"Tete-a-tete" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... then became general, and the girl did not look up for several seconds; but the young man on her right, who had not missed a word of the previous tete-a-tete, could not give attention to the story Mrs. Blackwell was telling, for ...
— The Mystery of Mary • Grace Livingston Hill
... show that I was not abashed by her haughty, reproachful air. Other passengers were strolling in. Here was Mr. John Van Blarcom, who, at the sight of Miss Falconer and myself to all appearances cozily established for a tete-a-tete meal, stopped in his tracks and fastened on me the hard, appraising scrutiny that a policeman might turn on a hitherto respectable acquaintance discovered in converse with some notorious crook. For an instant he ...
— The Firefly Of France • Marion Polk Angellotti
... There is, however, of course much individual difference even with reference to this, and some take much more kindly and readily to cleanliness, no doubt to godliness too, than some others. I met Abraham, and thought that, in a quiet tete-a-tete, and with the pathetic consideration of my near departure to assist me, I could get him to confess the truth about the disappearance of the mutton; but he persisted in the legend of its departure through the locked door; and as I was only heaping sins ...
— Journal of a Residence on a Georgian Plantation - 1838-1839 • Frances Anne Kemble
... and, for the sake of your uncle, I asked him to dine with me, and take a bed at my new house. Ah! I little thought what a dear bargain it was to be. He accepted my invitation, for I fancy—no offence, Sir,—there were few invitations that Mr. Geoffrey Lester ever refused to accept. We dined tete-a-tete,—I am an old bachelor, Sir,—and very entertaining he was, though his sentiments seemed to me broader than ever. He was capital, however, about the tricks he had played his creditors,—such manoeuvres,—such escapes! After dinner he asked me if I ever corresponded with ...
— Eugene Aram, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... with a great show of cordiality. I was handed over to the manservant, a melancholy, swarthy individual, who led the way, my bag in his hand, to my bedroom. The whole place was depressing. Our dinner was tete-a-tete, and though my host did his best to be entertaining, his thoughts seemed to continually wander, and he talked so vaguely and wildly that I could hardly understand him. He continually drummed his fingers on the table, gnawed his nails, and gave other signs of ...
— The Adventure of Wisteria Lodge • Arthur Conan Doyle
... Jim's shoes. Missy racked her brains. What do you say to boys who don't know the same people and affairs you do? Back there at the party things had gone easily, but they were playing cards or dancing or eating; there had been no need for tete-a-tete conversation. How do you talk to ...
— Missy • Dana Gatlin
... upon me hourly; his heart is uncommonly pure, his affections delicate, and his benevolence enlivened, but not sicklied, by sensibility. He is assuredly a man of great genius; but it must be in a "tete-a-tete" with one whom he loves and esteems that his colloquial powers open:—and this arises not from reserve or want of simplicity, but from having been placed in situations, where for years together ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... possessed it in the past and had just made such a sacrifice to please her. She consented to accept his declaration and permitted him to believe that she was not unmoved by his passion. The arrival of the Duchess, her mother-in-law, put an end to this tete-a-tete, and prevented the Duc from ...
— The Princess of Montpensier • Madame de La Fayette
... wore on, and still Theodora's fears kept her from allowing a tete-a-tete when he dismounted and joined ...
— Beyond The Rocks - A Love Story • Elinor Glyn
... begged her once more to be seated and to atone for all that was unkind in the past by letting me talk to her. There could have been no better place, outside of her cozy cabin, for this long-dreamed-of tete-a-tete, which now at last was to have a realization, than this she had herself chosen. The pile of pelts at her back kept off the east wind, the young moon in the west shone full upon her face, so that I could feast my eyes upon its glorious beauty (for the last time, I said to myself) ...
— The Rose of Old St. Louis • Mary Dillon
... advanced to such a point that a clattering noise within the tabernacle, as of machinery put in motion, intimated to the travellers that Freya, who perhaps had some qualities in common with the classical Vesta, thought a personal interruption of this tete-a-tete ought to be deferred no longer. The curtains flew open, and the massive and awkward idol, who, we may suppose, resembled in form the giant created by Frankenstein, leapt lumbering from the carriage, and, rushing on the intrusive traveller, dealt him, with its wooden hands and ...
— Letters On Demonology And Witchcraft • Sir Walter Scott
... imitate fashions, and get rid of provincial manners and prejudices. His friends never knew where he learned anything. When a Frenchman of title was basking in New York drawing-rooms it was found that Millard was equal to a tete-a-tete with the monolingual foreigner, though his accent was better than his vocabulary was copious. His various accomplishments of course represented many hours of toil, but it was toil of which his associates never heard. He treated himself ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston
... nor third, Captain.—The truth is, I want a tete-a-tete with Mr. Mowbray of St. Ronan's," replied the Earl; "and, besides, I have to beg the very particular favour of you to go again to that fellow Martigny. It is time that he should produce his papers, if he has any—of which, for one, I do not believe a word. He has ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... embarrassed one who had been used to mariners' laconic directness of speech. She looked at him, teasing him with her eyes. He was a bit relieved when the pale-faced secretary came dragging himself up the ladder and broke in on the tete-a-tete. ...
— Blow The Man Down - A Romance Of The Coast - 1916 • Holman Day
... the quick beat of her eyelids and in the subtle quiver of her lips. "And behold! the same notion had occurred to Azzolati. Imagine that for this tete-a-tete dinner the creature had got himself up as if for a reception at court. He displayed a brochette of all sorts of decorations on the lapel of his frac and had a broad ribbon of some order across his shirt front. An orange ribbon. Bavarian, I should ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad
... necessary for you to show your dislike to Dona Rosita quite so plainly," she said, coldly, slightly accenting the Puritan stiffness, which any conjugal tete-a-tete lately ...
— The Argonauts of North Liberty • Bret Harte
... promoted into the Ringdove, and Griffin became first of the Proserpine. This, of course, made Yelverton second, and left one vacancy. Thus far the orders had been made out, when Cuffe dined with the admiral, by invitation, tete-a-tete. ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... western wing and found the Tressilvains tete-a-tete over a card-table, deeply interested in something that resembled legerdemain; and he stood at the door and watched them with a smile ...
— The Firing Line • Robert W. Chambers
... span. V. pair [unite in pairs], couple, bracket, yoke; conduplicate^; mate, span [U.S.]. Adj. two, twin; dual, dualistic, double; binary, binomial; twin, biparous^; dyadic [Math.]; conduplicate^; duplex &c 90; biduous^, binate^, diphyletic^, dispermic^, unijugate^; tete-a-tete. coupled &c v.; conjugate. both, both the one and ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... uneven surface, or flew about us with such confiding curiosity, that by reaching out my hand I could touch their wings as they poised themselves in the air alongside. There was one old sober-sides with whom I passed a good ten minutes tete-a-tete, trying who could stare the other ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... hour before he returned. When he did, it was to find Hazen and the lawyer awaiting him in ill-concealed impatience. These two were much too incongruous in tastes and interests to be very happy in a forced and prolonged tete-a-tete. ...
— The Chief Legatee • Anna Katharine Green
... 'wild one'?" Lilda asked her husband one night, as they sat opposite each other in the great, high-ceilinged dining-room. They were, for a marvel, alone, and unlike the ordinary quiet jog-trot couple who welcome any casual stranger to break the monotony of five years of table tete-a-tete, they delighted in this happy chance that recalled their honeymoon meals together. They were so much sought after, and Lestrange's position required so much and such varied entertaining, that they could ...
— The Strange Cases of Dr. Stanchon • Josephine Daskam Bacon
... I saw his face. If that were so, then Kitty had blundered in her strategy and hurt Charley's cause; for after the two came Gazza, as obviously "sent" as any emissary ever looked: Kitty took care of the singing, while Gazza intercepted any tete-a-tete. I rose and made a fourth with them, and even as I was drawing near, the devilment in Hortense's face sank ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... that the face of the chevalier does not appear? is he too much occupied with his chicken to have heard the carriage? Let us see. As to you, monseigneur," continued Dubois, "be assured; I will not disturb your tete-a-tete. Enjoy at your pleasure this commencement of ingenuity, which promises such happy results. Ah! monseigneur, it is certain ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... wouldn't be ordinary—to me. And so far as I am concerned," she insisted, with a shade of restlessness in her manner, "that finishes the subject. You must please devote yourself to telling me at least some of the things I want to know. What is the use of having one of the world's successful men tete-a-tete, a prisoner to my hospitality, unless I can make him gratify ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... afternoon and Mary sat on the veranda steps with him, while Helen made hay with Wally on a tete-a-tete above. ...
— Mary Minds Her Business • George Weston
... enjoying his cup of unexpected tea at Mrs. Derrick's, Squire Deacon and Miss Cilly had a sociable tete-a-tete over theirs; for Joe Deacon, who was in the full enjoyment of some fourteen years of boyhood, scarcely made a third in the conversation until his appetite ...
— Say and Seal, Volume I • Susan Warner
... at her house in Newport ever since. Came down yesterday to try to earn some money," he continued, cheerfully making himself agreeable. "Deuced clever woman, much too clever for me and Jerry too. Always in a tete-a-tete with an antiquarian or a pathologist, or a psychologist, and tells novelists what to put into their next books and jurists how to decide cases. Full of modern and liberal ideas—believes in free love and all that sort of thing, and gives Jerry ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... mere man of the world, with no feeling of any kind: tolerable in company, but tiresome beyond description in a tete-a-tete. I did not choose that he should bestow ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... some embarrassment on the limbs of four visitors who had just been ushered into its glories. After hesitating before one or two gorgeous fawn-colored brocaded easy-chairs of appalling and spotless virginity, one of them seated himself despairingly on a tete-a-tete sofa in marked and painful isolation, while another sat uncomfortably upright on a sofa. The two others remained standing, vaguely gazing at the ceiling, and exchanging ostentatiously admiring but hollow remarks about the furniture in unnecessary whispers. Yet they ...
— A Ward of the Golden Gate • Bret Harte
... I believed was really uneasy if his company would not drink hard. JOHNSON. 'That is from having had people about him whom he has been accustomed to command.' BOSWELL. 'Supposing I should be tete-a-tete with him at table.' JOHNSON. 'Sir, there is no more reason for your drinking with HIM, than his being sober with YOU.' BOSWELL. 'Why, that is true; for it would do him less hurt to be sober, than ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... The tete-a-tete thus established, Miranda at once began to excuse herself for the means she had taken to attract Odo's attention at the theatre. She had heard from the innkeeper that the Duke of Pianura's cousin, the Cavaliere Valsecca, was expected that day ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton
... obtaining histories at one house to be detailed at another, and thus earning the character of being universally intimate. The sentiments of the young bride of Martindale had been, throughout her visit, matter of curiosity; and even this tete-a-tete left them guess work. Theodora's were not so difficult of discovery; for, though Jane had never been the same favourite with her as her more impetuous sister, she had, by her agreeable talk and show ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge
... at the evening's dinner, when Lady Anne would be occupied about Sir Brian, and would be sure to be putting the children to bed, and, in a word, would give him a quarter of an hour of delightful tete-a-tete with the ...
— The Newcomes • William Makepeace Thackeray
... longer the young ladies and their favored attendants strolled about the room in quiet tete-a-tete, and then the gentlemen bowed ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... and a change of costume by Cora occasioned a long postponement. Justice demands the admission that her reappearance in a glamour of lilac was reward for the delay; nothing more ravishing was ever seen, she was warrantably informed by the quicker of the two guests, in a moment's whispered tete-a-tete across the banisters as she descended. Another wait followed while she prettily arranged upon the table some dozens of asters from a small garden-bed, tilled, planted, and tended by Laura. Meanwhile, Mrs. Madison constantly turned the other cheek to the cook. ...
— The Flirt • Booth Tarkington
... liked Aleck, with his inoffensive Americanisms and unfailing kindliness; and with her friends she was frankness itself. With two men on Miss Reynier's hands for entertainment, it seemed to Aleck unlikely that either one could make any alarming progress. Besides, he was glad of a tete-a-tete with ...
— The Stolen Singer • Martha Idell Fletcher Bellinger
... to walk on the veranda for a bit of exercise. There was a large swing-seat, upholstered in red, which he declared was just the place for a tete-a-tete. ...
— Patty's Suitors • Carolyn Wells
... faithful hound Breaks rudely on our tete-a-tete; Too well I understand that sound! A mendicant is ...
— Poems • John L. Stoddard
... occur when a young lady indulges in tete-a-tete forest rambles with an old friend, instead of waiting at home for her mother's letters and telegrams," remarked Captain Winstanley, caressing his neat whisker with ...
— Vixen, Volume II. • M. E. Braddon
... they all wanted to stay and be amused by him. But Tess got rid of them at last by begging Samson to go first ostentatiously and set them an example, which he did after extracting a promise from her to see him tete-a-tete again at ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy
... as plainly furnished as the one they had quitted, but in its shelves, cupboards, and closely fitting boarding bearing out the general nautical suggestion of the house—and seated themselves before a small table on which their frugal meal was spread. In this tete-a-tete position Jim suddenly laid down his knife and fork and ...
— The Heritage of Dedlow Marsh and Other Tales • Bret Harte
... now in the new Forty-second Street offices that commanded a view of two rivers and a vast battledoor and shuttlecock of the city, it was the first time in all those years that stretched from the night at the Waldorf that they had sat thus tete-a-tete. The day of the move she had ridden up from the old Union Square offices with him, a stack of files in her lap. Once, too, on a Saturday, the day of Zoe's invariable luncheon downtown and subsequent opera matinee, he had strolled by what seemed mischievous chance into the tea room where ...
— Star-Dust • Fannie Hurst
... house last evening. Apparently it was to have been a tete-a-tete dinner, but my arrival changed it to a partie carree." She talked on about Wilsey and the conversation of the evening, but it made little difference what she said, for her full idea had reached Adelaide ...
— The Happiest Time of Their Lives • Alice Duer Miller
... after the guests had gone ashore that Monty discovered Mr. and Mrs. Dan holding a tete-a-tete in the ...
— Brewster's Millions • George Barr McCutcheon
... having a tete-a-tete with her, but as it fell out he did. They were all in the rectory garden together, Gerald and the rector a little behind Miss Gaylord and himself, as they strolled down a long walk with high hedges bordering it. On the other side of the hedge Lady ...
— O Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1919 • Various
... conversation and secretly watching the girl keenly, studying her play of expression, seeking, according to his habit, to make his guarded estimate of a new factor in his household. From Virginia's face his eyes went swiftly now and then to his daughter's, animated in her tete-a-tete with the sheriff. Once, when Virginia turned unexpectedly, she caught the hint of a troubled frown in ...
— The Bells of San Juan • Jackson Gregory
... particulars which he talked over with the authoress in a promenade on the platform while Dolores was left in the waiting-room; but afterwards he indulged his niece with a tete-a-tete, asking her father's address, and mourning over the length of time it would take to obtain an answer from Fiji. Mr. Mohun had promised to help him, solemnly and kindly promised, for the sake of her whom they had both loved so much, and here ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge
... to this request, and putting her hand into the one extended to help her, jumped lightly down. It was a welcome means of according an innocent tete-a-tete to her devoted lover, and both felt as if they were treading on air, they were so happy to find themselves alone together, as, arm in arm, they walked briskly forward, until they were out of sight of their companions. ...
— Captain Fracasse • Theophile Gautier
... white faces and red lips and bare throats, sat alone at tables or tete-a-tete with men too old or too young, and ate; but drank with ...
— Every Soul Hath Its Song • Fannie Hurst
... then left tete-a-tete. He had on his face no appearance of disquietude or menace; decidedly ...
— The Forty-Five Guardsmen • Alexandre Dumas
... for that. The young man, at first almost as much startled as his companion at the uncanny apparition, naturally experienced a revulsion of indignation at such an extraordinary interruption to his tete-a-tete, and stepped up to Mr. Morgan as if about to inflict summary chastisement. But perceiving that he had to do with an elderly man, he contented himself with demanding in a decidedly aggressive tone what the devil he meant by such ...
— A Summer Evening's Dream - 1898 • Edward Bellamy
... what a vast amount of mutual biography two young persons of the opposite sexes can exchange in a brief tete-a-tete. By the time Milly and the young artist were strolling slowly northward in the sombre city twilight, they had become old friends, and Milly was hearing about the girl in Rome, the fascination of artist life in Munich, the stunning things in the last Salon, ...
— One Woman's Life • Robert Herrick
... the first time in her days, Was much embarrass'd, never having met In all her life with aught save prayers and praise; And as she also risk'd her life to get Him whom she meant to tutor in love's ways Into a comfortable tete-a-tete, To lose the hour would make her quite a martyr, And they had wasted now ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... light-minded cardinal approach the object of his love, and procured for him an interview with the queen. That is all that can be charged upon me; I procured for the queen the fine necklace of Messrs. Bohmer and Bassenge; I gave the cardinal, as the price of a part of the necklace, a tender tete-a-tete with the queen. The cardinal will not deny that in the garden of Versailles he had a rendezvous with the queen, that he kissed her hand and received a rose from her; and the queen will be compelled to confess in the end that the necklace ...
— Marie Antoinette And Her Son • Louise Muhlbach
... must all know that when we are with friends to whose moods and emotions we are attuned, there takes place a singular degree of thought-transference, quite apart from speech. I had once a great friend with whom I was accustomed to spend much time tete-a-tete. We used to travel together and spend long periods, day after day, in close conjunction, often indeed sharing the same bedroom. It became a matter at first of amusement and interest, but afterwards an accepted fact, that we could often realise, even after a long silence, ...
— Where No Fear Was - A Book About Fear • Arthur Christopher Benson
... for Peter's sake she had remained behind. It revealed an amazingly dense ignorance of both her brother's position and Marjory's. On no other theory could he make it seem consistent for her to encourage a tete-a-tete between a married woman and a man as deeply in love with some one else as ...
— The Triflers • Frederick Orin Bartlett
... closed door came stealing the soft music of a waltz, while from another corner came the sound of a whispered tete-a-tete. Very still was the girl as she sat in the big arm-chair, with the man pleading passionately at her side. Once she caught her breath quickly when he recalled the time gone by—the time before her mother's political ambitions had ruthlessly waged war on her, and done their best ...
— No Man's Land • H. C. McNeile
... the country he is cut off from all his usual habits, and soon feels the dragging hours, no matter how attentive his friends may be to him. Therefore, because it is so impossible to prolong in a tete-a-tete conversations that are soon exhausted, the master and mistress of a country-house are apt to say, calmly, "You will be terribly bored here." It is true that to understand the delights of country life one must have something ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... an embargo on every subject. At last she recollected that she had been travelling, and they talked of Matlock and Dove Dale with great perseverance. Yet time and her aunt moved slowly—and her patience and her ideas were nearly worn our before the tete-a-tete was over. On Mr. and Mrs. Gardiner's coming up they were all pressed to go into the house and take some refreshment; but this was declined, and they parted on each side with utmost politeness. Mr. Darcy handed the ladies ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... stranger if he would not serve instead of begging. And he protests, "I am a Dervish at the door of Allah." "And I am a Spirit in Allah's house," she rejoins. They enter: and the parley in the vestibule is followed by a tete-a-tete in the parlour and another in the dining-room. They agree: and the stranger is made a member of the Spiritual Household, which now consists of her and him, the Medium and ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... at the far end of the table, and Howard was dimly and amusedly conscious that this tete-a-tete was of the nature of a romantic adventure to the little lady. He was surprised, when they came to talk, to find how much they appeared to have read of a solid kind. He asked if they had ...
— Watersprings • Arthur Christopher Benson
... in the patio, the noise of their laughter and their heavy voices penetrated no louder than the dim humming of bees to the ear of Red Jim Perris, sitting tete-a-tete with Marianne in an inner room. And he did not envy the sprawling freedom ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... Martin into a tete-a-tete corner with her, but after a polite quarter of an hour, he declared he must move around and confer with a few people concerning their parts ...
— Patty's Butterfly Days • Carolyn Wells
... supposed that they dined tete-a-tete; no, no— the corporal and his wife were not so churlish as that. The dinner party consisted of a chosen set, the most particular friends of the corporal. Mr Short, first officer and boatswain, Mr William Spurey, Mr and Mrs Salisbury; and last, although not the least important ...
— Snarley-yow - or The Dog Fiend • Frederick Marryat
... really think the ball has gone off well?" she asked incredulously. "It seems to me to have been an elaborate failure." She was thinking of those two whom she had surprised tete-a-tete in the balcony, and wondering what George Fairfax could have been saying to produce Clarissa's confusion. Clarissa was her protegee, and she was responsible to her sister Geraldine for any mischief brought ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... fashions of her bigger sister across the border in more ways than one, he could not be expected to know that de Cartier loved not his wife and did love the pretty Louise. Nor could his pride have been convinced that the young woman at his side was enjoying the tete-a-tete chiefly because de Cartier was fiercely cursing the misfortune which had thrown this new element into conflict. It may be unnecessary to say that Mrs. Garrison was delighted with the unmistakable signs of admiration manifested by the ...
— Castle Craneycrow • George Barr McCutcheon
... pleaded, "forgive me if for a moment I forgot how altered things are. Indeed, it was not a matter of choice with me. Of course, it will give me the greatest pleasure to dine tete-a-tete ...
— The Mischief Maker • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Mrs. Vavasour, breaking in upon this little tete-a-tete, "have you seen those curious spiders that my brother brought home from South America? You might fetch Uncle Horace's case, Madge, and show them to Mr. Morris; they are worth looking at, ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... man has to resort to alcohol to keep his nerves up to concert pitch, things are in a bad way with him, you may be sure of that,—but then you have never known what it is to stand in momentary expectation of a tete-a-tete ...
— The Beetle - A Mystery • Richard Marsh
... convenient for the landlord to favor him with his company over a bottle of wine. This was the almost invariable plan adopted, when he was unaccompanied with his 'better half.' It will readily be conceived that in these tete-a-tete gossipings, a great fund of anecdote and legendary tales had been gleaned, which were made subservient to the entertainment of friends when assembled around the social board. It is from this fund of gossip to which I have so often listened, that ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, April 1844 - Volume 23, Number 4 • Various
... the waiter at her elbow with pad and pencil poised for her order, unconscious also of her husband, now her happy tete-a-tete, she spoke aloud: 'One ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 158, May 5, 1920 • Various
... aware that dowager lady Chia had given her over to Pao-yue, so that her present behaviour was likewise no transgression. And subsequently she secretly attempted with Pao-yue a violent flirtation, and lucky enough no one broke in upon them during their tete-a-tete. From this date, Pao-yue treated Hsi Jen with special regard, far more than he showed to the other girls, while Hsi Jen herself was still more demonstrative in her attentions to Pao-yue. But for a time we will make no further ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... exclaimed Maud, as she emerged from the big closet where Polly kept her stores. "Such a cunning teakettle and saucepan, and a tete-a-tete set, and lots of good things to eat. Do have toast for tea, Polly, and let me make it with the new toasting fork; it 's such fun to ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott
... more at Fernley House; peace and cheerfulness, and much joy. It was not the same peace as of old, when Margaret and her uncle lived their quiet tete-a-tete life, and nothing came to break the even calm of the days. Very different was the life of to-day. The peace was spiritual purely, for the lively and varied round of daily life gave little time for repose and meditation, at least for Margaret. She had begun to give the children short but regular ...
— Margaret Montfort • Laura E. Richards
... give my dog dinner from my own plate," said Rebecca, laughing mischievously; and having enjoyed for some time the discomfiture of my lord, who hated poor Briggs for interrupting his tete-a-tete with the fair Colonel's wife, Mrs. Rawdon at length had pity upon her admirer, and calling to Briggs, praised the fineness of the weather to her and bade her to take out the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... Francesca Bassington sat alone in her well- beloved drawing-room. The visitor who had been enjoying the hospitality of her afternoon-tea table had just taken his departure. The tete-a-tete had not been a pleasant one, at any rate as far as Francesca was concerned, but at least it had brought her the information for which she had been seeking. Her role of looker-on from a tactful distance had necessarily ...
— The Unbearable Bassington • Saki
... plant himself against a corner of the mantelpiece, and remain a fixture till Clarissa departed. It was half-an-hour's talk that was almost a tete-a-tete. Bessie Lovel counted for so little between those two. Half-an-hour of dangerous happiness, which made all the rest of Mrs. Granger's life seem dull and colourless; the thought of which even came ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... was affected. She had some embroidery stretched on a frame before her, but had paused in her labor, and was looking down as if lost in mute attention. I felt a glow of self-satisfaction, but I recollected, at the same time, with a kind of pique, the advantage she had enjoyed over me in our tete-a-tete. I determined to push my triumph, and accordingly kept on with redoubled ardor, until I had fairly exhausted my subject, or ...
— The Crayon Papers • Washington Irving
... accompanist, for instance." She rose to dispense Scotch and soda. Stillman sat in thoughtful silence, while Mrs. Condor talked to very trivial purpose. She seemed suddenly to have grown tired of the subject of Claire Robson. The arrival of the expected dressmaker broke in upon the rather one-sided tete-a-tete. ...
— The Blood Red Dawn • Charles Caldwell Dobie
... The tete-a-tete continued for a very unreasonable time-how long we shall not say; but it was ended by six oclock in the evening, for at that hour Monsieur Le Quoi made his appearance agreeably to the appointment of the preceding ...
— The Pioneers • James Fenimore Cooper
... where there was a folding green table with cards on it. The captain, the commander of our division, went to our tent to sleep; the other gentlemen also separated, and Guskof and I were left alone. I was not mistaken, it was really very uncomfortable for me to have a tete-a-tete with him; I arose involuntarily, and began to promenade up and down on the battery. Guskof walked in silence by my side, hastily and awkwardly wheeling around so as not ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various
... manner, never did I have a moment's time to regard my inner self in the mirror of consciousness. No mental analysis now; no long hours of retrospection, no tete-a-tete interviews with my soul. At times I felt as if I had lost my identity. I was a slave of the genie Gold, releasing it from its prison in the frozen bowels of the earth. I was an automaton turning a crank in the frozen stillness of ...
— The Trail of '98 - A Northland Romance • Robert W. Service
... Italian educational experiences; then as a young girl, very determined to form her own character, and sure, with her father to second her assurance, that boarding-school was the proper place to form it. Eddy was also at school, and Mrs. Upton, with the alternative of flight or an unbroken tete-a-tete with her husband before her, chose the former. There was no breach, no crash; any such disturbances had taken place long before; she simply slid away, and her prolonged absences seemed symbols of fundamental and long recognized divisions. She came ...
— A Fountain Sealed • Anne Douglas Sedgwick
... attitude of mind conveyed itself to Nan, and the latter was rebelliously conscious of the older woman's efforts to dominate her. It came as an inexpressible relief when at last their tete-a-tete was interrupted. ...
— The Moon out of Reach • Margaret Pedler
... throne,' to confide to a man's own publisher (who has 'bought,' or rather sold, 'golden opinions' about him) such a damnatory parenthesis! 'Between you and me,' quotha—it reminds me of a passage in the Heir at Law—'Tete-a-tete with Lady Duberly, I suppose.'—'No—tete-a-tete with five hundred people;' and your confidential communication will doubtless be in circulation to that amount, in a short time, with several additions, and in several letters, all ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore
... across the table, with reference to the action of one of his country's Ministers, was referred to him. He replied to it and drifted quite naturally into a general conversation. Without any evident effort, he seemed to desire to bring his tete-a-tete with Catherine to a close. She showed no sign of disappointment; indeed she fell into his humour and made vigorous efforts to attack the subject of Y.M.C.A. huts with her neighbour on the right. The rest of the meal passed in this manner, ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... short visit to Mrs. Allen, in which Henry talked at random, without sense or connection, and Catherine, rapt in the contemplation of her own unutterable happiness, scarcely opened her lips, dismissed them to the ecstasies of another tete-a-tete; and before it was suffered to close, she was enabled to judge how far he was sanctioned by parental authority in his present application. On his return from Woodston, two days before, he had been met near the abbey by his impatient ...
— Persuasion • Jane Austen
... his wife's temporary absence in the country, had not been in the best of spirits for several days, during the course of our tete-a-tete dinner at Luigi's became suddenly and unexpectedly animated. The change in him was so noticeable that I leaned forward in my place to see what ...
— An Amiable Charlatan • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... than Littleton's, Lansdowne House excepted,—and perhaps Lord Milton's, which is also in Grosvenor Place. He gave me a dinner of dinners. I talked with Denison, and with nobody else. I have found out that the real use of conversational powers is to put them forth in tete-a-tete. A man is flattered by your talking your best to him alone. Ten to one he is piqued by your overpowering him before a company. Denison was agreeable enough. I heard only one word from Lord Plunket, who was remarkably silent. He spoke of Doctor Thorpe, ...
— Life and Letters of Lord Macaulay • George Otto Trevelyan
... one who has begun the quarrel and separated will be the first to fall ill and even die, perhaps, if the separation comes off. I know for a positive fact that several times Stepan Trofimovitch has jumped up from the sofa and beaten the wall with his fists after the most 'intimate and emotional tete-a-tete with Varvara Petrovna. ...
— The Possessed - or, The Devils • Fyodor Dostoyevsky
... city of Ludhiana once stood on its bank. Ludhiana and its dak bungalow, provides refreshments and a three hours' siesta beneath the cooling and seductive punkah, besides an interesting and instructive tete-a-tete with a Eurasian civil officer spending the day here. Among other startling confidences, this olive-tinted gentleman declares that to him the punkah is unbearable, its pendulous, swinging motion ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle Volume II. - From Teheran To Yokohama • Thomas Stevens
... discovered what he required in regard to Ferdinand Ardayre before they went into the hall for coffee—there was nothing further to be gained by having another tete-a-tete with Harietta, so he sat down by Stanislass and suggested that the other two should go on to the Coliseum without them, and Harietta was obliged to depart reluctantly with Ferdinand, having arranged that Stepan should ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... had conceived, reasonably or unreasonably, doubts as to the medium's honesty in the matter, and she determined to try him in the matter of this unanswered question. Talking one day with him in tete-a-tete, she turned the subject of maladies of the chest, of which they had been speaking, to the special case of her late brother-in-law, discussing the powerful influence of climate, and remarking that she ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 15, - No. 86, February, 1875 • Various
... had to offer her his hand to assist her in entering her carriage; he could ride near the door of her coach; he accompanied her on water excursions and pleasure rides, and these last were so much the more important because they afforded him, to a certain extent, opportunity for a tete-a-tete with the queen. For only the master of horse was permitted to ride at her side; he even had precedence of the ladies of the suite, so as to be able to give the queen immediate assistance in case of any accident, or the stumbling of her horse. Therefore, no one ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... proper under the circumstances; it was quite unembarrassed and natural, though, of course, there was more reserve than during the years they had lived so much together, almost as brother and sister. We are obliged to leave the ladies for the present, and follow Hazlehurst to his tete-a-tete dinner with Mr. Henley. ...
— Elinor Wyllys - Vol. I • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... light-hearted, was a delightful companion and the meal passed off cheerily. When we rose and the mayor left us for some necessary business it was with a look of satisfaction in my direction which was the best possible preparation for my approaching tete-a-tete with his moody ...
— The Mayor's Wife • Anna Katharine Green
... thousand miles away. Neither we, nor the day, nor the beauty of the drive had power to woo their glances from coming back to the focal point of interest they had found in each other. They were beginning to talk, not about each other but of themselves—the danger-signal of all tete-a-tete adventures. ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... from the first, conceived a great antipathy to Rose, whom she considered a dangerous rival, and generally avoided, excepting when Mr. Dinsmore was with her; but she always interrupted a tete-a-tete between them when it was in her power to do so without being guilty of very great rudeness. This, and the covert sneers with which she often addressed Miss Allison had not escaped Mr. Dinsmore's notice, and it frequently cost him quite an effort to treat Miss Stevens with the respectful politeness ...
— Elsie's Girlhood • Martha Finley
... young men pay few, if any, party calls, because they work and they exercise, and whatever time is left over, if any, is spent in their club or at the house of a young woman, not tete-a-tete, but invariably playing bridge. The Sunday afternoon visits that the youth of another generation used always to pay, are unknown in this, because every man who can, spends the week-end ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post
... of the Triumphs of Cally's Life, and the Tete-a-tete following, which vaguely depresses her; of the Little Work-Girl who brought the Note that Sunday, oddly remet at Gentlemen's ...
— V. V.'s Eyes • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... eyes; and when he told poor Lady Fermor, right out before every one, that she did not care a bit for music, but was extremely fond of musicians, it was generally felt that cheiromancy was a most dangerous science, and one that ought not to be encouraged, except in a tete-a-tete. ...
— Lord Arthur Savile's Crime and Other Stories • Oscar Wilde
... rude, raised a great hue and cry and everything changed. What she said of me I don't know but it made a most amusing difference. General Walker galloped a half mile across the desert to give me his own copy of the directions for the sham battle, and I was to have met Cromer at dinner tete-a-tete, and General Kitchener sent apologies by two other generals and all the subalterns called on me in a body. That was the day before I left. I don't know what Lady Gower-Browne said, but it made a change which I am sorry I could not ...
— Adventures and Letters • Richard Harding Davis
... had come from the prisons of St. Pelagie with my distinguished and unfortunate friend Madame Roland (in two volumes which I bought for two francs each, at the book-stall in the Place de la Concorde, Paris, at the corner of the Rue Royale). Deciding to pass the evening tete-a-tete with Madame Roland, I derived, as I always do, great pleasure from that spiritual woman's society, and the charms of her brave soul and engaging conversation. I must confess that if she had only some more faults, only a few more passionate failings of any kind, I ...
— Reprinted Pieces • Charles Dickens
... She knew that Wilmet would not like her affairs to be discussed without her own permission; but it seemed unfair that when all the Harewoods were open-mouthed, her own sister should know nothing. After all, much would depend on the chances of a tete-a-tete. ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge
... Midshipmen have a means of scenting the whereabouts of a fleet that mere censorship of letters cannot balk. There were at least half a dozen mothers in the foyer of the big, garish hotel on the sea-front. Some were tete-a-tete with their sons in snug, upholstered corners, learning aspects of naval warfare that no historian will ever record. Others presided over heavily laden tea-tables at which their sons and their sons' more intimate friends were dealing with eggs and buttered toast, marmalade, ...
— A Tall Ship - On Other Naval Occasions • Sir Lewis Anselm da Costa Ritchie
... personal efforts among his friends and business associates, they were not by any means the first arrivals. Half a dozen laughing groups were distributed about the round tables in the center space, while several tete-a-tete couples were confidentially ensconced in corners and at cozy tables for two, craftily sheltered by some of the most imposing of the marble figures ...
— Outside Inn • Ethel M. Kelley
... not?' said Attwater. 'Well, well, we are left tete-a-tete. A glass of wine with you, ...
— The Ebb-Tide - A Trio And Quartette • Robert Louis Stevenson and Lloyd Osbourne
... which might compromise him—or of a possible jealousy that might seek revenge. Yet he had no reason to believe that Susy's nature was jealous, or that she was likely to have any cause; but the fact remained that Miss Faulkner's innocent intrusion upon their tete-a-tete affected him more strongly than anything else in his interview with Susy. Once out of the atmosphere of that house, it struck him, too, that Miss Faulkner was almost as much of an alien in it as himself. He wondered what she had been doing there. Could ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... with a gusto only provoked by a glass or two of impeccable port after a good dinner. One would have thought, considering the anguished scene of the night before, that it would have been one of the most miserably impossible tete-a-tete breakfasts in the whole range of such notoriously ghastly meals. But here was Betty, serene and smiling, as though she had been accustomed to breakfast with me every morning of her life, off to the hospital, ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... from the hot midday sun by sloping roofs and awnings, and sheltered from the boisterous afternoon trade winds by the opposite side of the court. But Susy did not seem inclined to linger there long that morning, in spite of Mrs. Peyton's evident desire for a maternal tete-a-tete. The nervous preoccupation and capricious ennui of an indulged child showed in her pretty but discontented face, and knit her curved eyebrows, and Peyton saw a look of pain pass over his wife's face as the young girl suddenly and half-laughingly ...
— Susy, A Story of the Plains • Bret Harte
... ornament, and its ancient cross and mouldering yew-tree behind. Harry sat below in the boat, propped on the cushions, reading the last number of the 'Nineteenth Century;' Ernest and Edie took their seat upon the bank above, and had a first chance of an unbroken tete-a-tete. ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... out the scientific tete-a-tete going on behind the azalea, and Steve grinned as he peeped, then grew sober and said in a tone of despair: "If you had seen the pains I took with that fellow, the patience with which I brushed his wig, the time I spent trying to convince him that he must wear thin boots, and the fight I had ...
— Rose in Bloom - A Sequel to "Eight Cousins" • Louisa May Alcott
... Kennedy, with well-simulated excitement, was racing me in the car up to the Greenes' again. We literally burst unannounced into the tete-a-tete ...
— The Silent Bullet • Arthur B. Reeve
... impressed with her, notwithstanding his connection with Kitty, went everywhere that he was likely to meet her, and her joy at meeting him easily betrayed itself in her eyes and her smile. And he did not refrain from actually making love to Anna on the occasions when they were able to engage in tete-a-tete conversations. Nor was he positively repelled. Soon the acquaintance became more and more intimate. Meantime, Aleksei as usual would come home and, instead of seeking his wife's society, would bury himself in his library amongst his books. But ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Vol VIII • Arthur Mee and J.A. Hammerton, Eds.
... with envy swell, Because they see me used so well: 'How think you of our friend the dean? I wonder what some people mean; My lord and he are grown so great, Always together, tete-a-tete: What, they admire him for his jokes— See but the fortune of some folks!' There flies about a strange report Of some express arrived at court; 110 I'm stopp'd by all the fools I meet, And catechised in every street. 'You, Mr Dean, frequent the great; Inform us, will the Emperor treat? ...
— The Poetical Works Of Alexander Pope, Vol. 1 • Alexander Pope et al
... comes back kind of hot. "But Pyramid Gordon was white enough to want to divide his pile among the poor prunes he'd put out here and there along the way. You're on the list too, and the chief object of this little tete-a-tete is to frame up some plan of givin' you ...
— Shorty McCabe on the Job • Sewell Ford
... Court he was brought before the Duke of Berwick, who addressed several questions to him, which Catinat answered; he then told the duke he had something of importance to impart to him and to him alone. The duke was not very anxious for a tete-a-tete with Catinat; however, having ordered his hands to be securely bound, and telling Sandricourt not to go away, he consented to hear what the prisoner ...
— Celebrated Crimes, Complete • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... word. She knew nothing of the finesse of diplomacy in the manipulation of her company. Her method was straightforward dragooning. Observing the persistent attempts of Dr. Bulling during the early part of the trip to secure Iola for a tete-a-tete, she called out across the deck in the ears of the whole company, "See here, Bulling, I won't have you trying to monopolise our star. We're out for a good time and we're going to have it. Miss Lane is not your property. She belongs to us all." ...
— The Doctor - A Tale Of The Rockies • Ralph Connor
... his; again she flashed sufficient message to redden Longstreet's cheeks and make his own eyes burn with embarrassment. And since it was obvious that henceforward the combat must be waged in the open, she did not await the unlikely opportunity of some distant tete-a-tete to emphasize her intention. Before she mounted she managed to allow the glowingly embarrassed man to hold her two hands; and she ...
— The Desert Valley • Jackson Gregory
... breakfast she was disappointed to find that Bud was not there, and she was obliged to suffer a breakfast tete-a-tete with West. By dint, however, of asking him questions instead of allowing him to take the initiative, she hurried through her breakfast quite successfully, acquiring a superficial knowledge of her fellow-boarder ...
— A Voice in the Wilderness • Grace Livingston Hill
... He never strained after effect. His words seemed to crystallize into wit or poignant humor before he had time to reflect on what he was going to say. But these qualities were perhaps seen at their best in tete-a-tete encounters or correspondence. At all events, it is from such occurrences that illustrations of them can be ...
— Memoirs of Life and Literature • W. H. Mallock
... old man. In vain, at first, Abner Nott strove with profound levity to indicate his arch comprehension of the situation, and in vain, later, becoming alarmed, he endeavored, with cheerful gravity, to indicate his utter obliviousness of any but a business significance in their tete-a-tete. ...
— By Shore and Sedge • Bret Harte
... that no one but a book reviewer ever reads prefaces, so I seize upon the opportunity to have a tete-a-tete with my critics. Gentlemen, my cards are face up on the table. I have declared to the publisher that nearly every American who knows how to read longs to find his way into print, and should appreciate some of the dearly ...
— If You Don't Write Fiction • Charles Phelps Cushing
... was taken of her birthday. After keeping me for two hours and a half she dismissed me; and I am sure I could not say what she said, except that it was an olio of decousus and heterogeneous things, partaking of the characteristics of her mother, grafted on a younger scion. I dined tete-a-tete with my dear old aunt: hers is always a sweet and soothing society ...
— Memoirs of Mr. Charles J. Yellowplush - The Yellowplush Papers • William Makepeace Thackeray
... luncheon the girl approved her escort's manner and bearing as unexceptionable. No sooner had they entered into the implied intimacy of the tete-a-tete across a table than a subtle change manifested itself in his attitude. Gayety was still the keynote of his talk, but the note of the personal and insistent had gone. And, at the end, when he had paid the bill and ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... gay winter,—that is, the plans were gay; Ruth's presence could hardly be termed so. The old spontaneous laugh was superseded by a gentle smile, sympathetic perhaps, but never joyous. She listened more, and seldom now took the lead in a general conversation, though there was a charm about a tete-a-tete with her that earnest persons, men and women, felt without being able to define it. For the change, without doubt, was there. It was as if a quiet hand had been passed over her exuberant, happy girlhood and left a serious, thoughtful ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf
... to Manton and Enid, a troubled something in his expression. I could see that the promoter was making the most of his tete-a-tete with the girl, but she seemed perfectly at ease and quite capable of handling the man, and I, certainly, was more disturbed at the ...
— The Film Mystery • Arthur B. Reeve
... extinct, her temporary candour shut up; the little, red-coloured, piratical-looking pennon of audacity she had allowed to float a minute in the air, was furled, and the broad, sober-hued flag of dissimulation again hung low over the citadel. I did not like her thus, so I cut short the TETE-A-TETE and departed. ...
— The Professor • (AKA Charlotte Bronte) Currer Bell
... period of his past life? he replied, "It was that year in which he spent one whole evening with M—-y As—n. That, indeed," said he, "was not happiness, it was rapture; but the thoughts of it sweetened the whole year." I must add that the evening alluded to was not passed tete-a-tete, but in a select company, of which the present Lord Killmorey was one. "Molly," says Dr. Johnson, "was a beauty and a scholar, and a wit and a Whig; and she talked all in praise of liberty: and so I made this epigram upon her. She was the ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... fields at this time of day is hardly fitting for young ladies to take alone," said Mr. Lathom, anxious no doubt to escape from his tete-a-tete drive with my lady, and possibly not quite prepared to go to the illegal length of prompt measures, which she had ...
— My Lady Ludlow • Elizabeth Gaskell
... a tete-a-tete, in the family room, whither I had led Lucy, feeling that this little ceremony was due to my wife. Everything around us recalled former scenes, and tears were in the eyes of my bride as she gently extricated herself ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... them, put an end to their tete-a-tete. She entered softly, her face alight and tender, and laid her two hands upon Grange's great shoulders as he sat ...
— The Way of an Eagle • Ethel M. Dell
... of the hall was Mrs Gaskoin's boudoir, where she and her husband were sitting over the fire, awaiting the result of the tete-a-tete in the drawing-room. ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 452 - Volume 18, New Series, August 28, 1852 • Various
... on the contrary I had many a tete-a-tete with her, for her mother and sister were anxious for me to deposit some part of my pension in the Musical Banks, this being in accordance with the dictates of their goddess Ydgrun, of whom both Mrs. Nosnibor and Zulora were great devotees. I was not sure whether I had kept ...
— Erewhon • Samuel Butler
... whirled on this roundabout for a bit, and then had the fortune to fall off into a tete-a-tete with a lady whom my aunt introduced as Mrs. Mumble—but then she introduced everybody to me as Mumble that afternoon, either by way of humour ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells
... his thoughts to her because of whom he can find no repose; and yet he has plenty of time and opportunity to speak, if he were not afraid of being repelled; for now he can see her every day, and sit beside her "tete-a-tete" without opposition or hindrance, for no one sees any ...
— Four Arthurian Romances - "Erec et Enide", "Cliges", "Yvain", and "Lancelot" • Chretien de Troyes
... visitors, the countess was so tired that she gave orders to admit no more, but the porter was told to be sure to invite to dinner all who came "to congratulate." The countess wished to have a tete-a-tete talk with the friend of her childhood, Princess Anna Mikhaylovna, whom she had not seen properly since she returned from Petersburg. Anna Mikhaylovna, with her tear-worn but pleasant face, drew her chair nearer ...
— War and Peace • Leo Tolstoy
... made a hearty effort, but was generally too lazy to throw her leg over it.) "Society! I'm dwenched to death with it. If I could only catch fiah like other women, and love somebody, I would much rather have a tete-a-tete with him than go teawing about all day and all night, from one unintwisting cwowd to another. To be sure," said she, puzzling the matter out, "you are a beauty, and would be ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade
... going to describe his first tete-a-tete with his violin. Perhaps he returned from it somewhat disappointed. Probably he found her coy, unready to acknowledge his demands on her attention. But not the less willingly did he return with her to the solitude of the ruinous factory. On every safe occasion, becoming more and more frequent as ...
— Robert Falconer • George MacDonald
... train, in the first of their tete-a-tete, she sounded him cautiously, trying to discover if his feelings toward Linton were inspired wholly by political differences. She seemed to suspect there was something more behind it, even at the risk of flattering herself. But she had detected certain suggestive symptoms in ...
— The Ramrodders - A Novel • Holman Day
... midnight. Half a dozen couples danced lazily in the central dancing space. Other couples remained tete-a-tete ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science January 1931 • Various
... cannot ask?" said Flora. "I don't know why I spoke to you! Ah! come in! Why, George, that is a finer egg than ever," as he entered with a Shanghai egg in each hand, for her to mark with the date when it had been laid. Poultry was a new hobby, and Ethel had been hearing, in her tete-a-tete dinners with George, a great deal about the perfections of the hideous monsters that had obtained fabulous prices. They had been the best resource for conversation; but she watched, with something between vexation and softness, how Flora roused herself to give her full ...
— The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations • Charlotte Yonge
... are leaving Soeur Angelique and Miss Vernor to have a regular tete-a-tete of it, are we not? But you evade my question in a very unbecoming way, Miss Phebe. Tell me, what were you ...
— Only an Incident • Grace Denio Litchfield
... of eagerness and followed her, wondering if her intriguing sentence before breakfast had been nothing more than a clever piece of chicane, planned to entice me into a tete-a-tete. ...
— The Jervaise Comedy • J. D. Beresford
... before either was quite ready, so engrossed were they in happy gossip. And Palla looked up in blank surprise that almost amounted to vexation when the bell announced that their tete-a-tete ...
— The Crimson Tide • Robert W. Chambers
... between Mary Standish and John Graham's agent, Alan thought. There were not half a dozen people left at the tables, and the scheme was that Rossland should be served tete-a-tete with Miss Standish, of course. That, apparently, was why she had greeted him with such cool civility. Her anxiety for him to leave the table before Rossland appeared upon the scene was evident, now that ...
— The Alaskan • James Oliver Curwood
... might rest there, no longer visited it, fearing to find himself in the midst of a large and merry company, by whom he did not wish to be seen. This came about through his having once arrived to dine tete-a-tete with Marguerite, and having fallen upon a party of fifteen, who were still at lunch at an hour when he was prepared to sit down to dinner. He had unsuspectingly opened the dining-room door, and had been greeted by a burst of laughter, and had had to retire precipitately before the impertinent ...
— Camille (La Dame aux Camilias) • Alexandre Dumas, fils
... very brave young man," she replied with a roguish look at Bennett's discomfiture over the interruption of the tete-a-tete. ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... the fact. Simpkins never passed the black altar without a backward glance, as if he were fearful of an attack from behind. And he had determined that nothing should tempt him to a tete-a-tete with the statue behind the veil. But having so senseless, so cowardly a feeling was one thing, and letting Mrs. Athelstone know it another. ...
— The False Gods • George Horace Lorimer
... sounded he reluctantly went below for lunch. The prospect of a tete-a-tete with the captain was anything but pleasant. He understood about half that the officer said, and with that half he usually disagreed. His first ...
— The Honorable Percival • Alice Hegan Rice
... saw in Elviry only an unwelcome presence interfering with another tete-a-tete, and the hostile hardening of his eyes angered her so that the girl tossed her head, and wheeling haughtily she swept into the house. A minute later he saw her still flushed and wrathful stalking indignantly ...
— The Roof Tree • Charles Neville Buck
... the picnic party, donned their slippers and smoking jackets, and having lighted their cigars, and slipped into the easiest possible attitudes, prepared to devote the next few hours to a confidential tete-a-tete. The next day Rutherford would start on his journey to the coast, and naturally there were many topics of mutual interest to be discussed on this, their last night together for a number ...
— The Award of Justice - Told in the Rockies • A. Maynard Barbour
... Nor did the flag of Cuba Libre picked out in electric lights over the entrance of a restaurant near the theatre, nor other significant sights and sounds. But they warily held their peace. I looked for some show of feeling, but there was none. A tete-a-tete with Mercedes was out of the question, and for this I fervently thanked the gods! There was no telling the havoc that bewitching face might have wrought. Principles, opinions, and theories might have withered and fallen utterly consumed beneath the fire of those ardent glances and the magic of that ...
— The Statesmen Snowbound • Robert Fitzgerald
... ended in the doctor's and my dining tete-a-tete on a hastily improvised dinner,—it was then close upon eight, and our normal dinner hour is 6:30,—but it was such an improvised dinner as I am sure Mrs. McGurk never served him. Sallie, wishing to impress me with her invaluableness, did her absolutely Southern best. And after ...
— Dear Enemy • Jean Webster
... color that flew to Arkwright's face at sight of herself was construed at once by Alice as embarrassment on his part at being found tete-a-tete with Bertram Henshaw's wife. And she did not like it. She was not pleased that he was there. She was less pleased that he blushed for ...
— Miss Billy Married • Eleanor H. Porter
... to impart a similar confidence into the breast of Colonel Dickinson, with whom Sir Richard dined that night tete-a-tete. Dickinson was inclined to think that Sir ...
— Peter Ruff and the Double Four • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... went straight to the library. He knew the resources of his own mansion in the matter of nooks for a tete-a-tete interview; now he was particularly assisted by remembrance of Stewart's habits in the old days. He found his daughter and the mayor of Marion cozily ensconced among the ...
— All-Wool Morrison • Holman Day
... when they were enjoying a tete-a-tete by the fireside, she would place on the tea table the leather box containing the "trash," as M. Lantin called it. She would examine the false gems with a passionate attention as though they were in some way connected with a deep and secret joy; and she often insisted on passing ...
— Selected Writings of Guy de Maupassant • Guy de Maupassant
... in on a tete-a-tete, as she did once, when by chance she had sniffed the curative smell of spirits of camphor on the air of a room through which her mother had passed, and came to drag her off that night to share ...
— The Vertical City • Fannie Hurst
... This tete-a-tete was delightful, Maitre Lebrument having shown just the proper amount of delicacy. He had taken as his motto: "Everything comes to him who waits." He knew how to be at the same time patient and energetic. His success was rapid ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... might say would be inane, tawdry, inconsequent; so she waited, patiently happy, taking no count of time, nor the sunshine, nor the lilt of the birds, nor even the dissolution of conventionality in the unsupervised tete-a-tete. ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... with the laurels of his fine victory, he is side by side with the lovely Alcmene enjoying the delights of a charming tete-a-tete. They are tasting the pleasures of being reconciled, now their love-tiff has blown over. Take care how you disturb their sweet privacy, unless you wish him to punish ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere
... who had particular reasons for wishing that Clara should first see Colonel Le Noir with other company, to have an opportunity of observing him well and possibly forming an estimate of his character (as a young girl of her fine instincts might well do) before she should be exposed in a tete-a-tete to those deceptive blandishments he knew so well how to ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth |
