some southern ambush in the sky, With one great gush of blossom storms the world. A week ago the sparrow was divine; The bluebird, shifting his light load of song 10 From post to post along ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell
... out half that was going on." Then she added coyly, "I don't know whether you can keep a secret—do ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith
... childhood, of Haroun-al-Raschid. We expect so much when we come to the real Baghdad, and we find so little—so little, that is, of the glamour of the East. Few "costly doors flung open wide," but a great deal of dirt. Few dark eyes of ravishingly beautiful women peering coyly through lattice windows, but a great deal of sordid squalor. Few marvellous entertainments where we can behold the wonderful witchery of Persian dancing girls, but a theatre, the principal house of amusement in Baghdad—and lo, a man ...
— A Dweller in Mesopotamia - Being the Adventures of an Official Artist in the Garden of Eden • Donald Maxwell
... a voice behind them. They both turned. The butler was gazing rather coyly at a vision in a grey ...
— Piccadilly Jim • Pelham Grenville Wodehouse
... the gentleman with the crimson handkerchief coyly showing between dress waistcoat and shirt might have said, waving his pointer as the canvas of the diorama rumbled ...
— She Stands Accused • Victor MacClure
... o'clock. The noisy little clock on the mantelpiece announced the fact, and, by its frantic ticking, seemed as anxious as I to get the consultation hours over. I glanced wistfully at my mud-splashed boots and wondered if I might yet venture to assume the slippers that peeped coyly from under the shabby sofa. I even allowed my thoughts to wander to the pipe that reposed in my coat pocket. Another minute and I could turn down the surgery gas and shut the outer door. The fussy little clock gave a sort of preliminary cough or hiccup, ...
— The Mystery of 31 New Inn • R. Austin Freeman
... spanking trot. The way lies through the forest, up hill and down dale, and by beech and pine wood, in the cheerful morning sunshine. The English get down at all the ascents and walk on ahead for exercise; the French are mightily entertained at this, and keep coyly underneath the tilt. As we go we carry with us a pleasant noise of laughter and light speech, and some one will be always breaking out into a bar or two of opera bouffe. Before we get to the Route Ronde here comes Desprez, the ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. XXII (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... yacht have been turned to novel uses: thus the steering-wheel now hangs from the centre of the roof, with electric lights attached to it encased in bladders. A lifebuoy has become the back of a chair. Two barrels have been halved and turn coyly from each ...
— The Admirable Crichton • J. M. Barrie
... laughed and stood looking coyly up into Mr. Holmes's face. But at last, feeling absurd, Miss ...
— Dick Prescott's Second Year at West Point - Finding the Glory of the Soldier's Life • H. Irving Hancock
... to identify this blasphemer and Maudie's head, deprived of its support, made another revolution and then dropped coyly to her left shoulder. She looked so unspeakable in that attitude that the cabman felt called upon to offer a little ...
— New Faces • Myra Kelly
... after night-fall. No, the burnished golden pippins that peeped through the leaves in the western rays of evening, and made the mouths of the Ballyfermot school-boys water, glowed undisturbed in the morning sunbeams, and secure in the mysterious tutelage of the night smiled coyly on their predatory longings. And this was no fanciful reserve and avoidance. Mick Daly, when he had the orchard, used to sleep in the loft over the kitchen; and he swore that within five or six weeks, while he lodged there, he twice saw the same thing, ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... in accents all too human, Glanced at me coyly from beneath your casque; My vision vanished, and I saw the woman Behind ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 146, April 15, 1914 • Various
... the Swiss, the man pursues, stamping with energy, marking the time by exulting flings, or snapping of the fingers, in delighted confidence of succeeding at last; but the maiden coyly, demurely, foots it round, yet never gets out of the way, ...
— Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Vol. I • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... was riding with Miss Gittens, she glanced coyly at me over her sharp right shoulder, and said, 'Do you know, only such a little while ago, I never even dreamed that we should ever become as intimate as we are now; it seems almost incredible, ...
— The Talking Horse - And Other Tales • F. Anstey
... the path, And boys and jays go whistling by, And girls and thrushes coyly cry Their fine joys through the aftermath— Then laid ghosts know their amulet Which fickle siren mem'ry hath; So laughing comes that sad coquette, Comes ...
— The Court of Boyville • William Allen White
... audience—ay, and faithfully carried out too—which would do credit to a high-priced concert-room. But, then, who make up the audience? Gradually the "penny" people have been retiring into the background, as slowly but as surely as the old-fashioned pits at our theatres are coyly withdrawing under the boxes to make way for the stalls. The Penny Readings have been found to "draw" a higher class of audience than those for whom they were originally intended. The curate himself, if unmarried, secures ...
— Mystic London: - or, Phases of occult life in the metropolis • Charles Maurice Davies
... the moon, Ootah," she replied. "I shall await thee, Ootah! Bring thou back fat and blubber, Ootah, to warm thy fires, Ootah." And she laughed gaily. Then she turned her back to Ootah, bent her head coyly and did not turn around again. To Ootah this was a good augury—for when a maiden turns her back upon a suitor she thinks favorably of him. This is ...
— The Eternal Maiden • T. Everett Harre
... mother can succeed In gaining for her maxims heed, And softening the girl's heart too, So that she coyly shuns our view,— The heart of youth she knows ...
— The Poems of Goethe • Goethe
... shrinks from the coming night, Amid protecting leaves, KOLONA shrank, Amid her tresses, from her sovereign's eyes, So gloomy yet so kind; and mutely stood Amid the bright and coyly ...
— The Arctic Queen • Unknown
... They will thus form a natural roof over the fruit, keep off all injurious dews, and shade the grapes from above. There is nothing more pleasing to the eye than a vineyard in September, with its wealth of dark green foliage above, and its purple clusters of fruit beneath, coyly peeping from under their leafy covering. Such grapes will have an exquisite bloom, and color, as well as thin skin and rich flavor, which those hanging in the scorching rays of the sun ...
— The Cultivation of The Native Grape, and Manufacture of American Wines • George Husmann
... piece of carrot about his soup plate, watching it interestedly as it slid coyly from ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse
... reached us, toying coyly with the boat's canvas at first, but gradually bellying out the sails until at last they "went to sleep." The breeze was, after all, merely the gentlest of zephyrs, only just sufficient to give a ship steerage-way; but, very fortunately for us, the boats were ...
— The Congo Rovers - A Story of the Slave Squadron • Harry Collingwood
... imprecation, turned and fled. But he heard light footfalls behind him; he was conscious of a faint perfume, born of no earthly flower, felt a soft panting breath. A light hand touched his face. He flung his vows to anxious Satan, and turned to clasp the woman in his arms. But she coyly retreated, half-resentfully, half-invitingly, wholly lovely. Satan closed his iron hand about the vows, and the priest ran toward the woman, the lines of repression on his face gone, the eyes conquering the ...
— The Splendid Idle Forties - Stories of Old California • Gertrude Atherton
... anybody," explained the startled orphan, coyly accepting the chair he pushed forward. "I'm sure I don't feel any sectional hatred, nor ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 2., No. 32, November 5, 1870 • Various
... you?" inquired the nymph coyly. She had her share of sentiment, but she was her father's daughter and inherited from him ...
— Three Men and a Maid • P. G. Wodehouse
... purity of the orange-blossom, the voluptuous perfume yearningly foretells the luscious, perfect fruit, and the blush of the peach-bloom shows the flower coyly but triumphantly conscious that it will one day ripen into mouth-watering deliciousness,—so even then there were hints and prophecies in Margaret's budding womanliness that the time was approaching when she would not only awaken ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... in an innocent mood, Moppin' his brow ('cos 'twas a trifle sweaty) With a blue kerchief—lo, he spies a white 'un Coyly responding. ...
— Green Bays. Verses and Parodies • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... Henry William just too sweet for words," the maiden of the future will murmur to herself. Gently, coyly, she will draw from him his ideal of what a woman should be. In from six months to a year she will burst upon him, the perfect She; height, size, weight, right to a T. He will clasp ...
— Idle Ideas in 1905 • Jerome K. Jerome
... who the dragon displays. Both in the field before his feet he breaks That king's ensign and dragon, both abased. Baligant sees his gonfalon disgraced, And Mahumet's standard thrown from its place; That admiral at once perceives it plain, That he is wrong, and right is Charlemain. Pagan Arabs coyly themselves contain; That Emperour calls on his Franks again: "Say, barons, come, support me, in God's Name!" Answer the Franks, "Question you make in vain; All felon he that dares ...
— The Song of Roland • Anonymous
... clever woman; moreover, her potential cleverness had never been one half so manifest as when she talked about all this to Catie. She did not put forward her urgings crudely, as for the sake of Scott, her son. Rather than that, she held them up to Catie coyly, as glimpses of opportunity and power which waited for her at the gateway of maturity: opportunity given only to the helpmeet of a man in the commanding position offered by his ministerial profession, ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... bronze shelter of the porte-cochere belonging to an extremely expensive mansion overlooking the park; and presently, admitted, he prowled ponderously and softly about an over-gilded rococo reception-room. But all anxiety had now fled from his face; he coyly nipped the atmosphere at intervals as various portions of the furniture attracted his approval; he stood before a splendid canvas of Goya and pushed his thumb at it; he moused and prowled and peeped and snooped, and his smile grew larger and larger and sweeter and sweeter, ...
— Iole • Robert W. Chambers
... black tail coat, burst at the elbows, stained with mud, was tightly buttoned across his chest. This evidently with the idea of concealing the fact that he wore no shirt—an attempt which was not wholly successful. A pair of gray flannel trousers and boots out of which two toes peeped coyly, completed ...
— The Gem Collector • P. G. Wodehouse
... fear teaches now, The furtive glances and the frowning brow. [In a tone of envy. Ah happy bee! how boldly dost thou try To steal the lustre from her sparkling eye; And in thy circling movements hover near, To murmur tender secrets in her ear; Or, as she coyly waves her hand, to sip Voluptuous nectar from her lower lip! While rising doubts my heart's fond hopes destroy, Thou dost the fulness of ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson
... little stream that was! It leaped merrily down tiny, boulder-strewn inclines to show him how light-hearted and care-free it could be; it flowed sedately between narrow banks of turf to display its perfect propriety; it coyly hid behind walls of graceful, slender willows; it danced impudently into the open and dashed across clear spaces in frantic haste to escape him; it spread out, clear and limpid, upon little bars of golden sand, pretending ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various
... de la Rougierre broke down altogether. She sobbed, she wept, she gabbled piteously, all manner of incomprehensible roulades of lamentation and entreaty; coyly, penitently, in a most interesting agitation, she produced the very key from her breast, with a string tied to it. My father was little moved by this piteous tempest. He coolly took the key and tried it in the desk, which it locked ...
— Uncle Silas - A Tale of Bartram-Haugh • J.S. Le Fanu
... those worthies, excited or pensive as the case might be, you would have said that they were the greatest breeders of ideas on earth; unluckily, on the days when the Chamber was in session they were transformed, they clung coyly to their benches, as frightened as school-boys under the master's ferule, laughing obsequiously at the jests of the man of wit who presided over them, or taking the floor to put forward the most amazing propositions, ...
— The Nabob, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Alphonse Daudet
... of one couple, every glance and movement of the performers seemed directed or aimed at the Caliph. This couple consisted of the most sylph-like and exquisitely formed of the four female dancers, and of a Persian warrior, who was pursuing her, and from whom she strove coyly to escape. With admirable grace and skill did these two figures detach themselves from their companions, in order to continue a while their simulated flight and pursuit. The fairy feet of the fugitive scarcely touched the ground, and such charm and fascination were ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 57, No. 352, February 1845 • Various
... The widow was affected by my vehemence, as a matter of course—she stammered—she hesitated, and of course, being an ass, I was only made more vehement by all that sort of thing, you know. So I urged her, and pressed her, and then, before I knew what I was about, I found her coyly granting my insane ...
— The Lady of the Ice - A Novel • James De Mille
... coppery, his air swagger, devil-may-care, bacchanal. This made her a little cautious; but she rather liked his brown, hard face, handsome mouth, and crisp Jovian curls. His compliment was not utterly improper; but she nevertheless attempted coyly ...
— The Titan • Theodore Dreiser
... you remind me of an old sweetheart of mine," resumed the voice of his captor, coyly. "He was the first real lover I ever had. His eyes were big and pensive, just like yours, and there was always that same look in his face that just made me want to stay with him all the time to keep him from being lonely. He was awfully fond of me, but he had to go out West ...
— Sandy • Alice Hegan Rice
... of the Seven Champions of Christendom." There was the frontispiece, the gallant Saint George, in gold and green armour, thrusting his spear into the throat of the dragon, in green and gold scales. What a temptation! I ogled the book coyly at first. I asked for my Bible. "Read that, Ralph," said the purloiner; oh! recreant that I was, ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard
... psychological grounds, of course—in watching the thoughts as they rose one by one to the surface of those deep, clear wells (was truth at the bottom of them?—I doubt), like the strange shapes of beauty that reveal themselves to seamen, coyly and slowly, through the purple calm ...
— Guy Livingstone; - or, 'Thorough' • George A. Lawrence
... that must have been just as good as the 'sweet nothings' of another race, for clearly now her heart was won. Won, really, days ago, if only he had known. For full three days she had come at the loud tattoo and coyly admired him from afar, and felt a little piqued that he had not yet found her out, so close at hand. So it was not quite all mischance, perhaps, that that little stamp had caught his ear. But now she meekly ...
— Lobo, Rag and Vixen - Being The Personal Histories Of Lobo, Redruff, Raggylug & Vixen • Ernest Seton-Thompson
... the Hatter, tapping Alice on the shoulder coyly. "You must not believe all you overhear the Duchess say about me. She is so prejudiced, and blind to my faults. I—I'm almost sorry I connected you with ...
— Alice in Blunderland - An Iridescent Dream • John Kendrick Bangs
... Nancy was very pretty. He was taking her first by the right hand, then by the left, and turning her gayly about;—and now they were meeting again, for the fourth or fifth time, in the centre of the barn, with all eyes upon them, and the music lingered while Nancy, holding out her pink petticoats, coyly revolved around him. Then began a mysterious turning, and clasping of hands, and weaving of Nancy's pink frock and Evesham's dark blue coat and white breeches in and out of the line of figures, until they met at the door, and taking each other by both hands, swept with ...
— Stories by American Authors (Volume 4) • Constance Fenimore Woolson
... towards her. I had some pity for this passion of hers, which had grown of itself certainly, but which I had done nothing to check; and the indecent frankness with which it was displayed was only part of the livery of potentates who flaunt what meaner folk would coyly hide. But always before my eyes was a picture of the girl on whom her jealousy had taken such a bitter vengeance, and to invent spurious lover's talk then was a thing my ...
— The Lost Continent • C. J. Cutcliffe Hyne
... Suzanne, who stood beside him coyly, looking down. As for 'Polyte and Gaspard, they were quite breathless between rage and astonishment. But Colonel ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... on to the stage, and sat down at the piano that occupied one wing of the stage. Petty Officer Dawson, who was also the ship's painter, emerged from behind the canvas screen, coyly wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. The piano tinkled out the opening bars of the song, and ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... dejectedly. It was apparent that his courage was slipping from him. Aggie was quick to realise her opportunity, and before Jimmy could protect himself from her treacherous wiles, she had slipped one arm coyly about ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo
... musing, and the next instant the door opened. Madge entered the room, holding in one white hand a crumpled letter. She wore a gown of lustrous rose-colored material, with filmy lace on the throat and bosom, and her splendid hair strayed coyly over her neck and temples. She had never looked more dazzlingly lovely, ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... become aware that there was no end of ladies and gentlemen looking at her. Sometimes she would come out of the house, if the steps were very full, with her own sketching paraphernalia in her hands and say, ever so coyly: "May I scriggle through?" or ask the squatters on her own steps if they could find a little corner for her. That was so interesting for them: they would remember afterwards that just while they were engaged on their sketches, the lady of that beautiful house at the corner, who had been ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... emotions of sex and their expression are provoked by the inner stirring. When the nightingale warbles passionately and the mocking bird gurgles provokingly, when the robin fills its scarlet breast and the starling floats in ecstasy through the perfumed air, when the pigeon coyly woos its mate, and the butterfly flirts with the dazzling multicolors of its wings, when all the marvelous devices of sex attraction in nature, selection and courting, mating and reproducing are pondered, who but must wonder at the infinite possibilities of reaction of the sex hormones? All ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... think so?" she said, coyly, her eyes clouding with embarrassment. "I don't think they are soft at all. They would be if I did not have so much washing and scrubbing to do." Then she added, sadly: "America has made a servant of me. A land of gold, indeed! When I was in my father's ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan
... squaw smiled at him shy-eyed as he went by her, and though his physical eyes saw her standing demurely there in the shade of her wikiup, ready to shrink coyly away from too bold a glance, the man-mind of him was blind and took no notice. He neither heard the baffled screaming of vile epithets when old Hagar knew that her venom could not strike through the armor of his preoccupation, ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower
... said Mrs. Hazeldean coyly, and blushing as she saw the Parson, "Well, who's going to be ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 2, No. 4, March, 1851 • Various
... men and maidens is lightly turning to thoughts of love; the first dawn of the tender passion being intimated, on the part of the youth, by chasing his charmer into a corner and partially throttling her, whereupon the maiden coyly conveys that his sentiments are not unreciprocated by thumping him between the shoulders. From time to time, two champions contend with fists for the smiles of beauty, who may usually be heard bellowing inconsolably in the background. A small ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 8, 1891 • Various
... harmony, arched her neck coyly, and said in her most bewitching tones—the notes of a robin after a shower: "Well, I can't tell yet, Mr. Willits, but you shall have one or the other; just leave it to me—either the reel or the schottische. We will talk it over ...
— Kennedy Square • F. Hopkinson Smith
... on the subject, but I think I should advise you, if you are offered another job in the course of the day, to accept it. I cannot say that you are precisely the pet of the management just at present. However, I have ideas for your future, which I will divulge when we meet. I propose to slide coyly from the office at about four o'clock. I am meeting my father at that hour. We shall come ...
— Psmith in the City • P. G. Wodehouse
... white surface were painted pretty pink checks, red lips, black eyes, and oblique brows; through the tuft of dark silk on the head were stuck several glittering pins, and a pink jacket shrouded the plump figure of this capital little Chinese lady. After peeping coyly out, so that all could see and admire, she fell to counting the money from a purse, so large her small hands could hardly hold it on the window seat. While she did this, the song went ...
— Under the Lilacs • Louisa May Alcott
... soft colours of the young Spring- time were starting out, that delicate livery which is so soon worn. They were more soft to-day under a slight sultry haziness of the atmosphere — a luxurious veil that Spring had coyly thrown over her face; she was always a shy damsel. It soothed the light, it bewitched the distance, it lay upon the water like a foil to its brightness, it lay upon the mind with a subtle charm winning it to rest and enjoy. It etherealized Earth till it was no place to work ...
— Hills of the Shatemuc • Susan Warner
... flowers were twisted in their brown locks, and they waved branches before them as they smiled and beckoned and sang a song of spring's awakening. What could Sir Adelbert do but follow when they glanced coyly over their white shoulders and led the way through a narrow passage into a garden surrounded with rose-bushes in bloom, and filled with golden-haired maidens, lovelier than the flowers, who wandered about hand in hand and sang with sirens' voices? In the middle of the rose-hedged ...
— A Book of Operas - Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music • Henry Edward Krehbiel
... was selected unanimously to be the bearer of the child. Now honest Paul was a bachelor, and had literally never handled a baby in his life. He, therefore, felt an uncommon awe and trepidation, as half unwillingly and half proudly he undertook the office. However, at last, when coyly led forward, with his head all on one side and a beaming smile on his honest countenance, he found that his big paws, stretched out, made a first-rate cradle; though, not being aware of the excessive lightness of the little creature, ...
— True Blue • W.H.G. Kingston
... had been all spoken by the pensionary, the Emperor, whose cue was now to appear struggling with mingled emotions of reasonable wrath and of natural benignity, performed his part with much dramatic effect. "He held himself coyly for a little time," says the eye-witness, "without saying a word; deporting himself as though he were considering whether or not he would grant the pardon for which the culprits had prayed." Then ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... above everything else. With such bait I have seen the born angler (my grandfather was one) take a noble string of trout from the most unpromising waters, and on the most unpromising day. He used his hook so coyly and tenderly, he approached the fish with such address and insinuation, he divined the exact spot where they lay: if they were not eager, he humored them and seemed to steal by them; if they were playful and coquettish, he would suit his mood to theirs; if they were frank and sincere, he met ...
— In the Catskills • John Burroughs
... up some,' replies Miss Bark coyly. 'W'y, if I was reely out for his skelp, I'd have shore got it a heap. You can pin a patch the size of a dollar on that disparin' lover's coat, an' I'll cut it nine times in ten, offhand, at a ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... traders told the chief that if he would allow the girl to go to Boston with him he would give to him—Toby—a quart of rum. Toby was willing enough. He would give a good deal for rum. But the daughter declined to be sold off in such a fashion unless—she coyly admitted—she could have half of the rum herself. Loth as he was to do so, Toby was brought to agree to this proposition, for he knew that rum was rare and good and girls were common and perverse, so the gentle forest lily took her mug of liquor and tossed it off. Now, it is not clear whether ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner
... towards that rough, but generous, heart before. So then, on some significant pretence, well satisfied her favourite was himself again, as bold, and black, and boisterous as ever, the masculine mother kissed her hand to them, as a fat fairy might be supposed to do, and operatically tripped away, coyly bidding Emily "take care of Julian till ...
— The Complete Prose Works of Martin Farquhar Tupper • Martin Farquhar Tupper
... car never had a chance. Before he took his leave of her he had her signed order for a "Sedan" for immediate delivery. And she grasped his hand and held it, leaning coyly close. "We're going to have some wonderful times this fall. We'll drive to Bloomfield, just you and I. And what am I going to do about a chauffeur? What will I ever do with a strange creature who cares for nothing but speed? ...
— Stubble • George Looms
... smiling school, Jonathan Witchcott took up the song, turning yearningly to Dru who now smiled coyly, head to one side, while ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas
... lost upon his hearer, for Donald had become absorbed in a theatrical poster, which represented a preternaturally slim young lady, poised on a champagne bottle, coyly surveying an admiring world through the extended fingers of a small black gloved hand. It was "La Florine," whose charms he had heard recounted times without ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... piano, across the shining acres of floor, the mystical woman and a dentist had ceased singing, and were examining a fresh sheet of music. The dentist coyly poked his finger at her coiffure, and she ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis
... particularly sensitive and tender, owing in some degree, I daresay, to the low diet to which I had been so long confined; for nothing, in my opinion, takes the sense and pluck out of a man so quickly as that. At all events I soon surrendered at discretion, and was coyly accepted by the blushing lady. 'There was only one obstacle,' she timidly observed, 'to our happiness. The relatives of her late husband, by law her guardians, were prejudiced, mercenary wretches, anxious to marry her to an old hunks of a Spaniard, so that the property ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... Ryde! Come, you know, this is hardly fair," says the little captain, coyly, who is looking particularly pinched and dried to-day, in spite of the hot sun. There is a satisfied smirk upon his pale lips, and a poor attempt at self-depreciation ...
— Rossmoyne • Unknown
... HASSAN, ordered for eight o'clock, sometimes came at nine. Occasionally at six. "He asked for 'backseesh,' which" Miss CHENNELLS writes, "I did not consider myself bound to give, as he never did anything for me." On two occasions, her heart warming, she coyly pressed a florin into his hand, with dire results. "He was," she records, "much worse after it" (the florin, which he seems to have taken neat), "and would, when driving, stoop down, and look through the front window of the brougham, shouting 'Backseesh!'" However, Miss CHENNELLS got ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, April 15, 1893 • Various
... more, then. It's time to retire. You've had your amusement, and you've paid for it like a gentleman—very much like a gentleman—rather exorbitantly. That's the way a gentleman always pays. So now suppose you return to your own sort and coyly reappear amid certain circles recently neglected, and which, at one period of your career, you permitted yourself to embellish and adorn with your own ...
— Athalie • Robert W. Chambers
... mouldings, which had probably held tapestries. The partition of unplaned boards that formed other offices cut off the major part of a highly decorated ceiling where cupids with crimson-daubed bottoms swam in all attitudes in a sea of pink-and blue-and lavender-colored clouds, wreathing themselves coyly in heavy garlands of waxy hothouse flowers, while cornucopias spilling out squashy fruits gave Andrews a feeling of distinct insecurity as he looked up ...
— Three Soldiers • John Dos Passos
... with her, but she retreated playfully and coyly. Every advance on his part was accompanied by a corresponding retreat on her part. Step by step she was luring him away from the security of his human companionship. Once, as though a warning had in vague ways flitted through his intelligence, ...
— White Fang • Jack London
... party rode onward towards their place of embarkation. Luis found himself beside a dark-eyed maiden, who ambled along on a white mule, and when he ventured to joke her a little on her late appearance as an armed cavalier, she said coyly, "Did you think my only weapons were roses?" Looking eagerly at her, he recognized the laughing face which he had once seen at a window; but ere he could speak again she had struck her mule lightly and taken refuge beside the archbishop, where Luis dared not venture. He did not recognize the maiden ...
— Tales of the Enchanted Islands of the Atlantic • Thomas Wentworth Higginson
... guard under the absolute control of black Mustapha, armed to the teeth, chaperoned by Mrs. Grundy in the shape or, as I should say, represented in the shapeless person of a dusky duenna of many moons, a good heart and a vitriolic tongue, who coyly peeped from behind the sombre curtains of her middle-aged palanquin, Jill started on her wedding journey. Over a carpet of flowers, through a long lane of palm leaves, held by veiled maidens, so as to form an arch, she passed, whilst the sweetness of the girls' voices rose to the tops ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... entered, but it, somehow or other, had disappeared beneath the piano scarf—partially disappeared, that is, for one end still protruded. The lady's cotton dusting-gloves no longer protected her hands but now peeped coyly from behind a jig-sawed photograph frame on the marble mantelpiece. The apron she had worn lay on the floor in the shadow of the table cloth. These habiliments of menial domesticity slid, one by one, out of sight—or partially so—as she bustled and chatted. When, after ...
— Fair Harbor • Joseph Crosby Lincoln
... to be pedestrian, and the two other Larkins girls, confessing coyly to tight new boots and displaying a certain eagerness, were added to the contents ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells
... trouble with that film—it wasn't that it got in so many legs, but that it giggled coyly and promised to show more of them, and then didn't keep the promise. It was Peeping Tom's idea ...
— Main Street • Sinclair Lewis
... your drawer," laughing coyly. "There is just enough to keep Lewin in good humour till you are well again, and we can ...
— London Pride - Or When the World Was Younger • M. E. Braddon
... pantheism on a firm basis by his commentary on the Ved[a]nta S[u]tra.[7] These two men are the re-makers of ancient Brahmanism, which from this time on continued in its stereotyped form, adopting Hindu gods very coyly, and only as spirits of small importance, while relying on the laws as well as the gods of old, on holy [a]c[a]ra or 'custom,' and the now systematized exposition of its old (Upanishad) philosophy.[8] Its creative force was already spent. Buddhism, on the ...
— The Religions of India - Handbooks On The History Of Religions, Volume 1, Edited By Morris Jastrow • Edward Washburn Hopkins
... gone a great calm settled upon her. It was all so simple now. Nobody was left but Arthur Gatty. She had just got to make up her mind about him—which would take a little time—and then—either she was a happy married woman or, said Aggie, coyly, a still happier ...
— The Judgment of Eve • May Sinclair
... pipes to his knee, And with flourish so free sets each couple in motion; With a cheer and a bound, the lads patter the ground, The maids move around just like swans on the ocean: Cheeks bright as the rose—feet light as the doe's, Now coyly retiring, now boldly advancing— Search the world all around, from the sky to the ground, No such sight can be found as an ...
— The Home Book of Verse, Vol. 2 (of 4) • Various
... danced happily, and the fresh wind kissed the sparkling ripples till the foam curled over them—as white lids droop coyly over laughing eyes. Two snowy gulls dipped and soared, flashing now against the blue sky—now into the blue sea. I gazed at their white wings—and thought of all the vain prayers I had sent up ...
— Margaret Tudor - A Romance of Old St. Augustine • Annie T. Colcock
... and bent upon her an inquiring eye, smiled coyly, dog fashion, wagged his brief tail, then, instead of coming closer, wheeled about and dashed off down ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell
... a pretty Pomp he is now!" exclaimed one and another, until he sat up coyly and cocked his head one side as ...
— Concerning Cats - My Own and Some Others • Helen M. Winslow
... a light scarf of gauze or tulle around when she was out of the room, and being the same color as her gown, it made her seem more than ever like an houri. She smiled up into Somers' face, and then, coyly, her long lashes fell on her pink cheeks. Evidently, she had concluded to bewitch the newcomer, ...
— Vicky Van • Carolyn Wells
... the trees twisting and bending as a soft breeze ruffled the surface into tiny waves. The hills already brilliant with color—scarlet, burnt orange, mauve, and purple—flamed up to meet the clear blue sky; the elms softly rustled their drying leaves; the white houses of the village retreated coyly behind maples and firs and elms: everywhere there was peace, the peace that comes with strength that has been stronger ...
— The Plastic Age • Percy Marks
... tragic about the affair at all. (At the very moment when the train began to glide out of the station Uncle John was heard to remark that, in his opinion, these Bocks weren't a patch on the old shaped Larranaga.) Among others present might have been noticed Saunders, practising late cuts rather coyly with a walking-stick in the background; the village idiot, who had rolled up on the chance of a dole; Gladys Maud Evangeline's nurse, smiling vaguely; and Gladys Maud Evangeline herself, frankly bored ...
— Mike • P. G. Wodehouse
... happened. A hubbub arose in Scotland and elsewhere, and in consequence of the hubbub an Act of Parliament has somewhat coyly made its appearance in the Statute Book (5 Edward VII., chapter 12) appointing and authorizing Commissioners to take away from the successful litigant a certain portion of the property just declared to be his, and to give ...
— In the Name of the Bodleian and Other Essays • Augustine Birrell
... distance diminish! On and on he swam, till at length he was close to the rock, and the lady, bending down, was holding out her lily hands to him. Hans clutched at them, and they were, I thought, already in his fevered grasp, when she coyly snatched them away and struck him playfully on the head. The cruel, hungry waters then surged over him. I saw him sink down, down, down: I saw him no more. When I raised my agonised eyes to the rocks, all was silent and desolate: ...
— Byways of Ghost-Land • Elliott O'Donnell
... but to learn the answer, and this she did, by tugging firmly, coyly, to free her wrist. The answer was rapture; his grip had tightened. She pulled harder, and felt herself being drawn toward him. Yes, yes, her triumph was a fact. Slowly an arm of iron, a tremulous, masterful vandal, ...
— The Missourian • Eugene P. (Eugene Percy) Lyle
... She half started, and blushed in turn; and with one glance drank in every article of dress he had on. Her eyes beamed pleasure and admiration for a moment, then she made a little courtesy, then she took a step toward him, and held out her hand a little coyly. ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade
... didn't tremble with maiden modesty or yield my hand coyly and by degrees, or droop my lashes, or falter ...
— Peregrine's Progress • Jeffery Farnol
... by some wag laughing and thinking I had done it as a good joke. I was, of course, exceedingly annoyed to have been supposed capable of such a vulgar unmeaning piece of disrespect, and kept my feet as coyly under my petticoats as the veriest prude in the country till I should make my escape.' His circumstances were now improved, and though moralists, he said, thought property an evil, he declared himself happier every guinea he gained. He thanked ...
— The Wits and Beaux of Society - Volume 2 • Grace & Philip Wharton
... afternoon's work, dance a farandole in sabots, after which Ladies and Cavaliers arrive and prepare to dance too; the Cavaliers select their partners by chasing them on tiptoe, the Ladies run backwards, and coyly slap their favourites' faces with bouquets. Here, according to Argument, "refreshments are served by Pages." Don't see any; these particular Pages seem to have been cut. Dance follows: the Vicomte Raoul de Bragelonne arrives, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 102, June 25, 1892 • Various
... Briscoe stiffly rejoined. "But I think and I do say that it is a preposterous instance of coxcombry to subject such a woman as Mrs. Royston—because of a generous moment of self-reproach for a cruel and selfish deed—to the imputation of inviting advances from a man who coyly plans evasion and flight—and she scarcely ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... bulges away from his breastbone so the passerby can easily discover what brand of suspenders he fancies; but if he be stoutish, the waistcoat has a little way of hitching along up his mid-riff inch by inch until finally it has accordion-pleated itself in overlapping folds thwartwise of his tummy, coyly exposing an inch or ...
— 'Oh, Well, You Know How Women Are!' AND 'Isn't That Just Like a Man!' • Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb
... its course and the roses By Armenia's maiden pale, When she coyly and slowly discloses The glories ...
— Armenian Literature • Anonymous
... of the European trading companies. Further out, at the edge of the town, are the dwellings of the Dutch officials and traders—comfortable-looking, one-story, whitewashed houses with deep verandahs, peering coyly out from the midst of fragrant, blazing gardens. The Residency, the Custom House, the Police Barracks and the Koetei Club can readily be distinguished by the Dutch flags that droop above them. The river-bank itself is one interminable street. Here dwells ...
— Where the Strange Trails Go Down • E. Alexander Powell
... sand storm is food upon which the reminiscent may ruminate many a day, being much more pleasant in memory than in the making. First come the scurrying outriders, lithe and limber whisking gusts, dancing and whirling like Moslem dervishes, coyly brushing the traveler or boldly flinging fierce fistfuls of dirt into his eyes; then off with a swish of invisible skirts—vanishing possibly in the same direction whence they came. They go leaving him wiping his astonished eyes disgustedly, for the act was so sudden and tragic ...
— Trail Tales • James David Gillilan
... sat there in the soft spring morning a little bird perched itself on a budding bough, and began to chirp. As it turned its head from side to side, and peeped coyly at him, it reminded him, by one of those unconscious flights of association, of another bird, which hung in a gilded cage very near the couch of his invalid mother. He could see the little warbler doing his best to entertain ...
— Harper's Young People, April 27, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... went off, persuading Cis, who went coyly protesting that the paddock was damp, yet still following after them, he added, "Yea, Sue, considering all, it is better those two were apart for a year or so, till we see better what is this strange nestling that we have reared. Ay, thou art like the mother sparrow that hath bred up ...
— Unknown to History - A Story of the Captivity of Mary of Scotland • Charlotte M. Yonge
... agitation he put on his waistcoat with the hind part before, and this was a corroboration of good luck. He no longer doubted that a huge store of money lay buried somewhere in his cabbage-field, coyly waiting to be sought for, and he half repined at having so long been scratching about the surface of the soil, instead of ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... there was much mirth in the little house, such mirth as there had not been since Henri went away. The Belgians called it a bal masque, and putting them on bowed before one another and requested dances, and even flirted coyly with each other over their bits of white gauze. And in the very middle of the gayety some one propounded one of Henri's idiotic riddles; and Sara Lee went across to her little room and closed the door and stood there with her eyes shut, ...
— The Amazing Interlude • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... wetting their fingers on little sponges in little glass dishes and counting whole fortunes in bank-notes—or perched high on office-stools eating apples—while Presidents and Directors, with shiny bald pates and bewigged heads, some heroically with permanent spectacles and others coyly and weakly with eye-glasses held in the hand, sat perusing the papers, telling the news, and gossiping about engagements, and marriages, and family rumors, and secrets with the air of practical men of the world, with no nonsense, no fanaticism, no fol-de-rol ...
— Trumps • George William Curtis
... into the house, trolling a song. As John sat listening for her return, the thought came abruptly, "Hasn't Jeff-Jack got something to do with this?" But there was scarcely time to resent it when she reopened the door coyly, beckoned him in, passed out, and closed it; and, watchworn, wasted, more dead than alive, there stood before John the thing Garnet ...
— John March, Southerner • George W. Cable
... Pace, a peace enthusiast, with outstretched arms and pursed-up lips, rushed upon the Nebraskan in the hotel lobby. Bryan blushed coyly, clapped his hand over his mouth and dodged behind ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer
... to him. Like his late critic, Pete availed himself of two, though he had not the excuse of a pipe to be filled. One he coyly tucked above his left ear and one he lighted. Then he sat gracefully back upon his heels and drew smoke into his innermost recesses, a shrunken little figure of a man in a calico shirt of gay stripes, faded blue overalls, and ...
— Somewhere in Red Gap • Harry Leon Wilson
... a passer-by and did not hear the remark. Frankie had been paying better attention. She smiled and looked into his face coyly. ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... his wife. He had not seen her now for months, and it was more than two weeks since he had heard from her, and his heart beat high with joyful anticipation as he thought just how she would look when she came to him, shyly and coyly, as she always did, with that droop in her eyelids and that pink flush in her cheeks. He would chide her a little at first, he said, for having been so poor a correspondent, especially of late, and after that he would love her so much, ...
— Miss McDonald • Mary J. Holmes
... that every one should be made welcome on board. You should have seen these big fishermen coyly removing their heavy boots before treading our decks—I believe that "snowy deck" is the proper term—lest they should mar the holystoned smoothness. They have entered with bated breath the dining and sitting room, explored the mysteries of the galley ...
— Sweetapple Cove • George van Schaick
... shouldst abide My passion might decay? Thou leav'st me pining and denied, Coyly thou say'st me nay. Ev'n as I woo thee to my side, Thou, importuned to stay, Like Orpheus' half-recovered bride ...
— The Poems of William Watson • William Watson
... nodding coyly at me, while I stared into space with basilisk calm. I object to references to my problematical marriage—especially by aunts. The great "until" never arrived for them, yet they feel quite annoyed because twenty-six has found ...
— The Lady of the Basement Flat • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... water, the little low-roofed dumpy dwelling, washed white, half-swing doors, low stoep, and trellis front. It is in their topographical surroundings only that they differ. The one will stand bleak and exposed upon a dreary plain, the other will nestle coyly behind a grove of pointed gum-trees in some kloof or gully. Chance and nature alone decide if in structure and setting they please the eye. Man is indifferent. A house is to shield him from the elements, not to improve the landscape or ...
— On the Heels of De Wet • The Intelligence Officer
... us, as was easily seen by the broken bottles littered all over it. However, the Mayor was a bon-vivant, and I do not wish to have a better set of bins to pick from. Chambertin, Graves, Alicant, white wine and red, sparkling and still, they lay in pyramids peeping coyly out of sawdust. Old Bouvet stood with his candle looking here and peeping there, purring in his throat like a cat before a milk-pail. He had picked upon a Burgundy at last, and had his hand outstretched to the bottle when there came a roar of musketry from above us, a rush of feet, and such ...
— The Exploits Of Brigadier Gerard • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Let us look more closely among the airmen. Who is that whispering coyly to Sergeant Bangs, who stands cap in hand, despite the frosty night air? He talks earnestly, rapidly, western ...
— Our Pilots in the Air • Captain William B. Perry
... mouth on which the gaze Of ten fair girls was centred In rapturous amaze. Soon that august assemblage clear'd The dish; and—as they ate - The stones, all coyly, re-appear'd On ...
— Fly Leaves • C. S. Calverley
... it was really embarrassing to him, the tender way in which she looked up to him—her black eyelids coyly drooping over her dark, slumbrous eyes, inviting a caress. He was certainly wooed against his will, but there was no help for it; he was forced to take up his part ...
— Daisy Brooks - A Perilous Love • Laura Jean Libbey
... folded his arms, turned his back to the smiter and assumed a scientific arrangement of the shoulders with tense muscles and coyly withdrawn bones. He had been ...
— Snake and Sword - A Novel • Percival Christopher Wren
... coyly to my arms, and I then knew all was well between us, especially when she turned me ...
— Jethou - or Crusoe Life in the Channel Isles • E. R. Suffling
... ears, and yet vainly tried to obtain even a glimpse of the fall. Adverse Fate led us up and down, and round and round, and backwards and forwards, amid a labyrinth of overgrown bushes which might have bewildered an Australian settler; and still the nymph of the waterfall coyly hid herself from our eyes. Our ears informed us that the invisible object of which we were in search was of very inconsiderable height; our patience was evaporating; our time was wasting away—in short, to confess the truth here, as I have confessed it elsewhere ...
— Rambles Beyond Railways; - or, Notes in Cornwall taken A-foot • Wilkie Collins
... by time that each Had one of Noey's hands—ceasing their speech And coyly anxious, in their new attire, To wake the comment of their mute desire,— Noey seemed rendered voiceless. Quite a while They watched him furtively.—He seemed to smile As though he would conceal it; and they saw Him look away, and his lips purse ...
— A Child-World • James Whitcomb Riley
... she asked, glancing coyly at Roderick, as they moved back through the crowd. But he did not hear her, and she was surprised at a sudden light that sprang to his eyes. She looked in their direction, and saw Helen Murray in a blue gown and a white cap and apron. She was standing in ...
— The End of the Rainbow • Marian Keith
... is cold, and it comes in bitter scuds that blind you; but the rain of April steals upon you coyly, half reluctantly,—yet lovingly—like the steps of a bride to ...
— Dream Life - A Fable Of The Seasons • Donald G. Mitchell
... the aspic she was carrying. "Laws, Miss Kate, honey, I allus did have a eye fo' de gentlemen," she said coyly. "I des 'bleeged ter have a peep at de beaux. Mighty long time sense we-all's ...
— Kildares of Storm • Eleanor Mercein Kelly
... lightships that watch over the sea-roads to the imperial city like pickets round a sleeping army, and slipped out into the dark spaces of the North Sea. Stars were bright, summer scents from the Kent cliffs mingled coyly with vulgar steamer-smells; the summer weather held Immutably. Nature, for her part, seemed resolved to be no party to my penance, but to be imperturbably bent on shedding mild ridicule over my wrongs. An irresistible sense of peace and detachment, ...
— Riddle of the Sands • Erskine Childers
... mocked, "tell us the story of your lovely life. Having heard me coyly confess that I went into nursing because I had such a crush on this world,—and Helene here brazenly affirm that she went into nursing because she had such a crush on the world to come,—it's up to you now ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott
... like an epileptic patient; but presently recovers, and busies himself about the bower. When he has induced the female to enter it, he seems greatly pleased; alters the disposition of a feather or a shell, as if hoping that the change may meet her approbation; and looks at her as she sits coyly under the overarching twigs, and then at the little arrangement which he has made, and then at her again, till one could almost fancy that one hears him breathe a sigh. He is still in his transition dress, and has not yet donned his full Venetian ...
— International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, - No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 • Various
... rector of St. Mark's was conscious of a pleasurable emotion, even now, as he recalled the time when she had, at his own request, first called him Arthur, her bird-like voice hesitating just a little, and her soft eyes looking coyly up to him, ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes
... went feeling about, along the banks of the hot spring, searching everywhere, whilst she lay coyly hid under the ledges of the rocks, peeping out, wondering when she should ...
— The Romance of a Pro-Consul - Being The Personal Life And Memoirs Of The Right Hon. Sir - George Grey, K.C.B. • James Milne
... meet him again—and so Peter invited her to go to a picture show. On the way home they became very chummy, and before a week went by it was as if they had been friends for life. When Peter asked Miss Frisbie if he might kiss her, she answered coyly that he might, but after he had kissed her a few times she explained to him that she was a self-supporting woman, alone and defenseless in the world, and she had nobody to speak for her but herself; she must ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair
... these things. Throughout the interview Hank sat bolt upright, tucking a pair of shoes of the dreadnought class coyly underneath his chair, and drew suspiciously at Turkish cigarettes from Kirk's case. An air of constraint hung over the party. Again and again Kirk hoped that Hank would embark on the epic of his life, but shyness ...
— The Coming of Bill • P. G. Wodehouse
... John. But with this handful of exceptions all nobly toed the line. Ladies with the tiniest reeds of voices, which shook like reeds, warbled of Last Roses and Prairie Flowers; others, with more force but due decorum, cried to Willie that they had Missed Him, or coyly confessed to the presence of Silver Threads Among the Gold; and Mrs. Chinnery, an old-young woman with a long, lean neck, which she twisted this way and that in the exertion of producing her notes, declared her love for an Old Armchair. The gentlemen, in baritones and profundos, told the amorous ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson
... spite of his remembered appetite for savings and his regrettable multiplicity of wives, gave her the fair hump. That something in the expression of this new one's muddy eyes recalled the loving leer of "That There Green," she admitted to herself. Womanly anxiety throbbed in the bosom, not too coyly hidden by the pneumonia blouse, as the couple passed the gilded portals of a public bar, and the Slabberts' elbow was thrust painfully into her side, as its owner ...
— The Dop Doctor • Clotilde Inez Mary Graves
... nigh unto the leading company, Captain Trebizondi, coyly lurking behind its rear rank, shrilly screamed, "'A' Gompany! Royal Salutes! Present Arrrrms!" while a volunteer, late a private of the Loyal Whitechapel Regiment, and now an unwilling member of this corps of auxiliary troops, ...
— Driftwood Spars - The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who - Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life • Percival Christopher Wren
... saw about a dozen in the Opera House to-night, and all the men who wore them looked the same. They had the same walk, or rather waggle, the same coyly conscious expression, the same wavy motion of the head. When they spoke to each other, they called each other by Christian names. Is it a badge of some club or some society, and is Mr. Amarinth their high priest? ...
— The Green Carnation • Robert Smythe Hichens
... army blanket as a desirable residence and were quite indifferent as to whether you shared their quarters or not. Often they were already in possession when blankets were unrolled for the night, and if not then, one was usually to be found in the morning nestling coyly in the folds. The moment you touched him with a stick he elevated his poisonous battering-ram, which was as long as himself, and struck and struck again in an ecstasy of rage, until sometimes he actually poisoned himself and ...
— With Our Army in Palestine • Antony Bluett
... surface-drainage, and the sun-for-garbage cure, Till you've been a periwinkle shrinking coyly up a sewer. I believe in well-flushed culverts ... This is why the death-rate's small; And, if you don't believe me, get ...
— The Kipling Reader - Selections from the Books of Rudyard Kipling • Rudyard Kipling
... A proper conjunction! as who should say, Lately come out of the fire, I would go thrust my self into the flame. Let Maistres nice go Saint it where she list, And coyly quaint it with dissembling face. I hold in scorn the fooleries that they use: I being free, will never subject my self To any such as ...
— Fair Em - A Pleasant Commodie Of Faire Em The Millers Daughter Of - Manchester With The Love Of William The Conquerour • William Shakespeare [Apocrypha]
... pole, and gather up out of the grass or underbrush in the adjacent jungle the concealed presents. The arrival of the presents is a grand moment for the father and relatives of the young man. Even the future bride, who up to this time has coyly hidden away in a corner, can not help stealing a few peeps at the display of spears, ...
— The Manbos of Mindano - Memoirs of the National Academy of Sciences, Volume XXIII, First Memoir • John M. Garvan
... made a pretty sight. A foreground of water, smooth as one could wish had he nowhere to go, with illusive cat's-paws of wind playing coyly all around, marking the great shield with dark scratches, and never coming near enough to be caught except when the sail was down. Fold upon fold of low hills in the distance, with hamlets showing here and there at their bases by the sea. ...
— Noto, An Unexplored Corner of Japan • Percival Lowell
... Dunmore worried over the gunpowder in the Williamsburg magazine. On the night of April 20-21 marines from the H.M.S. Magdalene stealthily carried away the powder. Dunmore coyly suggested he had ordered the powder removed for safekeeping to prevent a rumored slave insurrection. Although his lame excuse fooled no one, quiet returned to Williamsburg after a brief flurry of excitement and marches to the Governor's Palace by ...
— The Road to Independence: Virginia 1763-1783 • Virginia State Dept. of Education
... innocence—perhaps from the suggestion of her tiny figure—of a mere child among an audience of children. Dancing it alone she assumed the parts of the man and woman; advancing, retreating, coquetting, rejecting, coyly bewitching, and at last yielding as lightly and as immaterially as the flickering shadows that fell upon them from the waving trees overhead. The master was fascinated yet troubled. What if there had been older spectators? Would the parents take the performance as innocently as the performer and ...
— Trent's Trust and Other Stories • Bret Harte
... different. Each year she had to impress Mrs. Tubbs of West Skipsit with new metropolitan finery, and this year Father had no peace nor comfort in the menage till she had selected a smart new hat, incredibly small and close and sinking coyly down over her ear. He was only a man folk, he was in the way, incapable of understanding this problem of fashion, and Mother almost slapped him one evening for suggesting that it "wouldn't make such a gosh-awful lot ...
— The Innocents - A Story for Lovers • Sinclair Lewis
... Our Women (CASSELL) Mr. ARNOLD BENNETT coyly disclaims any intention of tackling his theme on strictly scientific principles. The warning is perhaps hardly necessary, since, apart from the duty which the author owes to his public as a novelist ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, October 6, 1920 • Various |
