"Flick" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... sprang in, Frank gave the horses a flick with the whip. The afternoon air was keen and the high-spirited team needed no further urging. They swung out of the farm gate at a pace that made Reggie ...
— The Land of Promise • D. Torbett
... Mason paid the driver, got out, and walked down the busy street. Here and there, nuaniam signs began to flick on, their garish blues, reds, and whites bathing the street in a glow of synthetic light. It was early evening, but already Spaceman's Row was getting ...
— Danger in Deep Space • Carey Rockwell
... arrived at Mrs. Iggulden's a thought struck him—not heavily; only a light, reminding flick—and he stopped a minute to see what it had to say. It referred to his interview with Scotland Yard, some six weeks after Fenwick's ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... a habit she couldn't get over. But it no longer gave her keen pleasure. She told herself that her three friends were deteriorating in their middle age. Lizzie's sharp face darted malice; her tongue was whipcord; she knew where to flick; the small gleam of her eyes, the snap of her nutcracker jaws irritated Harriett. Sarah was slow; slow. She took no care of her face and figure. As Lizzie put it, Sarah's appearance was an outrage on her contemporaries. "She ...
— Life and Death of Harriett Frean • May Sinclair
... the road outside the "Bold Sawyer." The coach-horn, sounding in the distance, was drawing rapidly nearer; we could hear the rhythm of the sixteen hoofs. Presently the horses swung round the corner; we saw the coachman flick his leaders so that he might dash up to the inn in style. Then as they galloped up I saw two well-known figures sitting outside, ...
— Jim Davis • John Masefield
... the liberty of hasking and of sending in my card," said Aby; and he gave his horse a flick as intending thus to cut short the conversation. But Mr. Somers had put his hand upon the bridle, and the beast was ...
— Castle Richmond • Anthony Trollope
... few fleecy clouds, simple enough material for a picture; but by my faith! could I only have put down the colour of that mid-day glow from the sand, and the feeling of space, and the two blues, of the sea and sky, and the flick of colour from a scrap or two of drapery on sunny brown figures tailing on to the long ropes of a Seine net! Out beyond the surf mere dots in the blue swell, were more figures swimming about the ends of the net splashing to keep in the fish, and in the edge of the white surf the fishermen's ...
— From Edinburgh to India & Burmah • William G. Burn Murdoch
... bank for one desperate effort. She must catch him as he ran toward her and try to flick him out of the water. It was her only chance. She might break the line or the pole and lose him entirely, but she would ...
— The Shepherd of the North • Richard Aumerle Maher
... the roadside while the little party walked about or stood gazing up at the tall slender trees that seemed to tower to the very skies. Thomas was not fond of waiting, but he thought that he had the best of it in this case: it was more cheerful to sit in the carriage and "flick" the flies from Rex and Regina than to go poking about in the gloomy pine-woods. Yet, notwithstanding the darkness of its interior and the sombre character of its dense masses of evergreen foliage as seen from without—whence the name of "black timber," which has been applied to ...
— Among the Trees at Elmridge • Ella Rodman Church
... was a wide area in between, in which combat was practical. The Mekinese battleship reached a height where it could maneuver on solar-system drive without rockets. It might, of course, flick into overdrive and be gone thousands of millions of miles within seconds. But that would be flight. It would not return accurately to the scene of the fight. So overdrive could not be used as a battle tactic. It could be ...
— Talents, Incorporated • William Fitzgerald Jenkins
... wickedly with a sword-like gleam of fangs as he did so. The other pivoted, quick as thought, and counter-slashed, and, before you could wink, Mesomelas was in and away, in and out, once, twice, and again. One bite sent a little flick of the other's brown fur a-flying; one missed, one got home, and the side-stripe's ugly snarling changed to ...
— The Way of the Wild • F. St. Mars
... the three miles home in the boats: the slightest flick of the foot would have sent one of them flying beyond the eye of God or man. After a couple of miles the shoes began to tell, and I stood still and lifted up one foot behind me, craning over my shoulder to see if I could catch sight of the glimmer of skin through the heel of the stocking. The fog ...
— A Diary Without Dates • Enid Bagnold
... hurled, She journey'd on amid the gath'ring gloom, A spectre form emerging from the tomb. Earth had no resting place—no worshipper— No dove returned with olive branch to her: Her lamp burned dimly, yet its flick'ring light, Guided the wanderer thro' the lengthen'd night. Oft in her weary search, she paused the while, To catch one gleam of hope—one favour'd smile; But the dim mists of ignorance still threw, Their blighting influence o'er the famish'd few, Who ...
— Forty Centuries of Ink • David N. Carvalho
... fine dirt on to the occupants of the car. It would have been difficult to accuse Gay of doing it on purpose, however, for she appeared blandly unconscious of the neighbourhood of fellow beings. She gave a little flick of her whip, and away she went over a great burnt-out patch of veld, leaving the long, white, dusty road to those who had no choice but ...
— Blue Aloes - Stories of South Africa • Cynthia Stockley
... was a long steep hill to go up, and here Ruby the horse always waited for Andrew to get down and walk. David might really drive now, and even flick at Ruby's fat sides with the whip, which was pleasant, but did not make the least difference ...
— The Hawthorns - A Story about Children • Amy Walton
... gave back the sound of his tread as he mounted, with eerie, wandering echoes. The grey walls glimmered with a ghostly desolation around him. Halfway up, he stopped to flick the ash from his cigar, and laughed aloud. But the echoes of his laughter sounded like voices crying in the darkness. He went on more swiftly, like a phantom imprisoned and seeking escape. The echoes met him and fell away ...
— Charles Rex • Ethel M. Dell
... she was a kid? And when he did come back she would take her courage in both hands and tell him that she wanted to play the game. And then, having been honest, she would hitch on to life again with a light heart, and neither Alice nor Gilbert could stand up and flick her ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... his hook, crouched down, and cautiously drew near the bank. A dexterous flick of his rod landed the worm fairly in the middle of the run. Hardly had it hit the water before something grabbed it, and Charley drew forth a flopping fish. But it proved to be only a fingerling. In disgust Charley wet his hand and carefully ...
— The Young Wireless Operator—As a Fire Patrol - The Story of a Young Wireless Amateur Who Made Good as a Fire Patrol • Lewis E. Theiss
... strange and deep emotion he found himself once more in the world! Driving in the dense and devious thoroughfares was like sailing on a cross sea outside a difficult headland. He could smell the brine and feel the flick of the foam on his lips and cheeks. It ...
— The Christian - A Story • Hall Caine
... be guarded against, as to their revenge. One, whom I openly hold in some serious animosity, whom I am at the pains to wound and defy, and whom I estimate as worth wounding and defying;—the other, whom I treat as a sort of insect, and contemptuously and pleasantly flick aside with my glove. But, it turns out to be the latter who is the really dangerous man; and, when I expect the blow from the other, it ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... knot Then he would throw it on top of the large log at the back of the fire. This would make a bright flick-er-ing light. ...
— Stories of Great Americans for Little Americans • Edward Eggleston
... "I suppose I have made it easy enough for you: We have another twelve miles to make. You'll have to get up." But Peter this time did not stir till I touched him a flick with ...
— Over Prairie Trails • Frederick Philip Grove
... at that; an' she sez, 'Well, There ain't no cause at all for you to feel Modest about the things you 'ave to tell; An' wot yeh say sounds wonderfully reel. Your talk'—an' 'ere I seen 'er eyelids flick— ...
— Digger Smith • C. J. Dennis
... were feeding here, and at once Midnight lifted up his voice in a friendly neigh of salutation, which was immediately answered by several horses in the distance. In fact, he was on the point of slowing down and swerving from the trail, but a light flick of the whip reminded him that his mistress had other business on hand which had to be attended to first, so again throwing back ...
— Glen of the High North • H. A. Cody
... signs, but never expressing distinctly, or in plain language, the subject on which it turned. At length one of them, observing Meg was still fast asleep, or appeared to be so, desired one of the lads "to hand in the black Peter, that they might flick it open." The boy stepped to the door, and brought in a portmanteau, which Brown instantly recognised for his own. His thoughts immediately turned to the unfortunate lad he had left with the carriage. Had the ruffians murdered him? was ...
— Guy Mannering • Sir Walter Scott
... me at once as the missing convict. This choked me off, for though as a rule I have no objection to a slight scuffle, I felt that in my present condition the average housemaid could knock me over with the flick of a duster. ...
— A Rogue by Compulsion • Victor Bridges
... not,' says he. 'Mr. Flynn is beyond in Youghal and I borryed it in the dark dead of night over the yard wall. Faith, he'll run home like a flick of lightning, he's ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 158, February 4, 1920 • Various
... coat, brought out a cigarette case, opened it and slowly put a cigarette to his lips. About to flick on a lighter, he saw Ruben Jeffries watching him with an expression of disapproval from across the aisle. Jeffries shook his head, indicated the NO SMOKING sign on the wall. Cavender nodded, smiling a rueful apology for his absent-mindedness, and returned the ...
— Ham Sandwich • James H. Schmitz
... up the turkey-wing, and gave the clean hearth a perfunctory flick. Then she returned the wing to its place and leaned back in her chair, gazing ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... At a flick of the reins, Suraj broke into a smart canter, willingly enough. What were sunsets or local devils to him compared with stables ...
— Far to Seek - A Romance of England and India • Maud Diver
... organism, a little articulate being. There is his spine, the root; his body, the stem; his limbs and head, the formative elements, prefixes and suffixes, case-endings and what not. Let him loose in the sentence, and see how he wriggles gaily from state to state: with a flick of the tail from nominative to genitive, from singular to plural: declaring his meaning, not by means of what surroundings you put about him, but by motions, changes, volitions so to say, of his own. 'Now,' says he, 'I'm pater, and ...
— The Crest-Wave of Evolution • Kenneth Morris
... unfolding schematic structure. He was thrilled at sight of the selectors and analyzers of processed beryllium, the logic-and-semantic circuits in complex little bundles, the sensitized variant-tapes waiting for transferral impress, all revealed by a flick of Arnold's fingers that threw open entire sheathed sections to bare the inner secrets. The thousands of tiny transistors amazed Beardsley. The endless array of electric eyes startled him. And the spongy centers of synaptic cell-clusters horrified ...
— We're Friends, Now • Henry Hasse
... to milk, which was a much more princely diet. Once, even, the idea just crossed his mind, that, as he was so fond of mice, perhaps he wasn't a prince after all, but only an ordinary tabby cat. This thought he thrust from him with a flick of his tail. ...
— More Tales in the Land of Nursery Rhyme • Ada M. Marzials
... struck at his face, and the fingers were stiff; one arm was cast over his shoulders, and Andy heard the intake of breath which precedes a shriek. Not a long interval—no more, say, than the space required for the lash of a snapping blacksnake to flick back on itself—but in that interim the hands of Andy were buried in the throat ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand
... knew what? Perhaps you would better tell me and let me judge for myself," she suggested; and out of the past came a flick of the memory whip to make him feel again that she ...
— The Quickening • Francis Lynde
... hearts an' maiden's eyes Don't vreeze below the cwoldest skies, While they in twice so keen a blast Can wag their brisk lim's twice so vast! Though vier-light, a-flick'ren red Drough vrosty window-peaenes, do spread Vrom wall to wall, vrom he'th to door, Vor us to goo an' zit ...
— Poems of Rural Life in the Dorset Dialect • William Barnes
... drawing the lash of a whip back into striking readiness ... a brutal nose broken askew, a blaster burn puckering across cheek to misshapen ear ... that, evil, gloating grin of anticipation. Flick, flick, the slight dance of the lash in a master's hand as those thick fingers tightened about the stock of the whip. In a moment it would whirl up to lay a ribbon of fire about Shann's defenceless shoulders. Then Logally would laugh and laugh, his sadistic mirth echoed ...
— Storm Over Warlock • Andre Norton
... one of the wings, a thin curl of smoke rose and floated up alongside a painted tamarind-tree. It might at first have been only the smoke of a cigar. Next moment, however, a flick of flame stole out and moved up the tree, and a draught of air blew the smoke across the stage. There were a few excited whispers, a rush in the wings; some one in the gallery shouted "Fire!" and just then a shower ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... he said. "If it loses, I'll take it up." Hahn gave him an eye-flick of acknowledgment. He was used to mascots. Sandy watched the play until at last the jack slid off to rest by the side of the case, leaving the winning card, a nine, exposed. Sandy alone had won. The luck-piece had ...
— Rimrock Trail • J. Allan Dunn
... with a searching note in his voice which seemed to probe coldly and with deadly accuracy among the strenuous emotions in the young man's mind. "Harris—you are an officer of promise. Don't cut that promise short." With a flick of his ashes to one side he turned away. The cigar went back into the corner ...
— The Littlest Rebel • Edward Peple
... A smart flick of the whip upon their glossy backs, and the creams sprang forward at a run. The buggy was new and strong, and if they kept the road all would be well—unless they met Banjo upon the narrow ridge between two broad-topped knolls, known as the Hog's Back. Another ...
— Chip, of the Flying U • B. M. Bower
... not his brother artists. Away from his imitations he tries to make the most of his grotesque figure. He invents eccentric costumes; his sleeves reach no further than just below his elbows, his trouser hems flick his calves; he wears, inveterate tradition of the circus clown, a ridiculously little hard felt hat on the top of his shock of carroty hair. He paints his nose red and extends his grin from ear to ear. He racks his brain to invent novelties in manual dexterity. For hours a day in his modest ...
— The Mountebank • William J. Locke
... good hiding one day. But you know I can't, you dear old thing. I'm writing this in the orchard, where the H.Q. horses live, and Jezebel is standing sleepily in the shade of her tree. She looks intensely stupid. She occasionally tries to flick away a fly with her short tail. Occasionally she sighs deeply, with that blubbery, spluttery noise that all ...
— Letters to Helen - Impressions of an Artist on the Western Front • Keith Henderson
... vacation. That's just the point. You're going to stick on the job, and I'm going to stick within four feet of you till old Jim-jams Jones shakes along to get his morning's morning; and it will be a sign of awful bad luck for you if the lights in this end of town flicker a single flick any time to-night." ...
— The Making of Bobby Burnit - Being a Record of the Adventures of a Live American Young Man • George Randolph Chester
... curtains. Then the Kafir driver flourished his kambok, or long whip, in the air, and made it crack like a pistol, and the horses reared, and the oxen started and slowly bored in between them, for they whinnied, and kicked, and spread out like a fan all over the road; but a flick or two from the terrible kambok soon sent them bleeding and trembling and rubbing shoulders, and the oxen, mildly but persistently goring their recalcitrating haunches, the intelligent animals went ahead, and revenged themselves by breaking the harness. But that goes ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... to pass, but it gave the final flick to her anger. "You are the kind of person, Henry, who is so monumentally selfish that you think everybody who dares to cross you in any way is himself monumentally selfish too. Now you come to me in a protective role to save me from 'this ...
— Tutors' Lane • Wilmarth Lewis
... of this further compromise, of this something more than compromise, of this half acknowledgment of their own weakness, came from Mr. Flick, of the firm of Norton and Flick, the solicitors who were employed in substantiating the Earl's position. When Mr. Flick mentioned it to Sir William Patterson, the great barrister, who was at that time Solicitor-General and leading counsel ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope
... a hot reception—mosquitoes of unimaginable size, and enormous stinging flies which sought to deposit their eggs in his smooth hide, but with his giraffe-like neck he could bite himself where he would, and the lithe lash of his tail could flick off tormentors from ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts
... the most delicate of lemon puddings was cooling on the ice. Nothing more could be done for hours; but Polly resisted all her mother's efforts to induce her to rest, and roamed excitedly up and down the rooms, now and again pausing to flick a few grains of dust from the mantel, or to rearrange one of the graceful bunches of ...
— Half a Dozen Girls • Anna Chapin Ray
... and for the fact his scholars suffer. He wields a rod rather than a filigree bow, as old romancers fabled,—no plaything, but a most business-like article, well-poised in the handle, and thence tapering into graceful, stinging nothingness; and not a scholar escapes at least a flick of it. ...
— The Cords of Vanity • James Branch Cabell et al
... no patience with y'r ramrod independence! Bend a stiff neck, or you'll break a sore heart! Ride ahead, I tell you, you young mule!" and he brought a smart flick ...
— Lords of the North • A. C. Laut
... but yet I linger still, Gazing with rapture on the face of night; And mountain wild, deep vale, and heathy hill, Lay like a lovely vision, mellow, bright, Bathed in the glory of the sunset light, Whose changing hues in flick'ring radiance play, Faint and yet fainter on the outstretch'd sight, Until at length they wane and die away, And all th' horizon round ...
— The Mirror Of Literature, Amusement, And Instruction, No. 391 - Vol. 14, No. 391, Saturday, September 26, 1829 • Various
... his seat and began pacing the gravel. Now and then he would stop, flick a pebble from its bed with his foot, and walk on. She heard the sound of his steps, but she did not look at him, even when he stopped ...
— The Fortunes of Oliver Horn • F. Hopkinson Smith
... the cook a perfect life of misery. They steal round the galley and will nibble the carrots or turnips if his back is turned for one minute; and then he throws something at them and misses them; and they scuttle off laughing impudently, and flick one ear at him from a safe distance. This is the most impudent gesture I ever saw. Winking is nothing to it. The ear normally hangs down behind; the goat turns sideways to her enemy—by a little knowing cock of the head flicks one ear over one eye, and squints from ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson, Volume 9 • Robert Louis Stevenson
... flick of the officious napkin. "Now shall we say a chop, sir?" Here a smiling obeisance. "Or shall we make it a steak, sir—cut thick, sir—medium ...
— The Amateur Gentleman • Jeffery Farnol et al
... dislike sitting idle in a carriage. I always drive myself,' she said calmly, and, with a rather tighter hand than usual on the reins, she turned the ponies' heads, and even gave each a sharp flick with the whip, which sent them up the leafy road at a very ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan
... all the earth, but no one won't take no account of you." And the lies of them which have turned into ropes of hempen shall come up and strangle they. But me and my child shall pass by all fatted up and clothed, and with the last flick, afore the eyelids of they drop, they shall behold we, and, a-clapping of the teeth of them shall they repent them of their sins. Too late, too ...
— Six Plays • Florence Henrietta Darwin
... suspense, watching his opportunity each time they passed the gate to give Artless a start that would make him bound through it. Round and round they went, however, several times, with Artless rearing, backing, and plunging; but at last the whip came down at the right moment, just the slightest flick, Riley let go his head, and out he dashed in his indignation, the battle ending in a wild gallop up the street, with the car swinging behind him, and the whole of the Irish side of the road out cheering and encouraging, to the children's great delight. But their ebullition of ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... the defensive paralyzes will The idol of the hour is the mob's wooden puppet Their sneer withers Tighter than ever I was tight I'll be to-night With one idea, we see nothing—nothing but itself You want me to flick your indecision ...
— Quotations from the Works of George Meredith • David Widger
... social ladder whereby to clamber upward. Always she had disdained the material of which the ladder was constructed. Now that she was successfully landed upon the desired level and needed its support no longer, would she kick it aside entirely, with one flick of her slippered foot? As for their marriage: what had it really been? A delicately hand-wrought bond? A machine-made manacle? Indeed, the ...
— The Brentons • Anna Chapin Ray
... Bateman! I shall never forget his first wild scamper over the moorland. He would persist in riding in his best London clothes, spotless broad white collar, shining silk hat, gloves, and all. Before mounting he even bent down to flick a little tiny bit of dust ...
— Our Home in the Silver West - A Story of Struggle and Adventure • Gordon Stables
... these curious and exquisite things, such as flowers and fishes, and thrust them, not into a world where they could live out a peaceful and innocent life, but into the midst of dangers and miseries. Sometimes, beneath his windows, he could see a shoal of little fish flick from the water in all directions at the rush of a pike, one of them no doubt horribly ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... walking out of the room, with a toss of her head and a flick of her pretty skirts indicative of the independence and indifference she felt. She did not propose to be ...
— Sister Carrie • Theodore Dreiser
... vanity,—as of the vanity of a plunging colt who resents the liberty even of a touch. "By the end of the first session the thong will be cracked over his head, as he patiently assists in pulling the coach up hill, without producing from him even a flick of his tail," said Barrington Erle to an ...
— Phineas Finn - The Irish Member • Anthony Trollope
... there was this pleasant ritual. She would plod all round the house, duster in hand, picking things up, giving them a little flick and putting them back again, patting treasures that she especially loved, sighing heavily with satisfaction at the pleasant sight of all her possessions tranquilly in their right places. As she looked around the ugly sitting-room and saw the red glazed pots with the ferns, the faded football-groups, ...
— The Captives • Hugh Walpole
... ears twice, then lopped after me like a dog, at a slow canter. At the point where he had tumbled I collected him again by the ears, lifted him, climbed the bank and restored him to his thicket, into which he vanished with a flick of his ...
— Foe-Farrell • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... like to jump into a boat-like "pulk" all alone—for there is only room for one—twist the rein round your wrist, give it a flick, and so away over the waste of snow, watching the great antlers of the deer in front of you, and flinging yourself from side to side to prevent capsizing. And, if you do happen to upset, you must hang on to the rein like grim death and be dragged over the snow, otherwise the reindeer ...
— Peeps at Many Lands: Norway • A.F. Mockler-Ferryman
... type to be found in small towns. Bare floors, stained with tobacco juice and the dust of the street. Bare desks and tables, some of them unpainted, homemade affairs, all of them cheap and old. A stove in the larger office, a few wooden-seated armchairs. Starr took in the details with a flick here and there of his flashlight that he kept carefully turned away ...
— Starr, of the Desert • B. M Bower
... was not given to joking. I can still see his serious face, his unclipped head of hair, often brought back behind his ears with a flick of the thumb and spreading its ancient Gallic mane over his shoulders. I see his little three-cornered hat, his small clothes buckled at the knees, his wooden shoes, stuffed with straw, that echoed as he walked. Ah, no! Once childhood's ...
— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre
... from a bough overhead, and stopped just in front of the place where Archie sat. Archie looked at him; he looked at Archie. The squirrel put its paws together and rubbed its nose. It chippered a minute, twinkled its bead-like eyes, then, with a final flick of its tail, it was off, and up the tree again like a flash. Archie looked ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... mounted on small horses active as goats. Each horse was attended by a burroquero, literally a donkey driver. They were fine athletic fellows, armed with a rabo, a cow's tail at the end of a stick, to flick off the venomous flies which worry both animals and riders. They carried also cloaks and umbrellas, to shield their masters from cold and mist. We rode out of the town between walls covered in profusion with heliotropes, roses, geraniums, fuchsias, and other ...
— My First Voyage to Southern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... the stifling 'tween decks, row on row, At Aboukir, saw how the dead men lay; Charged with the fiercest in Busaco's strife, Brave dreams are his — the flick'ring lamp burns low — Yet couraged for the battles of the day He goes to stand full face to face ...
— In Flanders Fields and Other Poems - With an Essay in Character, by Sir Andrew Macphail • John McCrae
... her, the last verse of the song of Klein-Zach. When he drank too much gin or rack, You ought to have seen the two tails at his back, Like lilies in a lac, The monster made a sound of flick flack, Flic, flac, ...
— The Tales of Hoffmann - Les contes d'Hoffmann • Book By Jules Barbier; Music By J. Offenbach
... their last meeting? Did he mean he was going away? The questions formed in her mind, but there was no time for words. He had stopped the car with a flick of his agile cane, and handed her in as if he had handed her into a carriage; and not a word as to whether they would see each other again, though she hoped and hesitated ...
— The Coast of Chance • Esther Chamberlain
... me hurrying Back by the sword-blade thinness of the bridge From paradise to earth, and in the middle Flick me down sideways to the ...
— The Garden of Bright Waters - One Hundred and Twenty Asiatic Love Poems • Translated by Edward Powys Mathers
... surveying their domain. There was not space in it, at this hour, for the shadow of the elm-tree in the angle of the hedge; it crossed the lawn, cut the flower-border in two, and ran up the side of the house to the nursery window. She bent to flick a caterpillar from the honey-suckle; then, as they turned indoors, "If we mean to go on the yacht next Sunday," she suggested, "oughtn't you ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton
... Flush'd cocks and snipes about the moors; And put up hares by scores and scores; Coveys of birds, and lots of pheasants;— Yes, game enough to send in presents To ev'ry friend he has in town, Provided he had knock'd it down: But no—the whole three years together, He has not giv'n me flick or feather— For all that I have had to do I wish I had been ...
— The Poetical Works of Thomas Hood • Thomas Hood
... slid out from the crowd and closed over the disputed apple. In the flick of a whip it was gone, and no man could say where. The crowd ...
— The Deaves Affair • Hulbert Footner
... it might have been forever, Nicolovius reached out toward the table to flick the ash from his cigarette. In so doing, as luck had it, he struck the book and knocked it from his knees. Something shook from its pages as it dropped, and fell almost at Queed's feet. Mechanically he stooped to ...
— Queed • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... see," he cried, in his high, broken treble, "there's some on you that ain't fit to flick a fly from a joint o' meat. You'd make werry good ladies' maids, the most of you, but you took the wrong turnin' ven you came ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle
... him to be very busy. After all, if you haven't the brains or the inclination to work, it is something to have the nibs. These nibs, however, were put to better uses. There is a game you can play with them; you flick your nib against the other boy's nib, and if a lucky shot puts the head of yours under his, then a sharp tap capsizes him, and you have a hundred and one in your collection. There is a good deal of strategy in the game (whose finer points I have now forgotten), ...
— Not that it Matters • A. A. Milne
... stood on the middle line between the two courts with his hands folded in front of him. She certainly felt a little nervous, but she knew her skill, and she sent a scorcher of an undercut skimming across the net. The ball stopped dead. Phadrig gave a flick with his right forefinger, and it hopped back over the net and ran swiftly along the ground to Brenda's feet. She flushed as she picked it up and changed courts. Then she raised her racquet and sent a really vicious slasher into the opposite court. Phadrig, ...
— The Mummy and Miss Nitocris - A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension • George Griffith
... strike her. No driver, ever if an angry one, would have done that. But I had the whip in my hand, around which the reins were knotted for the struggle, and when the horse broke into a gallop the jerk gave her a flick. I was not in the habit of whipping her. She felt herself insulted. It was now her turn to be angry; and an angry runaway means a bad business. Donna put down her head, struck out viciously from behind, and kicked ...
— The Gates Between • Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
... whatever sense or ability it is which makes a mathematical prodigy what he is, Cloud knew that in exactly eight and three-tenths seconds from that observed instant the activity of the vortex would be slightly—but not too far—under the coefficient of his heaviest bomb. Another flick of his mental trigger and he knew the exact velocity he would require. His hand swept over the studs, his right foot tramped down, hard, upon the firing lever; and, even as the quivering flitter ...
— The Vortex Blaster • Edward Elmer Smith
... case, but we were none the wiser for that; for the old doctor was of the sort who intrench themselves in a professional reserve. You might draw up beside the road to question him, but you could as well deter the course of nature. He would give the roan a flick, and his ...
— Tiverton Tales • Alice Brown
... with duties; and she jumped cheerfully out of her warm bed and took them up one by one, without question or murmur. They were life. Life had no other meaning any more than it has for the omnibus hack, which cannot conceive existence outside shafts, and devoid of the intermittent flick of a whip point. The comparison is somewhat unjust; for Mary Ann did not fare nearly so well as the omnibus hack, having to make her meals off such scraps as even the lodgers sent back. Mrs. Leadbatter was extremely ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill
... night. I said not a word beyond what I believe to be strictly accurate; and, please Sir, I didn't sneer at anybody. There was only a little touch of the whip at starting, and it was so tied round with ribbons that it took them some time to find out where the flick had hit. ...
— The Life and Letters of Thomas Henry Huxley Volume 2 • Leonard Huxley
... for Harry that Evan did not deny it. The calm disdain which he read on Evan's face acted on his fury, and digging his heels into his horse's flanks he rushed full at him and dealt him a sharp flick with his ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... steadied himself with his back against the bunk when he saw Mart and Joe lift their hands and hold them there, palms outward, a bit higher than their heads. Something in the sight enraged Casey unreasoningly. A flick of the memory may have carried him back to the old days in the mining camps when Casey drove stage ...
— The Trail of the White Mule • B. M. Bower
... de do' wuz stan'in' open; a lighterd-knot wuz flick'rin' on de h'a'th, en de ole cunjuh man wuz settin' dere noddin' in de corner. Dan le'p' in de do' en jump' fer dis man's th'oat, en got de same grip on 'im w'at de cunjuh man had tol' 'im 'bout half a' hour befo'. It wuz ha'd wuk dis time, fer de ole man's neck wuz monst'us tough ...
— The Conjure Woman • Charles W. Chesnutt
... were, quite a little troop, arching their backs and purring, sticking their tails straight up, and every now and then giving their ends a flick. ...
— Brownsmith's Boy - A Romance in a Garden • George Manville Fenn
... me one, and I've had it," replied Burroughs, his eyes sparkling viciously at this flick of the whip. "What is the truth about ...
— The Grain Of Dust - A Novel • David Graham Phillips
... making a confession. I have never really been able to understand what technical symbolism in art is. A symbol in the plain sense is something which recalls or suggests to you something else; and thus the whole of art is pure symbolism. The flick of colour gives you a distant woodland, the phrase gives you a scene or an emotion. Five printed words upon a page make one suffer or rejoice imaginatively; and my idea of the most perfect art is not the art which gives one a sense of laborious finish, ...
— At Large • Arthur Christopher Benson
... of cannon had been packed here with their appendancies, and I was threading my way through them to the far side of the square, where stands Exeter House, and was within a flick of a pebble of it, when the Colonel ran out, bareheaded and eager, and ...
— The Yeoman Adventurer • George W. Gough
... arm this way and that, displaying it. He snapped his fingers: flick went each separate muscle, the ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman
... the back o' the cab, and afore I knew wot had 'appened the 'orse had got a flick over the head with the whip and was going along at a gallop. I kept putting the little flap up and telling the cabby to stop, but he didn't take the slightest notice. Arter I'd done it three times he kept it down so as ...
— Night Watches • W.W. Jacobs
... day it was, never a thought for Nelson, who preserved their honest pint-pots, to be paid for in honest pence, and saved them from litres and decimal coinage. Nearer at hand, frightened rabbits popped up and vanished with a flick of white tails; scared birds fluttered among the branches, or sped across the glade to quieter sleeping-quarters; but never a bird nor a beast gave a thought to the hero to whom they owed it that each year their little homes of horsehair, wool, or moss, were safe stablished 'neath the ...
— Dream Days • Kenneth Grahame
... She hesitated, tingling with the old desire to hurt him, flick him in the raw, make him wince in his exasperating complacency. Then, "I've said it anyhow. I'm trying to show an interest in you—as you asked me ...
— The Danger Mark • Robert W. Chambers
... from the wind, 'Mid glories of the hollowed night, To storm-swept vales and mounts we haste, And, in monastic halls we see, Above a greenish gyrus rind, The flick'ring flames of a light, Beneath whose subtle, shadowed waste Squat men and women that would flee The ghastly words from Vellum told, Who pluck their eyes and pull their hair,— Beneath their feet there writhes a worm! As bludgeons smite a leering soul. And when a wench that Satan sold To ...
— Betelguese - A Trip Through Hell • Jean Louis de Esque
... himself among distinguished men; gave a hand to Blondet and Nathan and Finot, and to all the coterie with whom he had been fraternizing for a week. He was a personage, he thought, and he flattered himself that he surpassed his comrades. That little flick of the wine did him admirable service; he was witty, he showed that he could ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... of wind, wandering through the damp and sooty obscurity over the waste of roofs and chimney-pots, touched his face with a clammy flick. He saw an illimitable darkness, in which stood a black jumble of walls, and, between them, the many rows of gaslights stretched far away in long lines, like strung-up beads of fire. A sinister loom as of a hidden conflagration ...
— Tales of Unrest • Joseph Conrad
... almost sleeping again I watched the light, to see if indeed it was going to cross my face, and then a sudden shadow flitted across it, and with a hiss and flick of feathers a long arrow fled through the window and stuck in the plaster of the wall not an inch above my chest, furrowing the fur of the white bearskin over me, ...
— A Prince of Cornwall - A Story of Glastonbury and the West in the Days of Ina of Wessex • Charles W. Whistler
... he, "surely you must know—" He paused to flick a speck of soot from his knee, and then continued: "Did she ...
— The Broad Highway • Jeffery Farnol
... over the red road. Wind must be lying down with its tail under it— doesn't even flick off the flies. And you can hear the silence buzzing in the gum trees, the way the angels buzzed when they flew through the cedars of Lebanon with thin gauze wings you could see through. Nice to hear the silence buzzing— till it comes too close and booms in your ears ...
— Sun-Up and Other Poems • Lola Ridge
... flickered and ceased to be. It had gone into overdrive. Another. And another. Suddenly they began to flick out of sight ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... as Shirley knew. It was closed because its master, a social acquaintance of the club man's, was at this time touring the Orient in his steam yacht. No man should have entered that doorway. So, as the horse started under the flick of the long whip, Shirley peered unobserved through the glass window at ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball
... see the race, I'm so groggy from the jolt Elsy hands me. Friendless breaks in front and stays there all the way. Lou Smith just sets still 'n' lets the hoss rate hisself. That ole hound comes down the stretch a-rompin', his ears flick-flackin' 'n' a smile on his face. He wins by five len'ths 'n' busts the track record fur the distance ...
— Blister Jones • John Taintor Foote
... the animals in the cages, there was always a crowd of women about his den; but I thought that it was because he was such an inveterate beggar, and had a habit of standing at the bars with his mouth wide open, waiting for some one to flick a ...
— Side Show Studies • Francis Metcalfe
... of the valley of the Serchio, toward Corellia. The peasants sing choruses as they trudge upward, taking short cuts among the trees at the angles of the zigzag. The evening lights come and go among the chestnut-trees and on the soft, short grass. Here a fierce flick of sunshine shoots across the road; there deep gloom darkens an angle into which the coach plunges, the peasants, grouped on the top of a bank overhead, standing out darkly in ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot
... When your hand moves, it'll be as fast as the jump of a spark! And when that hand moves, the gun is going to come out clean in it. It's got to come out with it! You hear? It's got to! Your fingertips catch under the butt; they flick up. They don't draw the gun; they throw it out of the holster; they pitch the muzzle up, and the butt comes smack back against the palm of your hand. And in the same part of a second you pull the ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand
... had intended to give a flick to his jealousy at the end of her letter she had failed. If she met fifty living bronzes and added them to her collection it was nothing to him. He compared his feeling when Braybrooke had suggested Seymour Portman ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens
... and, in addition, that he has a fever. Thus you should contrive to put your steel through him, and a duel it will have been. But if by luck or skill he should have you in danger, I shall be at hand to flick in my sword at the right moment and make an opening through which you may ...
— St. Martin's Summer • Rafael Sabatini
... is generated by the nature of the finishing process. At other times, or rather in other machines, the water is distributed on the two sides of the cloth by means of two rapidly rotating brushes which flick the water from two rollers rotating in a tank of water at a fixed level. In both cases, both sides of the fabric are "damped," as it is termed, simultaneously. The damped fabric is then allowed to lie for several hours to condition, ...
— The Jute Industry: From Seed to Finished Cloth • T. Woodhouse and P. Kilgour
... and sat begging for a nut. Betty searched in the grass in the hope of finding one, but came upon nothing but shells. The squirrel bounded away, with a disdainful flick ...
— The Prince and Betty - (American edition) • P. G. Wodehouse
... rock-rampart is fissured by only a few narrow clefts. On the left hand, facing oceanward, the coast is a labyrinth of mountain fiords, straits, and bays, where you may see great craggy shoulders and domed summits waver in their crystal calm at the flick of a gull's dipping wing, or add to the terror of the tempest as they start out black and unmoved behind rifts of swirling mists. On the right there is the same fretwork of land and water, but wrought in less high relief—a tract ...
— Stories by English Authors: Ireland • Various
... compassion in her face as Frikkie jumped from the stoop with a twelve-foot thong in his hand. It was, after all, the baboon that suffered most, if his yells were any index to his feelings. Frikkie could smudge a fly ten feet off with just a flick of his whip, and all the tender parts of the accomplished animal came in ...
— Vrouw Grobelaar and Her Leading Cases - Seventeen Short Stories • Perceval Gibbon
... even unto the vilest of the vile, the pig, into the company of which she was relegated for all eternity. She was then ordered to ground in a manner reminiscent of the tones used to bazaar dogs, which order was emphasised with a flick of the courbaash upon a part which had known the meeting ...
— Desert Love • Joan Conquest
... Rabbit exclaimed. He called to Sandy. But Sandy did not stop. He made no answer, either, beyond a flick of his tail. You see, his mouth was so full that he ...
— The Tale of Sandy Chipmunk • Arthur Scott Bailey
... watch the herd, Es the plungin' leaders squirm'd an' shrank— Es I heerd the flick of the unseen lash Hiss on the side of a steamin' flank. Guess the feller was smart at the work! We work'd them leaders round, ontil They overtook the tail of the herd, An' the hull of the ...
— Old Spookses' Pass • Isabella Valancy Crawford
... through so strong that I could almost read the filed-off serial number of the thing, but the guy himself I couldn't dig at all. I stopped to look back but the only sign of life I could see was the fast flick of taxicab lights as they crossed an intersection about a half mile back. I stepped into a doorway so that I could think and stay out of the line of ...
— Stop Look and Dig • George O. Smith
... her dying bed, and her wi' naught but a bit o' cold to her chest, what's gone to her head now, and a glass or two o' hot cider, and ginger, and allspice, and rosemary will be puttin' right sooner nor you can flick a fly ...
— Antony Gray,—Gardener • Leslie Moore
... faster and faster. Occasionally Nora touched the mare the faintest little flick with the end of her long whip. The creature responded to her touch as though ...
— Light O' The Morning • L. T. Meade
... tuberculosis is in current magazines and reports of anti-tuberculosis crusaders. For a scientific, comprehensive treatment, libraries and students should have The Prevention of Tuberculosis (1908) by Arthur Newsholme, M.D. A popular book is The Crusade against Tuberculosis, by Lawrence F. Flick, of the Henry Phipps Institute for the Study, Treatment, and ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen
... getting a little warmer and his feet were thawing. Instead of the cold he felt ants creeping under the soles of his feet. They crept in among his toes, swarmed over his injured leg, then over the other, and reached his knees. In a mysterious way one had suddenly settled on his nose; he wanted to flick it off, but a whole swarm was sitting on his arms. He decided not to drive them away, for in the first place they were keeping him awake, and then he rather liked them. He smiled, as one reached his waist, and did not ask how they came ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... mantel-piece, reflected from the glass above it, right on to the white statuette of the Venus of Milo that supported a photograph of a dancing Poppy—Poppy, who laughed in the face of the goddess with insatiable impudence, and flung to the immortal forehead the flick of her shameless foot. White and austere gleamed the Venus (if Venus she be, for some say she is a Wingless Victory, and Rickman, when sober, inclined to that opinion). White and austere gleamed the little camp-bed in the corner. He ignored ...
— The Divine Fire • May Sinclair
... man's soul. He saw the trolleys hurrying west, in the hot, hazy morning, full of women in light summer dresses, and white-faced straw-hatted men fresh from Boston desks; the stack of bicycles outside the post office; the come-and-go of busy officials, greeting one another; the slow flick and swash of bunting in the heavy air; and the important man with a hose ...
— "Captains Courageous" • Rudyard Kipling
... the cabin and go over those tally books." Which was merely a subterfuge to get Bill away from the wagon without letting the boys know something was wrong. Bill got up, brushed the dirt off his trousers with a flick of his fingers, lighted the cigarette he had just ...
— Skyrider • B. M. Bower
... Steel could hear the distant dying swish of silk, the rustling of the portiere, and then, with a flick, the lights came up again. Half-blinded by the sudden illumination Steel fumbled his way to the door and into the street. As he did so Hove Town Hall clock chimed two. With a cigarette between his teeth David made ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White
... stoning of Stephen. She yawns; then she looks towards the tall glass; then she looks out at the weather, mooning her great black eyes, and fixing them on the sky as if they stuck there, while my tongue goes flick-flack along, a hundred and fifty words a minute; then she looks at the clock; then she asks ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy
... horse home for me. The next day he turned out to be broken-winded and lame. I tried having him put in harness; the horse backed, and if one gave him a flick with the whip he jibbed, kicked, and positively lay down. I set off at once to Mr. ...
— A Sportsman's Sketches - Works of Ivan Turgenev, Vol. I • Ivan Turgenev
... of Monte Carlo, where The pallid croupiers call, And in the gorgeous, guilty air The gamblers watch the ball; And as I flick away the foam With which my beer is crowned, The wheels beneath the gilded dome Go ...
— Ballads of a Bohemian • Robert W. Service
... monk around this scene of gloom The flick'ring lustre of his taper throws, He says, 'Such, stranger, is my destined tomb; Here, and with these, shall ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... shadow of the punkah wavered across the room, and the 'flick' of the punkah-towel and the soft whine of the rope through the wall-hole followed it. Then the punkah flagged, almost ceased. The sweat poured from Spurstow's brow. Should he go out and harangue the coolie? It started forward again with a savage jerk, and a pin came out of the towels. When this ...
— Life's Handicap • Rudyard Kipling
... lady!' The phrase was like the flick of a lash. Rogers had known it applied to such ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood
... something and he frowned again. Dammit, why didn't the communicator flick? He should be getting some kind of inquiries. Hell, he was practically giving the ...
— This Crowded Earth • Robert Bloch
... see—all that's wanted is a small movable steel brush above the shears, to flick away the grass and keep them clear. Hang it all, a child could see it. By Jove, little woman, it'll soon be ...
— The Great Hunger • Johan Bojer
... oath that he never would marry anybody else, and the young lady drew in her head, and pulled up the window. He jumped upon the box, squared his elbows, adjusted the ribands, seized the whip which lay on the roof, gave one flick to the off leader, and away went the four long-tailed, flowing-maned black horses, at fifteen good English miles an hour, with the old mail-coach behind them. Whew! How they ...
— The Pickwick Papers • Charles Dickens
... where they pay their premiums, and await possible engineers. I consult with the grave, elderly man in the office, and he asks for firemen in the bare, cold waiting-room. One man comes up, a pale, nervous chap, clean-shaven and quiet. I take his "Continuous Discharge" book, flick it open at the last entry—trawling! The last foreign-going voyage is dated 1902, "S. Africa," "Voyage not completed." I hand it back. "Won't do," I remark shortly, and look round for others. The man looks at the grave, elderly person, who takes the book. "Give him a ...
— An Ocean Tramp • William McFee
... his army, led by traitors. Oh, I say no names, Monsieur Charles, You needn't hammer so loud. If there are any spies lurking behind the bellows, I beg they come out. Dirty fellows!" The old Sergeant seizes a red-hot poker And advances, brandishing it, into the shadows. The rows of horses flick Placid tails. Victorine gives a savage kick As the nails Go in. Tap! Tap! Jules draws a horseshoe from the fire And beats it from red to peacock-blue and black, Purpling darker at each whack. Ding! Dang! Dong! Ding-a-ding-dong! It is a long ...
— Men, Women and Ghosts • Amy Lowell
... of laughter as he disappeared from view, howling and shrieking and swearing away to the end; the tortoise plodding on regardless of his struggles, which, indeed, accelerated its pace onwards to its retreat in the hills. "You can carry on, old flick, ...
— The Island Treasure • John Conroy Hutcheson
... Buck," said a voice, "let 'em out!" and with a flick of the dainty ears, almost as if he understood, the little beast fell into the steady swinging lope which was his natural gait, and which he could follow if need be without a ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... it easy to do." Her next words, uttered while she continued to flick color into her sketch, caused him to jump with astonishment. "I'd ...
— The Wild Olive • Basil King
... the ladies. Some baby, eh, boys?"—this following the flick of a skirt and a backward-tossed glance perhaps, as some ...
— Twelve Men • Theodore Dreiser
... TIPPY goes and lets KEN and LAURA in. They are happy and gay and terribly in love. She can hardly keep her hands from caressing him. She finds threads to flick off his sleeve ...
— Class of '29 • Orrie Lashin and Milo Hastings
... had given the last flick to the restive courses of the Press on both sides of the Rhine. In his Reminiscences he has described his depression of spirits on hearing the news of the withdrawal of Prince Leopold's candidature and of his nearly formed resolve to resign ...
— The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 (5th ed.) • John Holland Rose
... significant nods and signs, but never expressing distinctly, or in plain language, the subject on which it turned. At length one of them, observing Meg was still fast asleep, or appeared to be so, desired one of the lads 'to hand in the black Peter, that they might flick it open.' The boy stepped to the door and brought in a portmanteau, which Brown instantly recognised for his own. His thoughts immediately turned to the unfortunate lad he had left with the carriage. Had the ruffians murdered him? was the horrible doubt that crossed his ...
— Guy Mannering, or The Astrologer, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... evidently desperately wounded. It was strange indeed that he could still sit there and flick his whip with so terrible an injury. In the back of his great red coat, just under the left shoulder-blade, was a gash in the cloth, where some weapon had passed, and all round was a wide patch of dark scarlet which told its own tale. Nor was this all. As he raised his whip, the moonlight ...
— The Refugees • Arthur Conan Doyle
... and scrambled into the seat beside the driver, settling his bag between his knees; and, with a flick of the peeled hickory whip, the carriage rolled into the branch road and disappeared, scattering a whirl of mud drops as it splashed through the shallow puddles which lingered in the dryest season beneath the ...
— The Voice of the People • Ellen Glasgow
... the little gun, ran up to the lock and into it, bringing the gun up. She had a glimpse of Dr. Egavine and Quist standing near a rusty bench in the compartment, of Graylock half into a salvage suit, Dasinger on the floor ... then a flick of ...
— The Star Hyacinths • James H. Schmitz
... flick of scornful fingers. "Enough of words, Master Innocent. Bring me where I may eat and bed ...
— Martin Conisby's Vengeance • Jeffery Farnol
... Flick, flick, flick! I guess it must be going to begin now, but it's queer the people don't stop talking: how can they expect to hear the pictures if they go on talking? Now it's off. PASSED BY THE BOARD OF—. Ah, this looks interesting—passed by the board of—wait till ...
— Further Foolishness • Stephen Leacock
... that can be imagined, with elbows always flexed, and fingers always stretched apart. In due course his legs followed, of like purpose and absurdity. For swimming he only used his tail, but for balancing and steering, his feet and hands. Would he rise to the surface, he must flick his tail, and turn his toes and fingers upwards. Would he seek the bottom, he must depress them. Would he lie motionless, suspended in mid-water, he must point them straight ...
— "Wee Tim'rous Beasties" - Studies of Animal life and Character • Douglas English
... was through the door indignantly, and as indignantly out, before the district-attorney could so much as flick the ...
— Phantom Wires - A Novel • Arthur Stringer
... The pressure had fallen away in a flick, almost as if some current had been snapped off. Through the red curtain of his torment Ross sensed a surprise and disbelief. He was unaware that in this queer duel he was using both a power of will and a depth of perception he had never ...
— The Time Traders • Andre Norton
... The lights flick up. There is a great burst of applause. The curtain rises and falls. Lady Cicely and Mr. Harding and Sir John all come out and bow charmingly. There is no trace of worry on their faces, and they hold one another's hands. Then ...
— Behind the Beyond - and Other Contributions to Human Knowledge • Stephen Leacock
... those frequent, small cat-like gestures of hers, picking off an invisible thread from her sleeve, rolling it up to an invisible ball between her white finger and thumb, and casting it delicately away; or settling a ring, or brushing off invisible dust with a flick of a polished finger-nail; all these manoeuvers executed with such leisure and easy deliberation that they didn't make her seem restless, and you knew she calculated that effect. A man who had had years with ...
— The Brimming Cup • Dorothy Canfield Fisher
... to be a man; and he was equally clear that he was not successful in his paramount business. Meanwhile he pretended to be, hoping that on some miraculous day a sudden test would prove the straw man he was to have become real flesh and blood. A visit to a surgeon and the flick of a knife quite shattered that illusion. He went down to Yarmouth afterwards, fairly disheartened. The test had been applied, and he ...
— Ensign Knightley and Other Stories • A. E. W. Mason
... a pound. Sally's heart seemed to stop beating for an instant. She looked again at the postal-order, and with a sharp movement put it inside her blouse. Then she put the letter in the fire, and watched it flame and blacken and flick to pieces in the draught. Slowly, thinking with all her might, she took off her out-of-doors jacket and hung it up. A pound! She was rich! With a pound you could do a lot. You could ... you could buy material for a frock. You could buy underclothes, stockings, shoes. Not all of them, but what you ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... started toward the hallway. For the first time his eye was attracted by a thick layer of dust and lint on his coat sleeve. Worse still, there was a smudge on his cuff. If there was one thing more than another that Alfred detested it was untidiness. Putting his hat down with a bang, he tried to flick the dust from his sleeve with his pocket handkerchief; finding this impossible, he removed his coat and began to ...
— Baby Mine • Margaret Mayo
... reminiscent detachment the wearer of the Peacock feather describes himself as "one whom Fate in one of her freakish moods had wedded to the roads, the highways and hedges, the fields and woods. Once Cupid had touched him with his wing—the merest flick of a feather. The man—poor fool!—fancied himself wounded. Later when he looked for the scar, he found there was ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller |
