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Telltale   /tˈɛltˌeɪl/   Listen
Telltale

noun
1.
Someone who gossips indiscreetly.  Synonyms: blabbermouth, talebearer, taleteller, tattler, tattletale.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Telltale" Quotes from Famous Books



... had never had a success like "Splendour." Indeed, there were those who said that all the plays that followed had been failures, carried to semi-success on the strength of that play's glorious past. She eschewed low-cut gowns now. She knew that it is the telltale throat which first shows the marks of age. She knew, too, why Bernhardt, in "Camille," always died in a high-necked nightgown. She took to wearing high, ruffled things about her ...
— Cheerful—By Request • Edna Ferber

... the dismay she had not been able to conceal, and to hide this embarrassment she lifted to her face—not the handkerchief or the bouquet with which beauty is wont to cover the telltale signal in the cheek, but a wee dog, as white as a handkerchief and no less sweet than a bouquet. She rubbed her nose fondlingly in the soft silk of his breast, while, tickled, he tried, with baby growls and an exposure of sharp pin teeth, to get ...
— Aurora the Magnificent • Gertrude Hall

... better-looking one than your cousin. But excuse me for changing the subject of the conversation, for I am losing time. I see by the telltale over our heads that the Bronx is headed to the south-west, which is doubtless the course you were ordered to take ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic

... harvest from her summer's sowing. She sat and thought till her cheeks burned and her temples throbbed; but she dared not ease her pain with tears. The gong sounded like a Judgment-Day trump of doom, and she trembled at the idea of confronting many eyes with such a telltale face; but she could not stay behind, for Aunt Pen must know the cause. She tried to play her hard part well; but wherever she looked, some fresh anxiety appeared, as if every fault and folly of those months had blossomed suddenly within the hour. She saw Frank Evan more sombre ...
— A Modern Cinderella - or The Little Old Show and Other Stories • Louisa May Alcott

... self-sacrifice involved. In that little book was immortal love—old laughter—old tears—old beauty which had bloomed like a rose years ago, holding still its sweetness like old rose leaves. She removed the telltale fly-leaf; and late on the night before Sylvia's birthday, the Old Lady crept, under cover of the darkness, through byways and across fields, as if bent on some nefarious expedition, to the little Spencervale store where the post-office was kept. She slipped the thin parcel through ...
— Chronicles of Avonlea • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... for Katy to answer with her lips a question to which her telltale cheeks had made instant reply. Evidently she would greatly mind; and the tears, too, sprang into her large brown eyes as ...
— Can Such Things Be? • Ambrose Bierce

... the first course was served, Commander Bainbridge ordered the ward-room doors closed after the attendants had passed outside. Then he stated that Captain Gales wished it understood that the finding of the telltale envelope under Ensign Darrin's mattress was the only circumstance against that officer, and that, in the captain's opinion, it was wholly likely that some one else had placed the envelope there with the intention of arousing suspicion against ...
— Dave Darrin at Vera Cruz • H. Irving Hancock

... temper and speech hotter than the enchilladas of Margarita? I could love him for his rages! When the Blessed Mary sends me a lover—" She looked over her shoulder and sighed romantically, hiding the laughter in her eyes and the telltale twist of her lips as best she could, with ...
— The Gringos • B. M. Bower

... not remember the way Marusya treated me at first. But I do remember the look she gave me when I first entered her father's house. There are trifling matters that one remembers forever. Hers was a telltale look, wild and merry. It is hard to describe it in words—as if she wanted to say, "Welcome, friend! You did well in coming here. I need just you to pass my leisure hours with me!" And she really needed someone like myself, for she never associated ...
— In Those Days - The Story of an Old Man • Jehudah Steinberg

... automobiles racing through the streets loaded with armed men. There were crowds looking for a telltale face in their own midst. Guards, deputies, coppers were surrounding houses and peering into alleys, raiding saloons, ringing doorbells. The whole city was on his heels. The city was like a pack of dogs sniffing wildly for his trail. And when they found it they would come whooping toward him for ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht

... sit on the parapet nor to receive the support of his arm. Her chatter had dwindled to sighs and exclamations. He felt the need of a competing sound as the chug of the spearhead in the ditch should announce the discomfiture of the West Germans. But before committing the telltale runes to this ditch, Hauptmann scanned it carefully over Linda's curly head, and considered thoughtfully its worthiness to receive so important a deposit. The survey could not have been more reassuring. Like so many of the main irrigating ditches that carry the water of Father Po and ...
— The Collectors • Frank Jewett Mather

... had dropped several garments upon the floor, and the telltale fur that had fallen partly within the corridor had proved the means of guiding me to the very spot he would least have wished me to have ...
— Warlord of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... you to go!" The moment she had said it, she caught herself with a nervous little laugh, and added a postscript of whimsical nonsense to disarm her utterance of its telltale feeling. "Why, I'm just getting you civilized, yourself. It took years to get your ...
— The Call of the Cumberlands • Charles Neville Buck

... not starved my curiosity altogether," said Clara, smiling, "but have given it a little hope to feed on for the present, I think, woman though I am, I can promise all you wish. Seriously, Basil," she continued, "that telltale locket of yours has so pleasantly brightened some very gloomy thoughts of mine about you, that I can now live happily on expectation, without once mentioning your secret again, till you give ...
— Basil • Wilkie Collins

... of respect came into the little girl's wisely regarding blue eyes. She, with the swiftness of her sex, recognized in forlorn little Johnny the making of a man. "Oh, well," said she, loftily, "I never was a telltale, and, anyway, we are not grown up, and there will be my trousseau to get, and a lot of other things to do first. I shall go to Europe before I am married, too, and I might meet a boy much nicer than you ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

... of a mile down the track, and she made for it as being the nearest possible point where water might be procured. The station-master gave her a tin can and filled it for her; and ten minutes later she set about scrubbing the tinker free of all the telltale make-up of melodrama. It was accomplished—after a fashion, and with persistent rebelling on the tinker's part and scolding on Patsy's. And, finally, to prove his own supreme indifference to physical disablement, he tore the can from her administering hands, threw it over the bridge, and started ...
— Seven Miles to Arden • Ruth Sawyer

... the home habits of the male biped she gleaned from the telltale hints of the inanimate garments that passed through her nimble hands. She could even tell character and personality from deductions gathered at heel and toe. She knew, for example, that F.C. (in black ink) ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... to replace it in the safe he had had built for it in one of his cabinets, that it did not strike his eye with its usual force and brilliancy, and, on examining it closely, he discovered the absence of the telltale flaw. Struck with dismay, he submitted it to a still more rigid inspection, when he found that what he held was not even a diamond, but a worthless bit of glass, which had been substituted by some cunning ...
— The Woman in the Alcove • Anna Katharine Green

... objections, and having rolled himself in his blankets was almost immediately asleep and breathing heavily. The moment Dan heard his companion draw breath with a telltale regularity, he sat up again in his blankets. Bart was instantly at his side. He patted the shaggy head lightly, and ...
— The Untamed • Max Brand

... surface. The shaft of the arrow had now been detached from the loose head cunningly contrived by the native arrow-makers, and a long cord, which attached the arrow-head to the shaft, and which was wound around the latter, now unreeled and left the shaft floating, telltale evidence of the otter's whereabouts, ...
— The Young Alaskans • Emerson Hough

... night, you never ought to have heard about it, and you never would have done if Uncle Bruce had not been such an old telltale. Just wait till I get him alone; that's all. Anyhow, he didn't think it a heinous crime did he ? I expect he gave a great laugh that ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page

... turned to his wife. "Stay here at the port, Bobby. Wrap one leg around that lever, to anchor you. What does your telltale read? That gauge there—your radiation meter. It reads twenty, same as mine. Just pink, so we've got a minute or so. I'll roust out some passengers and toss 'em to you—you toss 'em along in ...
— Subspace Survivors • E. E. Smith

... was leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, murmuring lover's confidences behind the shield of his tilted hat, which hid from all but Evadna his smiling lips and his telltale, glowing eyes. He looked up at that last sentence, though it is doubtful if he had heard much of ...
— Good Indian • B. M. Bower

... her eye, she picked up the paper and entered the bedroom where Duncan lay. There were telltale traces of tears on his unshaven face, and an ache in his discouraged heart that would not be assuaged, for it was becoming rumoured about the village that Dunk the Dauntless might never operate on the vitals of an ailing ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1920 • Various

... It was no use to reason with this girl. She had been trapped like a wild thing and could not see any way out. He shot out a strong hand and clutched her shoulder and with one heave he drew her to him, so her face was under his. It went pale. The telltale eyes dilated in sudden fear. She beat at him ...
— Valley of Wild Horses • Zane Grey

... If not to seize? Why, pouting lips should always ready be To catch a kiss. If cheeks will blush, why, it is plain to see 'Tis not amiss. And when a maiden sweet, and roguish eyes, And mistletoe, And madd'ning lips, while telltale blushes rise, A-teasing so— Think you that I all idle waiting sat To see her go? Did I believe when she insisted that ...
— Cap and Gown - A Treasury of College Verse • Selected by Frederic Knowles

... to get my umbrella, that is, to see how your father finds himself today," said Mr. Brooke, getting a trifle confused as his eyes went from one telltale face to the other. ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott

... In silence we went up the elevator; in equal silence, he leading, we passed along the corridor over carpets that gave out no telltale sound. ...
— A Breath of Prairie and other stories • Will Lillibridge

... answer sufficient. His hand, held against his stinging cheek, was telltale enough for the proprietress ...
— The Goose Girl • Harold MacGrath

... latitude Bridget requested. The Pacific rolled up under the atomjet's polished nose, which sparkled with myriads of brighter star reflections. Then he recalled he couldn't play over the ocean and veered slowly northward, up the coast to the telltale ...
— A Fine Fix • R. C. Noll

... laugh, Miss Smarty," Bess had retorted, straightening up defiantly with a large wad of the cotton still in her hand and a telltale tuft of it protruding from the keyhole. "I'm not going to have any skinny old man with a funny mouth looking in at me while I sleep, I can tell you! Nan Sherwood," she added threateningly, as Nan went off into a gale of uncontrollable mirth, "if ...
— Nan Sherwood at Palm Beach - Or Strange Adventures Among The Orange Groves • Annie Roe Carr

... carried a sincere message, and Cortlandt saw by the faces about him that the others were pleased. His own gaunt features turned more sallow than ever. The memory of what he had heard on the porch of his own house a few afternoons ago, of what he had seen at other times, of his wife's telltale behavior on this very evening, swept over him, fanning anew the sullen emotions he had cherished all these months. How far would this fellow dare to go, he wondered? What motive inspired him thus to pose before his friends, and openly goad ...
— The Ne'er-Do-Well • Rex Beach

... was in the Bounty with Captain BLIGH at the Time of the FATAL MUTINY, which happened April 28th, 1789, in the South Seas, and who, instead of returning with the Boat when she left the Ship, stayed behind. Tell me, thou busy flatt'ring Telltale, why— Why flow these tears—why heaves this deep-felt sigh,— Why is all joy from my sad bosom flown, Why lost that cheerfulness I thought my own; Why seek I now in solitude for ease. Which once was centred in a wish to please, When ev'ry hour in joy and gladness past, And each new ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow

... smut, on the edge of one of the chambers, is the telltale, sirs. A bullet passing out always leaves smut behind. The man who fired this, remembering the fact, cleaned the barrel, but forgot the cylinder." And stepping aside he ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green

... cook held sway over the kitchen. There was also a meat pie that seemed delicious, both as to crust and contents, when opened; though Obed in-formed them that it was made of canned beef, and even displayed the recent tin jacket, with its telltale label, as confirmation to ...
— At Whispering Pine Lodge • Lawrence J. Leslie

... Uncle Teddy, vainly trying to stifle a telltale yawn. Uncle Teddy was secretly wishing that Katherine had overslept with the rest of them and did not have such a tremendous idea of good sportsmanship. But, being a thorough sport, he shook himself out of his drowsiness and shouted the ...
— The Campfire Girls on Ellen's Isle - The Trail of the Seven Cedars • Hildegard G. Frey

... — N. disclosure; retection^; unveiling &c v.; deterration^, revealment, revelation; exposition, exposure; expose; whole truth; telltale &c (news) 532. acknowledgment, avowal; confession, confessional; shrift. bursting of a bubble; denouement. [person who discloses a secret] tattletale, snitch, fink, stool pigeon, canary. V. disclose, discover, ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... piece of elaborate cabinet-work; and one does not altogether see why it should be given to the gales, and the salt-sea atmosphere, to be tossed upon the waves, and occupied by a rude shipmaster in his dreadnaught clothes, when the fairest lady in the land has no such boudoir. A telltale compass hung beneath the skylight, and a clock was fastened near it, and ticked loudly. A stewardess, with the aspect of a woman at home, went in and out of the cabin, about her domestic calls. Through the cabin door (it being a house on deck) ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... a whit. Is't dishonor to her purity To urge thy smoky flame to brightness worthy Of her? 'Tis what she wishes most; witness Her confusion and her telltale blushes. Do me justice, man; my thoughts are pure And dwell on lawful marriage only. Thou, thou Alone, couldst see impurity in that. I spoke of thee, man, of thee; and who Beside thyself would think ...
— The Scarlet Stigma - A Drama in Four Acts • James Edgar Smith

... this season Nature makes the most of every throb of life that can withstand her severity. How heartily she indorses this fox! In what bold relief stand out the lives of all walkers of the snow! The snow is a great telltale, and blabs as effectually as it obliterates. I go into the woods, and know all that has happened. I cross the fields, and if only a mouse has visited his neighbor, the fact ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 101, March, 1866 • Various

... come," cried Nell, in agitation, fairly running to the door to open it, but stopping aghast as her eye caught over her shoulder the sad, telltale condition of ...
— Mistress Nell - A Merry Tale of a Merry Time • George C. Hazelton, Jr.

... all the persons on board, should have been the object of so unusual an assault. He was in the disagreeable plight of having subjected her to danger, and as they entered the brilliant saloon he freed himself of the ulster with its telltale gash and sought to minimize her impression of ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson

... pace lessened and at last fell to a walk. Conscious of her telltale eyes and troubled face, she dared not turn to her companion to ask him why, ...
— A Sappho of Green Springs • Bret Harte

... me a telltale. Now I'll go and tell papa. You got into a fine scrape for calling me names ...
— Junior Classics, V6 • Various

... see the dial of the compass, fixed to a strut on the pilot's left. By that telltale their course lay nearly due northeast. Already the weltering roofs of Paris were in sight, to the right, the Eiffel Tower spearing up like a fairy pillar of gold lace-work, the Seine looping the ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance

... ban; which seemed at one time to have been formed almost at pleasure, the only condition being that the combination should be a happy one—I mean all those singularly expressive words formed by a combination of verb and substantive, the former governing the latter; as 'telltale', 'scapegrace', 'turncoat', 'turntail', 'skinflint', 'spendthrift', 'spitfire', 'lickspittle', 'daredevil' (wagehals), 'makebate' (stoerenfried), 'marplot', 'killjoy'. These with a certain number of others, have held their ground, and may ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench

... simply are incompetent to amuse themselves without external assistance, Peter ignored the dozen pair of curious and interested eyes which were focussed on his white uniform as he passed, with those telltale chevrons of golden sparks at the sleeves, strode into the wireless cabin, hastily closed the door, locked it, and thereupon gave his attention ...
— Peter the Brazen - A Mystery Story of Modern China • George F. Worts

... for time to regain her composure. Jimmy looked so big and strong and DEAR there in the door of the summerhouse that she feared her eyes had been surprised into a telltale admiration, ...
— Pollyanna Grows Up • Eleanor H. Porter

... of emotion in the presence of her former sweetheart—only in her domineering eyes one might have seen an intenser sparkle, a glint of golden fire,—telltale evidence of yearnings unconfessed. And a happy year went rapidly by. But the money which penny by penny had been painfully assembled in the wretched store where Rosario had been born, streamed away between the fingers of the spendthrift husband; and the cow was running dry, as the mistress of ...
— Mayflower (Flor de mayo) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... felt insulted by Katharine's term of "servant," but could not repress a smile, and turned into the pantry to hide that telltale weakness. ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond

... not answer at once. He was hurrying along, his eyes on the telltale marks. He had proceeded some distance from the place where the log was when he uttered a cry. At the same moment he hurried from the road toward a thick clump of bushes that were in the ditch alongside of the highway. Reaching them, he parted ...
— Tom Swift and his Motor-boat - or, The Rivals of Lake Carlopa • Victor Appleton

... to pace the deck of the radar bridge, and with each turn, he glanced at the radar scanner where Roger was waiting anxiously for the telltale blip of ...
— On the Trail of the Space Pirates • Carey Rockwell

... adventure, a man four years in prison in Siberia, and six more in that bleak country under official inspection; truly, a martyr to his country, an epileptic and a genius. You may be disappointed to learn from these telltale documents—translated by Ethel Colburn Mayne—that the Russian writer while in exile avoided his fellow convicts, was very unpopular with them, and that throughout his correspondence there are numerous contemptuous references to ...
— Ivory Apes and Peacocks • James Huneker

... had been burning for an hour and had spread so alarmingly before the gusty breeze that it threatened several claim-shacks before they noticed the telltale, brownish tint to the sunlight and smelled other smoke than the smoke of the word-battle then waging fiercely among them. They dropped stakes, flags and ditch-level and ran to where their horses waited sleepily the pleasure of ...
— The Flying U's Last Stand • B. M. Bower

... temporary name it may have acquired. Ill-temper cannot hide itself under the simper of assumed amiability. The querulousness of incompetent complaining natures confesses itself almost as much as in the tones of the voice. The anxiety which strives to smooth its forehead cannot get rid of the telltale furrow. The weakness which belongs to the infirm of purpose and vacuous of thought is hardly to be disguised, even though the moustache is allowed to hide ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... whole repulsive, rotten business came back to me. And, changed man that I had become in the last six months, I saw myself as I had been. I felt that she was looking at me, was reading the degrading confession in my telltale features. ...
— The Deluge • David Graham Phillips

... the beam of light, searching for some telltale discoloration in wiring, or a gleaming icy patch which would indicate a fuel leak. "Might be the firing ...
— Tight Squeeze • Dean Charles Ing

... pride in the thought!—but Mr. Allison had a secret, or why did he so often break off abruptly in some telltale speech and drop his eyes, which were otherwise always upon me. Something not easy to understand lay between us—something which he alternately defied and succumbed to, something which kept him from being quite the good man I had pictured myself as marrying. Why I was so certain of this latter ...
— The Hermit Of ——— Street - 1898 • Anna Katharine Green (Mrs. Charles Rohlfs)

... me of it,' murmured AEnone; and, struggle as she would, the telltale blood began to flow up into her face. 'Is there any woman who does not care to listen to a love story?' she added, as though in excuse ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 2, August, 1864 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... his book. Stooping down and reading slowly, Noting every trace around, Of the travel gone before him, Every mark upon the ground, Down the winding, deep-cut roadway Furrowed out by grinding tire, Where the ruts lead to the water, In the half-dried plastic mire, He beholds the telltale marking Of an odd-shaped band of steel, Welded to secure the ...
— Nancy MacIntyre • Lester Shepard Parker

... struggle with sordid everyday cares. He had worn himself out over all the exigencies of a petty bourgeois existence, like a poor man ashamed of his poverty, making pathetic efforts to conceal a tear in his clothes and always seeing the telltale hole staring out from under the covering. For thirty-nine years he had never swerved from disciplining himself to abstemiousness, and there was much gold on his uniform, but very little in his pocket. As a matter ...
— Men in War • Andreas Latzko

... mother became | |worried when he failed to recover from drowsiness | |which had overtaken him and she called Dr. J. N. | |Pait. The physician made an examination of the boy, | |but found nothing to account for his condition. | | | |Then he rubbed his hand over his head. The telltale | |blood revealed the fact that the boy had been | |injured. With the little brother holding on to his | |coat the boy walked bravely to an automobile and was| |taken to the Kenosha hospital, where the X-ray | |machine revealed his secret. ...
— News Writing - The Gathering , Handling and Writing of News Stories • M. Lyle Spencer

... still hidden under the pad of the bed in his tent. His fish-pole in its usual place disposed of the theory that he had fallen in the river, and although trained eyes followed every trail there was not a single telltale track. He had vanished as though he ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart

... understand how it had happened. Over and over during the past six hours he had retraced his steps mentally, trying to visualize the trail, trying to locate the telltale marks he had made with his jungle knife, and so find Major Connel, Tom, and Roger. It was dark now and the big cadet had to face the dangerous jungle alone. He laughed ironically. Connel had given him the point because he knew the jungle! And now he ...
— The Revolt on Venus • Carey Rockwell

... in a certain square, Or court, or lane,—in short, no matter where; Time,—early morning, dear to simple souls Who love its sunshine and its fresh-baked rolls; Persons,—take pity on this telltale blush, That, like the AEthiop, whispers, "Hush, ...
— The Poetical Works of Oliver Wendell Holmes, Complete • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... Several times he caught Aholibah's eye upon him, and he vaguely wondered if he had omitted anything—or, had he betrayed his feelings? In Paris the waiter who shows that he has ears, or eyes, or a heart, except in the exercise of his functions, is lost. He is bound to be caught and his telltale humanity scourged by instant dismissal. So when those fathomless eyes glittered in his direction, his knees trembled, and a ball of copper invaded his throat. He could barely drag himself to her side and ask if he could help her. A burst of ...
— Visionaries • James Huneker

... seats the three girls darted to and fro. The telltale spelling and copy-books were flung into the drawer of the chiffonier, and the key was turned on them. Polly, her immodest sampler safely hidden at the bottom of her workbox, was the most composed of the three; and while locks ...
— Australia Felix • Henry Handel Richardson

... long spurs into his wild horse's flanks, and dashed along the road with the lasso lying like a coiled snake at the saddle-bow. In skilful hands, the silent, bloodless noose, flying like an arrow, but not like that leaving a wound behind it,—sudden as a pistol-shot, but without the telltale explosion,—is one of the most fearful and mysterious weapons that arm the hand of man. The old Romans knew how formidable, even in contest with a gladiator equipped with sword, helmet, and shield, was the almost naked retiarius, with his net in one hand and his ...
— Elsie Venner • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

... stronger and stronger within me. The fresh morning air and the sunlight seemed powerless to dissipate for a moment the haunting terror of last night. It was a real face which I had seen pressed against the window, and where had Ray been when he returned with sand-clogged boots and the telltale seaweed upon his trousers? And later on, had I dreamed it, or had there really been a cry? It came back to me with horrible distinctness. It was a real cry, the cry of a man in terror for his life. I stopped short in the road and wiped my damp forehead. ...
— The Betrayal • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... CONCEAL COMBATANTS.—The French have discarded the historic red trousers, and the elimination of lace, white gloves, and other telltale insignias of the officers, have been dispensed with by ...
— Aeroplanes • J. S. Zerbe***

... Squire came in whistling, a picture of homely contentment, hands in pocket, smiling jovially. She knew there must be no telltale tears on her cheeks, even if her heart was crying out in the cold and snow. She knew the bitterness of being denied the comfort of tears. It was but one of the hideous train of horrors that pursued a woman ...
— 'Way Down East - A Romance of New England Life • Joseph R. Grismer

... where all were gathered to the barn where the horses were put up. There he took an oat-bag out of a neighbor's sleigh and poured out a good feed for his own horse. In the morning it was found that his horse had not relished the shoe-pegs that had been put in his manger; and their telltale presence plainly pointed out the thief. These shoe-pegs were a venture of two farmer boys which their father was taking to town to sell for them, and in indignation the boys thrust on the thief the name of Shoe-pegs Meigs, which he carried to ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... my intense relief I saw Mac sitting there apparently talking unconcernedly with Braga, the manager, and the Hebrew. As I had not attracted attention I closed the door, went out in the street and gave George the pre-arranged signal that all was well. Just then our partner appeared but with telltale face. It was flushed with chagrin and vexation, and there was gone from the contour of his body that indescribable port that tells, better than words, of ...
— Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison - Fifteen Years in Solitude • Austin Biron Bidwell

... fidgetings, which ended with a sigh of relief and a guilty look, and producing from a hiding-place a cigarette, he smoked it out of the window, so that his room might not carry forward the faintest trace of its telltale odor. ...
— The Penalty • Gouverneur Morris

... an old gentleman come to live next door," Prudence continued, taking up her sewing again, "who watches us through a telescope sometimes, and when he sees us in the green- almond trees he writes to Papa. He says it is for our good, old telltale. Once, though, he took us into his library and showed us some beautiful fossils. He said they were as old as Moses, and one of them might be a million years old. It was a fan-shell, quite whole and pretty. ...
— The Happy Adventurers • Lydia Miller Middleton

... it was sound, not sight that gave me the first clue. There came a purring from the lake; and when I had searched for a minute for the source of it I saw the glow we had watched from the dhow in the storm the first night out—the telltale crimson stain on the dark that rides above a steamer's funnel, and at intervals a stream of sparks to prove they were burning wood and driving ...
— The Ivory Trail • Talbot Mundy

... since—" But the Baroness did not allow herself to go back so far. "If there is any fruit I DETEST, it is DATES," she often said laughingly. "Some people delight in a good memory—I delight in a good forgettory of the past, with its telltale milestones of birthdays and anniversaries ...
— An Ambitious Man • Ella Wheeler Wilcox

... you feeling now, Bumpus?" asked Thad, some time later, as he once more stopped to allow all the stragglers pull up; for some of the boys were beginning to look rather fagged, though they tried to hide the telltale signs, being too proud to own up to any weakness that ill ...
— The Boy Scouts' First Camp Fire - or, Scouting with the Silver Fox Patrol • Herbert Carter

... until he found a second similar spot. This he marked, and dodging and circling, like a hound on a scent, the Snipe ran his trail from his first tiny spot to the trees near the creek where the horses had been left. Doubling, he patiently tracked the telltale spots up the path that led to the cabin. Then ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... but save appearances." A dignified hypocrisy none disobey. These men and women, with the historic names, dare not show each other what they are. There was no flirting, no romping, no loud laughter; not a loud word—no telltale glances, no sitting in corners. It was a pose throughout. Men bowed ceremoniously, and addressed as strangers ladies with whom they spent every evening. Husbands devoted themselves to wives whom they never saw but in public. Innocence may betray itself, seems to betray itself—guilt ...
— The Italians • Frances Elliot

... the Lani didn't charge. He moved slowly, half crouched, long arms held slightly forward. Kennon backed away, watching the humanoid's eyes for that telltale flicker of the pupils that gives warning of attack. The expression on George's face never changed. It was satisfied—smug almost—reflecting the feelings of a brute conditioned to kill and given an opportunity to do so. The Lani ...
— The Lani People • J. F. Bone

... for all the listlessness of the tone in which it had been uttered. So I went skipping down-stairs and closed my baby grand and inspected the table and twisted the glass bowl that held my nasturtium-buds about, to the end that the telltale word of "Salt" embossed on its side would not betray the fact that it had been commandeered from the kitchen-cabinet. Then I turned up the lamp and smilingly waited until my lord and master seated himself at the other side of the table, grateful beyond words ...
— The Prairie Mother • Arthur Stringer

... cowardice upon his conscience. He had tried to compromise with his conscience, as it appeared, by enclosing a sum of money in an envelope and addressing it to the father of the child he had run down. But his death had prevented the mailing of this. The telltale finger of accusation was pointed at him from the newspaper ...
— Tom Slade's Double Dare • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... Except for a telltale bit of courtplaster, Inza showed no sign of the dangerous and exciting experiences through which she ...
— Frank Merriwell's Reward • Burt L. Standish

... seemed like hours. Gradually, however, the leader of the silent ships drew nearer. There was no mistaking the telltale reports in the wireless room. Basing his calculations on the chief electrician's reports, McClure figured the leader of the oncoming squadron to be now not more than half a mile away and moving steadily forward toward the desired range—-a dead line on the ...
— The Brighton Boys with the Submarine Fleet • James R. Driscoll

... shaken herself for the telltale, inevitable rush of blood that overspread her face. If Rose saw, she made no sign; she ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf

... moment's pause she answered, while a sudden smile dimpled around her mouth and the big glove went up to hide her telltale cheeks: "Uncle, if I must have lovers, I do wish they'd be more interesting. How can I like or respect men who go on as some of them do and then imagine women can feel honored by the offer of their hands? Hearts are out of fashion, so they don't ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott

... of my life was that on which I learned that I could not have inherited tuberculosis from two uncles who died of consumption. For years I had known that I was a marked victim. Silently I carried my tragedy, suspecting each cold and headache to be the telltale messenger that should let others into my secret. He was a veritable emancipator who informed me that heredity did not work from uncle to nephew; that not more than a predisposition to consumption could pass even from parent to child; that a predisposition to consumption would ...
— Civics and Health • William H. Allen

... and about Baxter, sir. I am not a telltale, but certain things have happened which I think Captain Putnam should know for his own sake and for the ...
— The Rover Boys at School • Arthur M. Winfield

... look of astonishment annoyed the Master, even while it hurt him. He took scant pleasure in rebuffing this old friend; but certainly "Captain Alden" would not bear discussing. Feeling himself in a kind of impasse regarding Alden, and fearing some telltale expression in his eyes, the Master swung up his binoculars and once more swept the cloud-horizons from northeast ...
— The Flying Legion • George Allan England

... This word of Scandinavian origin seems to unite the senses of 'grinning,' 'flattering' (see Love's Labour's Lost, V, ii, 109, and Ben Jonson's "fawn and fleer" in Volpone, III, i, 20), and 'sneering,' and so is just the right epithet for a telltale, who flatters you into saying that of another which you ought not to say, and then mocks you by going to that other and telling what you have said.—/Hold, my hand:/ stay! here is my hand. As men clasp hands in sealing a bargain. In Rowe's text ...
— The New Hudson Shakespeare: Julius Caesar • William Shakespeare

... Legion. The soul of the Legion was speaking in its tragic-sweet voice, and the Place Carnot was full of soldiers sauntering singly or in pairs, mostly silent, as if to hear their own heart-secrets cried aloud by telltale 'cellos and ...
— A Soldier of the Legion • C. N. Williamson

... and told her that in order to thoroughly enjoy it, she must strip. In a minute she dropped off everything, while I took off my trousers—coat and waistcoat having been already laid aside. I had brought a towel to lay on the couch below her bottom, to prevent any telltale stains. Laying her down on her back, with her bottom close to the end, her legs gathered up, and her two feet resting on the sofa, with her knees falling outwards (in the very best position for my intended operation), I put a pillow on the floor, on which I knelt, ...
— The Romance of Lust - A classic Victorian erotic novel • Anonymous

... suspected is the skulker who approaches from covert to covert. They knew he had ridden into Alder before in the middle of the night and they might suspect the danger of such another attack, but they surely would not have fear of a solitary pedestrian unless a telltale light ...
— The Seventh Man • Max Brand

... there was to carry back to the anxious Katy, who on the afternoon of Morris' return from New York was over at Linwood waiting to pour his tea and make his toast, she pretended, though the real reason was shining all over her telltale face, which grew so bright and eager when ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes

... all surprised," she said calmly, almost too calmly, and with premeditated irrelevance, "if Kitty and Bea were both of them awaiting me now." His boldness was incapable of ruffling her composure; but, nevertheless, he saw with a secret joy the telltale and uncontrollable carnation again fly to ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow

... to go nearer. An old Mexican, ignorant, rough, and callous as he was, begged me, with tears streaming down his face, to retrace my steps. Alas, when would impulsive youth ever listen to wise counsel and take heed! I entered the ruins and saw a dark telltale pool oozing forth from under the door of a cellar. Oh, had I but then overcome my morbid curiosity and fled! But no! I must needs open the door and look in. I saw—I saw a beautiful whiskey barrel, its belly bursted ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann

... do on delicacies. Their beds are not so handsome or so well appointed as ours, but their sleep is sounder and their rest less broken. They have no ladies pranked out and painted like those whom we idolise, but they take their pleasure oftener than we, without fear of telltale tongues, save those of the beasts and birds that see them. What we have they lack, and what we lack ...
— The Tales Of The Heptameron, Vol. III. (of V.) • Margaret, Queen Of Navarre

... thoroughly and always her guide that it was not likely she thought of the white-feathers being the telltale. But now she realized that a man, one she knew of old as a treacherous character, one whose scent had always meant mischief to her, that had been associated with all her own troubles and the cause of nearly all her desperate danger, was ...
— Johnny Bear - And Other Stories From Lives of the Hunted • E. T. Seton

... with the news that Yvonne was somewhat better, adding that she had come to take leave of me. Her composure surprised me gladly, for albeit in her eyes there was also a telltale light, the lids, demurely downcast as was her wont, amply screened it ...
— The Suitors of Yvonne • Raphael Sabatini

... question, or shall I not?" he went on, gripping her hand hard, and half raising himself in his chair as he looked intently at her telltale face. "For it means more than you can realise. It is an audacious, impudent question, Lucy,—one that no man of my age ought to ask any woman,—one that is likely to offend ...
— The Treasure of Heaven - A Romance of Riches • Marie Corelli

... for several moments, until a puff of wind carried the telltale scent to the moose, who is most ...
— Black Bruin - The Biography of a Bear • Clarence Hawkes

... a telltale pallor, was leaning forward with an elbow on the table and shielding her face with widespread fingers propped against cheek and forehead. In the noise and flurry of the train it was easy to tune the voice to such a ...
— A Son of the Immortals • Louis Tracy

... walked over here and robbed the store," suggested Silas Tripp, with withering sarcasm, as he held up the telltale evidence ...
— Chester Rand - or The New Path to Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr

... every bone and muscle in him aching from his long night of tedious exertion, the chuckle grew into a laugh as he looked upon the telltale signs in ...
— The Country Beyond - A Romance of the Wilderness • James Oliver Curwood

... The colonel stood at her elbow. She had a pretty back, he thought, and a still youthful turn of the head, and still plentiful, glossy brown hair. Her hands were white, slender and well kept, though he saw on the side of the forefinger of her left hand the telltale marks ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt

... telltale flush, and slowly shaking his head, remarked, "I don't know, Leslie, about the advisability of leaving you here; you were always inclined to be very philanthropic, and it would be like you to adopt some young man out here, thinking you had ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour

... Cuban hounds that howl from Don Jose's kennels cannot snuff the trail of the stolen canoe that glides through the sombre blue vapors of the African's fastnesses. His arrows send no telltale reverberations to the distant clearing. Many a wretch in his native wilderness has Bras-Coupe himself, in palmier days, driven to just such an existence, to escape the chains and horrors of the barracoons; therefore not a whit broods he over ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable

... point, the wide, old boards of the floor gave a telltale snap. It was behind him, and so loud that it shattered his vision of Big Tom and the pudding bowl. Some one was in the room! Father Pat? Mrs. ...
— The Rich Little Poor Boy • Eleanor Gates

... so, would they recognize him? Would they see the ringed cockades on his wings, or would eager anti-aircraft gunners start blazing away? Even if they recognized the plane, his whole plan would be knocked into a cocked hat should that telltale streamer of light point him out to the enemy planes above who must now be looking sharp. Darkness was both his ally and ...
— Aces Up • Covington Clarke

... great sadness and pity, he thought of poor Coira O'Hara and of the pathetic wreck her life had fallen into. The girl was so patently fit for better things! Her splendid beauty was not a cheap beauty. She was no coarse-blown, gorgeous flower, imperfect at telltale points. It was good blood that had modelled her dark perfection, good blood that had shaped her long and ...
— Jason • Justus Miles Forman

... Lagrange did not fail to note that James Rutlidge had seen the telltale gloves. Fixing his peculiar eyes upon the visitor, he asked abruptly, with polite but purposeful interest, after the health of Mr. and Mrs. ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright

... The telltale newspaper item, reproduced above, outlines the story behind this volume. What is not made clear is the fact that the entire expedition was painstakingly planned many months ago, the publishers themselves making it financially ...
— The Cruise of the Kawa • Walter E. Traprock

... everything that had been said, and before he concluded his story his heart gave a wild throb at the telltale face and eyes ...
— Wildfire • Zane Grey

... thus believing am most fortunate. It was not Hermes led thee here, but Eros, And swifter than his arrows were thine eyes In wounding me. There was no moment's space Between my seeing thee and loving thee. O, what a telltale face thou hast! Again I see the wonder ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow • Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

... an admission from him or to entrap him into the use of some technical phrase, some slip of the tongue which would verify their suspicions. They even examined his hands with minutest care, as if to find some telltale callous or chemical discoloration which would convict him. Then finally, to give him the lie absolute, the aggressive colonel seized a nickel- plated atomizer from the table and brandished it triumphantly before the ...
— Rainbow's End • Rex Beach

... she saw some one coming, she felt the necessity of bringing her telltale face to order and getting ready to answer whoever she was to meet. As she drew nearer she became suddenly aware that it was Rosa Rogers coming with her arms full of bundles and more piled up in front of her on her pony. Margaret knew at once that Rosa must have seen ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill

... but so intent were they on this phenomenon they were facing, they paid it no heed. Their eyes were alight, their lips in firm straight lines of resolve, as they dived down upon the invisible obstruction—whatever it was—from whose surface the telltale updraft came. ...
— Lords of the Stratosphere • Arthur J. Burks

... course, he couldn't understand what Farmer Brown's boy was saying. Nor could he see what Farmer Brown's boy was doing. So he held his breath and hoped and hoped that he hadn't been discovered. And perhaps he wouldn't have been but for that telltale nest-egg on the floor. That was the cause of all his troubles. First it had angered Jimmy Skunk because as you remember, it had fallen on Jimmy's head. Then it had led Farmer Brown's boy to look in all the nests. It had seemed a trifle, kicking that egg out of that nest, but see what the results ...
— The Adventures of Jimmy Skunk • Thornton W. Burgess

... the loose gravel as he began a steady pull. With his aid the other crawled out, lay panting. Rynch grabbed the man's shoulder, jerked him away from the body of the female water-cat. He was sure he had seen a telltale scurrying around the smaller of the ...
— Star Hunter • Andre Alice Norton

... be terrible," said Betty, trying hard to keep the telltale tremulousness from her voice—trying desperately to sound brave and resigned. "But we must remember that thousands of women and girls all over the United States are going through the same thing. And for the boys' ...
— The Outdoor Girls in Army Service - Doing Their Bit for the Soldier Boys • Laura Lee Hope

... things turn out," he said to Ridge as he turned from examining this telltale relic. "Our Government learned some time ago that the Manuel Ros was taking on board at Cadiz a cargo of improved mines, submarine torpedoes, and high explosives for use in Puerto-Rican harbors. It was positively stated ...
— "Forward, March" - A Tale of the Spanish-American War • Kirk Munroe

... souls. We go directly under the branch where one of them is sitting ten feet above and still he makes no sign. We throw a clod, but yet there is no movement of his wings. Not till a stick hits the limb close to where he is sitting does he stretch his long wings with their telltale white spots and fly rapidly away. And the other two sit unmoved. But some night we hear the whirr of the nighthawk's wings as he drops rapidly from a great height, or we see him skimming close to the surface of ...
— Some Spring Days in Iowa • Frederick John Lazell

... she heard the stage breasting the hill, she was up from the bed as swift as a panther and at her dressing-table dabbing with a kerchief at the telltale eyes and cheeks. Before the passengers began streaming into the house for dinner she was her competent self, had already cast a supervising eye over Becky the cook and Manuel the waiter, to see that everything was in readiness, and ...
— Mavericks • William MacLeod Raine

... his knees, leaving his hands free, and from the leather girdle drew the old-time metal case, thin, like a cigarette case, and from the case, with a pair of little tweezers that precluded the possibility of telltale finger prints, lifted out a small, diamond-shaped, gray-coloured paper seal, adhesive on one side, which he moistened now with his tongue—and, stooping quickly, attached it ...
— The Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard

... orchid which she was pinning to the bosom of her gown. Her intent gaze met the mask of Shirley's ingenuous smile, reading in his telltale eyes a message which needed no court interpreter! Quickly she turned to her mirror to put the finishing touches to her coiffure, the golden curls so ...
— The Voice on the Wire • Eustace Hale Ball

... and kindly. "It is a frightful risk, young man, but the trail to the glacier is your only open road. The sheriff is tired. Even if he finds out that you are here he may not come back to-night. He will know you cannot escape. You can't stir without leaving a telltale mark. If you could only get below the snow on the ...
— They of the High Trails • Hamlin Garland

... the waiting was over. The ship filled with vibration as Guns opened up. Twenty-five seconds to target. His eyes flicked from the sightscreen to the sky ahead, looking for the telltale flare of rockets—ready to follow ...
— Slingshot • Irving W. Lande

... were ample accounts of the capture of the horse, the finding of the body, its position, and the nature of the wound,—medical opinion in addition that death had been instantaneous, and probably received before the breaking of the storm. If there had been any telltale track or mark in the soil of the river road, the continued and beating rain had made the way impossible to read. Witnesses from Malplaquet told of Ludwell Cary's setting forth that morning, and Forrest, the blacksmith, vouched ...
— Lewis Rand • Mary Johnston

... walk on." Then, after a pause, she continued, "I found your note, Lizzie, and I am sorry that I have such a telltale face; but I am unhappy, Lizzie; yes, I am miserable, and I cannot conceal it. I would not obtrude my sorrow upon others, but it is my face and not my ...
— Leah Mordecai • Mrs. Belle Kendrick Abbott

... experience—the troop ships sailing in echelon formation, preceded, followed, and flanked by destroyers; at night every glimmer of light eclipsed, the ships speeding ahead in perfect blackness, each inch of the sea swept by watchful eyes to discover the telltale ripple of a periscope or the trail of a torpedo, gun crews on the alert, depth bombs ready. Nor was the crossing anything like a vacation yachting cruise for the doughboys transported, packed as they were like sardines two and three decks below the ...
— Woodrow Wilson and the World War - A Chronicle of Our Own Times. • Charles Seymour

... a small, and, in itself, an unimportant Kingdom with Mediterranean sea-front, called Galavia," said Blanco. Benton's start was slight, and his features if they gave a telltale wince at the word became instantly casual again in expression. But his interest was no longer forced by courtesy. It hung from that moment ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck

... most prolific, I brought my magnifying-glass to bear upon them at a respectful distance. Was ever actual thorn more motionless or non-committal than most of these?—their under surfaces hugging close against the bark, their telltale feet closely withdrawn, and all their pointed helmets inclined in the same parallel direction. One after another of the sly little family was examined without a revelation. Not until I had reached the upper limit of the group ...
— My Studio Neighbors • William Hamilton Gibson

... had gone two hours evidences grew thick and fast that tribes inhabited the island. Muro, and the different men, were continually finding traces, none of them, however, which indicated that the people were near at hand, or that the telltale marks had ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: Adventures on Strange Islands • Roger Thompson Finlay

... them had any lights behind them. Only the one door that he had come through showed the telltale glow from the ...
— Viewpoint • Gordon Randall Garrett

... idly making chords at the grand piano. Seating herself on the ottoman at her mother's feet, the girl took the still handsome hand in her own and amused herself with examining the old-fashioned jewels that covered it, a pretext for occupying her telltale eyes, as ...
— The Abbot's Ghost, Or Maurice Treherne's Temptation • A. M. Barnard

... after the retreating form of his friend; then he picks up the handkerchief; it is of softest linen, and across one corner he reads the embroidered name of Clifford Heath. For a moment he stands with the telltale thing held loosely in his hand, and then he bends down, spreads it once more over the dead face, and turns to ...
— The Diamond Coterie • Lawrence L. Lynch

... found, it was behind the hemlocks when I quartered the sides of the road in the silence and the frost-fog: and it was nothing but a patch of shell ice. But the flimsy, crackling stuff was crushed into two cup-like marks, as plainly telltale as if I had seen a man fall on his knees in them. And by them, frozen there, were ...
— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones

... go and leave us alone with Mercy," gulped Susanne, striving hard to keep the telltale quiver ...
— Tabitha's Vacation • Ruth Alberta Brown

... suit and hat so warmly that a flush of pure pleasure in her clothes rose to Ruth's face. Grace, however, examined the inside of the coat and the lining of the hat with the utmost care. Every telltale mark had been removed. Even the boxes themselves were plain. The giver had evidently wished his or her identity to remain a mystery. The writing on the card was not particularly distinctive. There was only one thing of which Grace ...
— Grace Harlowe's First Year at Overton College • Jessie Graham Flower

... with logic frailer than the flowers, To justify a life of sensuous rest, A question dear as home or heaven was asked, And without language answered. I was blest! Blest with those nameless boons too sweet to trust Unto the telltale confidence of song. Love to his own glad self is sometimes coy, And even thus much doth seem to do him wrong; While in the fears which chasten mortal joy, Is one that shuts the lips, lest speech too free, With the cold touch of hard reality, Should turn its priceless jewels into dust. Since ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod

... appears to have been no instance of the destroyers themselves having been picked up by the periscope. This because they set pretty nearly as low as a submarine, and with their oil-burning propulsion give forth no telltale cloud of smoke. Other nets are hung from hollow glass balls, which the periscope cannot pick up against the sea water. These nets are set in profusion in the English Channel, the North Sea, or wherever submarines lurk, and they are tended just as ...
— Our Navy in the War • Lawrence Perry

... hid them from the valley as they ascended. Its bottom was covered with rock and shale. The wounds Thor had received in the fight, unlike bullet wounds, had stopped bleeding after the first few minutes, and he left no telltale red spots behind. The ravine took them to the first chaotic upheaval of rock halfway up the mountain, and here they were still more lost to ...
— The Grizzly King • James Oliver Curwood

... Well, he had worked fast and with results gratifying. The spats that might have betrayed him were safely hidden in one place—yonder between the seat cushions of O'Gavin's car, which stood where he had left it, not thirty feet distant. His telltale overcoat and his derby hat were safely bestowed in the cafe check room behind him awaiting a claimant who meant never to return. Even if they should be found and identified as having been worn by ...
— From Place to Place • Irvin S. Cobb

... joy of hearing her voice and of looking into her dear face once more had passed, his skilled eyes probed the deeper. He noted with a sinking at the heart the dark circles under the drooping lids, the drawn, pallid skin and telltale furrows that had cut their way deep into her cheeks. Her eyes, too, had lost their lustre, and her step lacked the spring and vigor of her old self. The diagnosis alarmed him. Even the mould of her face, so distinguished, and to him ...
— The Tides of Barnegat • F. Hopkinson Smith

... knocked off work for the day, the two laborers had gone back to the blaze beyond the tool-house and conscientiously had scattered and stamped on its last visible remnants. The Master, too, coming home from his evening walk, had glanced toward the back garden and had seen no telltale spark to hint at ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune

... Edna's exciting journey. But the hour was soon up, and Ellen at the door beckoned them in. Edna wanted to tell about Phil Blaney, but didn't know just what to do about it, especially when Louis called her a telltale for thinking of such a thing. Before she decided the question something happened which put it quite ...
— A Dear Little Girl • Amy E. Blanchard

... scrambled quickly down from his lookout and drove them into the only available hiding-place—the box canyon. Many years in the sheep business had taught him into what small compass a band of sheep can be pressed, and he knew that, once thrown together in the dark canyon, they would stop their telltale blatting and go to sleep. Leaving his herders to hold them there he climbed back up to his peak and beheld the cowboys in the near distance, ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge

... in a hammock together on the rear balcony of the Block-House. It had been a dangerous moment passing through the house. There had been embarrassments, the telltale artifices of the establishment, but she would not suffer the work of the ride to be torn down. She held him in enchantment by sheer force of will; and now they were alone, and she was building again. There was wine. Over the balcony ...
— Fate Knocks at the Door - A Novel • Will Levington Comfort

... my hearing—please!" he begged. "You never can tell when Jeremiah is snooping about, and he's a telltale." ...
— The Cat in Grandfather's House • Carl Henry Grabo

... the blockade; and he had been in action with a steamer from the other side of the ocean; and he knew that this black smoke of the soft coal, exclusively used by English steamers, was a telltale in regard to such vessels. It had been an idea of his own to take in a supply of this kind of fuel, for while its smoke betrayed the character of vessels intending to run the blockade, the absence of it betrayed the loyalty of the national steamers to the blockade runners. It was a poor rule ...
— On The Blockade - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray Afloat • Oliver Optic

... telltale eyes and ventured downstairs to look after supper. The Mexican cook was already peeling the potatoes. She gave him directions about the meal and went out to the garden to get some radishes and lettuce. ...
— The Sheriff's Son • William MacLeod Raine

... Elinor Mayhew was not in her usual place. Grace and Flora had been told by the other girls what had happened on the day of Sylvia's disappearance from school. May Bailey had declared that Sylvia must have "run straight to the teacher," and that she was a telltale as well as a "Yankee." Grace had defended ...
— Yankee Girl at Fort Sumter • Alice Turner Curtis

... Row The Boy Who Was Told The Night Given over to Revelry He Should Have Overslept The Dancing Man The Collision How Albert Sat In The Treasure in the Strong Box The Old-Fashioned Prosecutor The Unruffled Wife and the Gallus Husband Books Made to Balance The Two Unfettered Birds The Telltale Tintype ...
— Knocking the Neighbors • George Ade

... discovered that he was mistaken. My appearance produced a sensation, and the telltale glances of the women from me to a large girl with black eyes who stood at the mantelpiece not only showed plainly that they knew all about "it," but also indicated who of the young women present ...
— The Rise of David Levinsky • Abraham Cahan

... a wide belt that went on somewhat after the fashion of a life preserver, the thongs being used for shoulder straps—a belt that, once on, the vest would hide completely, and, fitting close, left no telltale bulge in the outer garments. It was not an ordinary belt; it was full of stout-sewn, up-right little pockets all the way around, and in the pockets grimly lay an array of fine, blued-steel, highly tempered instruments—a compact, ...
— The Adventures of Jimmie Dale • Frank L. Packard



Words linked to "Telltale" :   gossip, informative, rumormonger, newsmonger, gossipmonger, gossiper, informatory, rumourmonger



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