"Front door" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... from the part of the hall in which the coatroom was situated, and directly afterward two slender young fellows climbed out a rear window, and a few moments later Billy Sudden and Clay Whipple came calmly through the front door and joined the throng about ...
— Ted Strong's Motor Car • Edward C. Taylor
... of the stranger's errand had stimulated the old man's garrulity, but receiving no reply, he finally retreated, leaving the front door open. By the aid of a disfiguring scar on his furrowed cheek, Beryl recognized him as the brave, faithful, family coachman, Abednego, (abbreviated to "Bedney")—who had once saved his mother's life at ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson
... The front door stood open, and she went in through its Gothic archway, glad to escape from the glare outside. The great hall she thus entered had been the chapel in the days of the monks, and it had the clammy atmosphere ...
— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell
... carriage and was driven to the Bangs mansion. A servant answered his rather impatient ring at the front door. ...
— Randy of the River - The Adventures of a Young Deckhand • Horatio Alger Jr.
... the front door and the mother called out if anybody were in? As there was no reply they went into the parlour. On the floor, surrounded by a whole forest of flowers, stood a black coffin with silver feet and in the coffin lay a young girl with a bridal crown ...
— In Midsummer Days and Other Tales • August Strindberg
... Curly. So the two little piggy boys walked along through the front door of the school, right into the room where the nice lady bug teacher was telling the children how to make a straight line crooked by bending it, and how to put butter on their bread, by ...
— Curly and Floppy Twistytail - The Funny Piggie Boys • Howard R. Garis
... took a great interest in this cottage. He was frequently to be seen there in the evening, tramping up and down the new piazza, and offering to the moon, that looked in through the boughs of a live-oak at the end of the gallery, the incense of his lonely cigar. Sometimes he would take the key of the front door from his pocket, enter the silent house, and wander from one room to another, like a restless but not unhappy ghost; the moonlight, touching his face, showed it strangely stirred and softened. His ...
— In Exile and Other Stories • Mary Hallock Foote
... of oneself, each stood covertly studying it, calculating that plump mother Coupeau would never fit into it. They all looked at each other with this thought in their eyes, though without communicating it. But there was a slight pushing at the front door. Monsieur Madinier, extending his arms, came and said ...
— L'Assommoir • Emile Zola
... minister to the sick and exhort the wicked; they give him no rest, and never let him feel he has done enough; and when he comes home weary, after a day's wrestling with his parishioners' souls, he is confronted on his doorstep by filthy abuse pasted up on his own front door. He never speaks of these things, but how shall they be hid? Everybody here knows everything that happens before the day is over, and what we have for dinner is of far greater general interest than the most astounding ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp
... again with his foot Timothy Sweeny was a publican who kept a small shop in one of the back streets of Rosnacree. He was known to the sergeant, but was not regarded with favour. There is a way into Sweeny's house through a back-yard which is reached by climbing a wall. Sweeny's front door was always shut on Sundays and his shutters were put up during those hours when the law regards the consumption of alcohol as undesirable. But the sergeant had good reason to suppose that many thirsty people found their way to the refreshment ...
— Priscilla's Spies 1912 • George A. Birmingham
... in-doors," I answered. "Let me help you up the steps." And with this I took hold of her under the arms, and in a second I had set her down in front of the closed front door. I then ran down and brought up her wheel. "Do you think you can manage to walk in?" ...
— A Bicycle of Cathay • Frank R. Stockton
... came home rather earlier than we expected, and rather cross. Chris did not hear the front door, because his ears were pinched up with tying curtain rings on to them, and just at that minute he shouted, "I go Fantee!" and tore his pinafore right up the middle, and burst into the front hall with it hanging in two pieces by the armholes, his eyes shut, ...
— Last Words - A Final Collection of Stories • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... softly to the front door, and there he was still waiting, ready to ring if the door opened or a face appeared in the area, and doubtless to pretend that he had rung already. But he had not to ring at all; and suddenly I saw his foot in the letter-box, ...
— Raffles - Further Adventures of the Amateur Cracksman • E. W. Hornung
... almost opposite a house in front of which hung a sign, just distinguishable in the darkness: "Hotel Van Dijk." Regardless of the fact that I did not possess a cent, I proceeded to knock loudly on the front door. After a few minutes my efforts were rewarded by hearing an upstairs window open, and being told in Dutch to go away. However, my mind being made up, I persisted in making more noise than ever. Seeing his protestations were in vain, ...
— 'Brother Bosch', an Airman's Escape from Germany • Gerald Featherstone Knight
... swept through the house. Front and back the doors stood open. The sun was already low in the west and the evening promised to be chill. Presently Charlotte rose. She closed the front door carefully, wrapped Hope in a cloak, and, with her child on her arm, passed ...
— Life at High Tide - Harper's Novelettes • Various
... a short time after seeing the old man at his gate that I had my first sight of an inmate of Dovecot House. While slowly riding by it I saw a lady come out from the front door—young, good-looking, very pale and dressed in the deepest mourning. She had a bowl in her hand, and going a little distance from the house she called the pigeons and down they flew in a crowd to ...
— A Traveller in Little Things • W. H. Hudson
... requested permission to go out for about an hour and a half to purchase various trifles for the signorina. Soon after, Frederick saw the excellent housekeeper, all muffled up, step from the front door into ...
— Atlantis • Gerhart Hauptmann
... Guy closed the front door with a heavy bang and went out into the street troubled. He was talking to himself: "Such a farce, by Jove! one would think she was a little sister, by the way I try to speak, and if she only knew how I struggle to suffocate the passion ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... been spread on, and Hal had scraped out the dish, giving Mab a share even though she had said she did not want any, the front door ...
— Daddy Takes Us to the Garden - The Daddy Series for Little Folks • Howard R. Garis
... soon the man appeared, plunging, tumbling over the stairs. Wrenching open the front door he stumbled down the steps to the road. He was hatless, collarless, and his feet were shod in slippers. As he reached the gate he looked at himself as if accustomed to take pride in his personal appearance, drew a handkerchief ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick
... allow me the use of this faithful, overworked phrase—was broken by the tintinnabulation of the bell. This time I recognized it as the electric bell operated by a push-button upon the right side of my front door. To rise and rush to the door was the work of a moment. It always is. In another instant I had flung it wide. This operation was singularly easy, considering that it was but a narrow door, and width was the last thing it ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... his breast. Dombey could not sleep, the thought that what at first was barely possible was now become highly probable goaded him almost to madness. He rose and dressed himself, going quietly out of the front door into Sherbrooke street. Along the street he went at a fearful pace, till, almost faint from want of breath, he turned down the hill towards the city, habit bringing him along the route he was accustomed to take ...
— The Mysteries of Montreal - Being Recollections of a Female Physician • Charlotte Fuhrer
... longer," began Tom, when they saw the front door of the tenement opened and two men hurried forth. Both had their hats pulled far down over their eyes and had their coat collars turned up, even though the ...
— The Rover Boys on the Ocean • Arthur M. Winfield
... theatre of the crime." Then Messieurs Mouilleron and Lousteau-Prangin, accompanied by the lieutenant of gendarmes crossed over to the Hochon house, which was now guarded by two gendarmes in the garden and two at the front door. The crowd was still increasing. The whole town was surging in the ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac
... Marcia returned almost absently. She opened the door for herself, because I had forgotten it, and stood looking at the lighted living room at the end of the passage by the front door. "But the wolves have been round for a week—that was what I meant when I said I was going to have some wolf hunts! The mine superintendent's ...
— The La Chance Mine Mystery • Susan Carleton Jones
... provided for them choose to run the risk of loss, they deserve very little sympathy if the chance goes against them. Last year an unregistered letter containing a cheque was alleged to have been stolen in the post. It was found, however, to have been duly delivered by being pushed under the front door, and afterwards to have been torn in pieces by some puppies inside the house. The fragments were in the end discovered in the straw of the dog-kennel. Now, had the sender only spent 2d. in registering this letter, a receipt would have been taken on its delivery, and all chance of its falling into ...
— The Girl's Own Paper, Vol. VIII: No. 353, October 2, 1886. • Various
... tell me, then," Philippa demanded, her anger gradually giving way to bewilderment, "what is wrong with my front door?" ...
— The Zeppelin's Passenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... was the week after Mary Taylor's ride that found him at Cresswell's front door, thin, eagle-eyed, fairly well ...
— The Quest of the Silver Fleece - A Novel • W. E. B. Du Bois
... her to the door, but stops there. Then, as full realization begins to dawn on him, he runs to the bay window, craning his head to catch sight of the front door. There is the sound of a vehicle starting, and the continual hooting of its horn as it makes its way among the crowd. He turns ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... the glory of the clouds was all reflected in the sea. The air grew chilly, and we went in and watched at the front door for Mr. Floyd and my mother to return from their drive. It seemed curiously like the old times, and once or twice I started at some sound, expecting to hear a querulous voice and see old Mr. Raymond with his ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, November, 1878 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various
... wood, and was remarkably pretty in design. In the Emerald City it would have been considered a tiny dwelling, indeed; but in the midst of this paper village it seemed immense. Real flowers were in the garden and real trees grew beside it. Upon the front door ...
— The Emerald City of Oz • L. Frank Baum
... of him was somewhat larger,—about the distance between Mrs. Levice's bedroom and the front door. She had a homely little way of seeing people to the door, and here it was the doctor gave her any new instructions. Instructions are soon given and taken; and there was always time for a word or ...
— Other Things Being Equal • Emma Wolf
... taken for housebreakers, Gladys climbed into the window and went downstairs. Opening the front door a crack, she gave a low whistle which she fondly believed to be a burglar-like signal. Nyoda answered with a similar whistle. "Is that you, Diamond Dick?" she ...
— The Camp Fire Girls at School • Hildegard G. Frey
... Jack has been hunting a job, and has been unable to find one. The drop-curtain shows a street-scene. (The Play-play begins to loom, as described.) A row of houses, just off Fifth Avenue, having the front door on the street level in the modern fashion. It is evening, and the ground is covered with snow. The snow-shoveller is at work Right. His feet and hands are tied with rags and his face is red with cold. (The Play-play ...
— The Pot Boiler • Upton Sinclair
... The front door was open, and boxes stood in the passage; he walked in as far as the parlor door; then he tapped with his riding-whip against the frame of it. Sylvie started on her perch, and ...
— The Other Girls • Mrs. A. D. T. Whitney
... care he sha'n't want cunning or strength. It was ten o'clock instead of nine before he left, which he did with a feeling of triumph. Poor Patty remained behind, and shut up the bar, her heart in a flutter, and her hands shaking, while Dick was locking the front door. She hardly knew whether to laugh or cry; she felt the change which had come over him, and was half fascinated ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes
... her as she walked across the garden and went into the hotel at the front door. Then he ...
— Love at Second Sight • Ada Leverson
... two by the last notch on the front door. I stood in my socks, and the squire measured it ...
— We and the World, Part II. (of II.) - A Book for Boys • Juliana Horatia Ewing
... told her, "and will tell my darkies to bolt the front door: so you'll be as safe in ...
— Master Tales of Mystery, Volume 3 • Collected and Arranged by Francis J. Reynolds
... all the reigns exactly as many feet to the reign as there were years in it. You can look out over the grounds and see the little pegs from the front door—some of them close together, like Richard II, Richard Cromwell, James II, &c; and some prodigiously wide apart, like Henry III, Edward III, George III, &c. It gives the children a realizing sense of the length ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... was so great that for a moment Nannie was almost too bewildered to know what she did, and was half frightened when she found herself at the front door calling "Steve! Steve!" ...
— The Gentle Art of Cooking Wives • Elizabeth Strong Worthington
... front door close he crossed to the telephone, and asking for a number, told the person who answered it to come round and see him ...
— Mademoiselle of Monte Carlo • William Le Queux
... no right to present herself at the front door, certainly; but then, before the languid footman could recover from the first shock of indignation at her impertinence, she might slip past him and reach the door leading to those apartments in which the banker hid himself ...
— Henry Dunbar - A Novel • M. E. Braddon
... each night Bull sat near the ranch-house front door as though waiting for some one. He waited a long time. Bill Jordan, who prided himself on what he knew about dogs, and men, said that Bull's former owner probably was a city man, and was in the habit ...
— Injun and Whitey to the Rescue • William S. Hart
... separate door opening from the Greshamsbury pew out into the Greshamsbury grounds, so that the family were not forced into unseemly community with the village multitude in going to and from their prayers; for the front door of the church led out into a road which had no connexion with the private path. It was not unusual with Frank and his father to go round, after the service, to the chief entrance, so that they might speak to their neighbours, and get rid of some of the exclusiveness which was intended for them. ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope
... watch. She rose hurriedly, said as carelessly as she could, "I am going to the school," and tying her bonnet on all in a flurry, whipped out at the back-door with her shawl in her hand just as Sarah opened the front door to Alfred. She then shuffled on her shawl, and whisked through the little shrubbery into the open field, and reached a path that led to the school, and so gratified was she at her dexterity in evading her favourite, that she hung her head, and went ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade
... aside, needles left sticking in the half-finished seams, and many a nose, spectacled and unspectacled, was popped out of the adjoining windows, which had the good fortune to command a view of Mr. Bindloose's front door. The faces of two or three giggling clerks were visible at the barred casements of which we have spoken, much amused at the descent of an old lady from this respectable carriage, whose dress and appearance might possibly have been fashionable ...
— St. Ronan's Well • Sir Walter Scott
... was told one morning that "a lady" wished to see me at the front door. I obeyed the summons, and, to my surprise, was greeted by my friend Madame Four-Legs. After much demonstration of joy at seeing me, such as putting her two hands together over her forehead and then parting them in a waving kind of gesture, laughing, and ...
— Wau-bun - The Early Day in the Northwest • Juliette Augusta Magill Kinzie
... Accordingly, we proceeded to the New York terminus of the Natural Products Manufacturing Corporation's New York, Sumner Ferry, Thanksgiving Flats, and Spread Eagle Springs Railroad, along which a special train speedily whirled us to the front door of the works. On the steps stood the genial managing director, supported by the principal manager Colonel Exodus V. Rooster, the head chemist Major Madison B. Jefferson, and the assistant chemists Judge Vansittart J. Sumner and ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 27, March 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... Vortex shares, the loan from Tensor, and his balance from bank,—a comfortable sum altogether; and he thought it not prudent to risk the whole by waiting for Fletcher, who, after all, might not come. So, seeing the coast clear, he put on his surtout and walked out of the front door with an ...
— Atlantic Monthly Vol. 3, No. 16, February, 1859 • Various
... with pools and puddles of water in the time of rainy weather and with the pigs and chickens running in and out, was of clay, beaten down flat and hard, and neatly whitewashed at the edges. Outside, in front, were laid nice flat flagstones, that made a pleasant path to the front door. Flowers, inside and out, added to the beauty of the home and made perfume for those who ...
— Welsh Fairy Tales • William Elliot Griffis
... wizened-up little woman, with a wrinkled face. Her home was unthinkably filthy; you could not enter by the front door at all, owing to the mattresses, and when you tried to go up the backstairs you found that she had walled up most of the porch with old boards to make a place to keep her chickens. It was a standing jest of the boarders that Aniele cleaned house by letting the chickens loose ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... had stopped before the door of Nancy's little house which was arrayed in its summer dress of red and white awnings, and red and white window boxes. The footman had rung the bell, and was waiting with his eye on the front door, so as to catch the right second for opening the door of ...
— Ladies Must Live • Alice Duer Miller
... is ma here?" Wide open banged the front door as Benny bounded down the hall. "Oh, here you are! Say, is it true? Tommy Hooker says our great-grandfather in Africa has died an' left us a million dollars, an' that we're richer'n Mr. Pennock or even the Gaylords, or anybody! Is it true? ...
— Oh, Money! Money! • Eleanor Hodgman Porter
... "Go inside now; I wish to speak to this gentleman." She closed the front door and asked me, all the stores being closed, how she would be able to get the materials for the dinner and to redeem her ...
— Some Reminiscences of old Victoria • Edgar Fawcett
... making theirs. One step within was sufficient. "C" Company sent nightly patrols to the Wadi Sihan and to Two Tree Post, but they returned each morning with no tale to tell. Except when an enterprising member of a patrol entered the back door of a hut unknown to the officer who entered the front door. A little mutual stalking was indulged in with bombs ready, but fortunately recognition took ...
— The Fifth Battalion Highland Light Infantry in the War 1914-1918 • F.L. Morrison
... Wait by the wall, till he a little while Went forward, and prepared. So Reuben stayed; And Jerry with uncertain step advanced, As dreaming of his youth and this his home. Slowly he passed between the gateless posts Before the unused front door, slowly too Beyond the side porch with its woodbine thick Draping autumnal splendor. Thus he came Before the kitchen window, where he saw A gray-haired woman bent o'er needle-work In gathering twilight. And without a voice, Rooted, he stood. He stirred not, but his glance ...
— Rose and Roof-Tree - Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... along the hall, heard the front door shut behind her, and, after a pause, heard the deeper tone of the house door. The droschke drove away. After that, he stood at the window, looking out into the pitch-dark night. Behind him, the landlady set the room in order, and extinguished the ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson
... down the stairs, leaving the lady in possession of her own grandeur. He had not quite understood what she had meant, and was still wondering at the energy of her opposition. when he met Mary herself at the front door. Her father was not with her, but his retreating form was to be seen entering the portal of the Bush. "Oh, Mr. Morton!" exclaimed Mary surprised to have the house-door opened ...
— The American Senator • Anthony Trollope
... resolution at last, and in a half desperate mood, went round to the front door and knocked—a tremulous conscience-stricken knock, as of some milliner's apprentice bringing home a delayed bonnet. The man who opened the door; looked involuntarily for ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon
... orders to his men. Some were to creep to the front door, some to the back. Some were to watch the east, and some the west. He and the sergeant stole on tiptoe to the ...
— The Green Flag • Arthur Conan Doyle
... wall, found a ladder in an out-building, and applied it to one of the back-windows, which they burst open. A shout of triumph, and the report of their pistols, informed their companions of their entrance, and the next moment one of them threw open the front door, and the guerillas ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... at the rich fur rug on her knees. Just then the cariage rolled into a beautifull drive with tall trees and big red flowers growing amid shiny dark leaves. Presently the haughty coachman pulled up with a great clatter at a huge front door with tall pillers each side a big iron bell and two very clean scrapers. The doors flung open as if by majic causing [Pg 32] Ethel to jump and a portly butler appeared on the scene with a very shiny shirt front ...
— The Young Visiters or, Mr. Salteena's Plan • Daisy Ashford
... this would betray them; but, though the Captain and his wife heard the barking, they did not guess the cause. So, the front door being very gently opened and closed, the ...
— In the Yule-Log Glow, Book II - Christmas Tales from 'Round the World • Various
... to where one of them lived, and kept us over night. One of our pigs was cooked for us to eat that night; and the turkey the next morning. But we were both tied that night with our hands behind us, and our feet were also tied. The doors were locked, and a bedstead was set against the front door, and two men slept in it to prevent our getting out in the night. They said that they knew how to catch runaway negroes, and how to keep ...
— Narrative of the Life and Adventures of Henry Bibb, an American Slave, Written by Himself • Henry Bibb
... a cab were heard rattling towards the front door, as if in haste. The vehicle stopped suddenly. Then there was impatient thundering at the knocker, and wild ringing of ...
— The Island Queen • R.M. Ballantyne
... hair seemed to me so touching. Trying not to make a noise, I went to my room on tiptoe and sat down on my bed. No, I was too happy; I could not sleep. Besides, it was too hot in the rooms. Without taking off my uniform, I went quietly into the hall, put on my overcoat, opened the front door and stepped out ...
— The Forged Coupon and Other Stories • Leo Tolstoy
... The front door bell pealed, and there sounded the rustle of Sadie's print skirt on the stairs. A man's voice murmured; Sadie answered, careless, "I'm sure I don't know. ...
— The Garden Party • Katherine Mansfield
... her. A very singular case, the doctor himself had recorded, and which the reader may accept as authentic, is the following: At the head of the doctor's front stairs stood, and still stands, a tall clock, of early date and stately presence. A middle-aged visitor, noticing it as he entered the front door, remarked that he should feel a great unwillingness to pass that clock. He could not go near one of those tall timepieces without a profound agitation, which he dreaded to undergo. This very singular idiosyncrasy he attributed to a fright when he was an ...
— A Mortal Antipathy • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... we did not hear the front door slam, or the sound of footsteps in the hall. Our overstrained nerves found relief in laughter, so that Peter Orme, a lean, ominous figure in the doorway looked in ...
— Dawn O'Hara, The Girl Who Laughed • Edna Ferber
... Martin. I see we're ready to go." He went over to his assistant and took the baby. Together they walked out the front door. ...
— The Ultroom Error • Gerald Allan Sohl
... I saw that the windows of the rooms immediately left and right of it had been stripped of the agent's bills, for I could see where fragments of paper still adhered to the glass. There were no bills in the porch either; but when Gatton opened the front door I ...
— The Green Eyes of Bast • Sax Rohmer
... towards the house when they heard the car drive up to the front door, and before they reached the windows of the dining-room, Randal Bellamy turned ...
— Ambrotox and Limping Dick • Oliver Fleming
... reached home, she bolted the back door, but the front door she took off the hinges, and said, 'Frederick told me to lock the door, but surely it can nowhere be so safe if I take it with me.' So she took her time by the way; and when she overtook her husband she cried out, 'There, Frederick, ...
— Grimms' Fairy Tales • The Brothers Grimm
... elderberry for sore throat, and dandelion for affections of the blood. Then I was shown the oak presses full of linen white as snow and laid up in lavender. This inventory being concluded, I was presented with a key of the front door to mark my admission into the freedom of the house, and invited to take a glass of Burgundy while Sykes was unpacking ...
— Leaves from a Field Note-Book • J. H. Morgan
... found Marie's mother still there, packing dishes and doilies and the like. They had a terrible row, and all the nearest neighbors inclined ears to doors ajar—getting an earful, as Bud contemptuously put it. He finally led Marie's mother to the front door and set her firmly outside. Told her that Marie had come to him with no more than the clothes she had, and that his money had bought every teaspoon and every towel and every stick of furniture in the darned place, and he'd be everlastingly thus-and-so if ...
— Cabin Fever • B. M. Bower
... away!" flashed back Tom. "I'm going to get that powder out of the auto before it goes up! If it does we'll be blown to kingdom come, back door or front door! Come on!" ...
— Tom Swift and his Giant Cannon - or, The Longest Shots on Record • Victor Appleton
... there as upon the floor above, and he had begun to think that the impression he had received had been given him in a dream, though he could not remember that he had been dreaming. But when he came to the front door, he found it was ajar. It was usually secured by a spring lock, and those who were liable to be out in the evening were ...
— Stand By The Union - SERIES: The Blue and the Gray—Afloat • Oliver Optic
... clock in the kitchen; it was reasonably improbable that the faithless servants would come back much before midnight; and she need only wait for the storm to pass to return across the roofs, or, for that matter, to leave circumspectly by the front door. For it would certainly be dark by the time the storm uttered its last surly growl and trailed its bedraggled skirts off across ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... Furry Ones," he continued, after pressing down the tobacco in his pipe, "were born in a dry, warm, roomy den in the bank, under the roots of an old birch that slanted out over the water. The front door was deep under water. But as the old otters had few enemies to dread, being both brave and powerful, they had also a back entrance on dry land, hidden by a thicket of fir bushes. The two furry 'pups' were at first as ...
— Children of the Wild • Charles G. D. Roberts
... was wondering what could be the cause of this, he heard the front door open, and he knew that his father had come home. So he jumped up and ran off into the entry, Nathan following him, to show his father the magnet. His father was busy putting away his coat and hat, and told ...
— Rollo's Experiments • Jacob Abbott
... with deep basement and a flight of steps leading to its front door could, if its walls had lips, tell ...
— Hushed Up - A Mystery of London • William Le Queux
... her sister that takes place in a lower room below Borkman's quarters; and all the while, in the pauses of the conversation, the hero is heard walking overhead, pacing incessantly up and down. As the act advances, the audience expects at any moment that the hero will appear. The front door is thrown open; two minor characters enter; and still Borkman is heard walking up and down. There is more talk about him on the stage; the act is far advanced, and soon it seems that he must show himself. From the upper room is heard the music of the Dance of Death ...
— The Theory of the Theatre • Clayton Hamilton
... adventure. Stuffing a piece of candle and a box of matches into his pocket, he crept downstairs more quietly than he had ever moved in his life before, and through the stone passage to the kitchen, for the front door, when opened, grated on the stone floor, and made a noise which could not fail to rouse the whole household. Everything, looked strange and uncanny in the dim light, but Paul was too anxious and eager to feel fear, and of ordinary ...
— Paul the Courageous • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... and Ellen as lost for ever, whether as sister or friend. So distraught was he that he had nearly tried to open a mid-Victorian cabinet before he discovered it was not the door. Downstairs he hurried wildly, threw on an ulster and cap, and the front door ...
— The Prodigal Father • J. Storer Clouston
... Indian Affairs, his office being in the dwelling house, and I could hear him giving orders to his clerk, as I ran lightly down the stairs, out of the front door to the street, and with fleet foot, I skimmed the road which led to my mother's door, and, reaching it, stood trembling in every limb ...
— From the Darkness Cometh the Light, or Struggles for Freedom • Lucy A. Delaney
... in some measure that he was far from calm, and her own heart began to beat unaccountably. She talked rather fast about the place and its history, and both were relieved when the front door came in sight. ...
— The Price of Things • Elinor Glyn
... that was why he talked so well. On Thursday night his crutch would be left with his big hat at the front door; then, one hand leaning on his cane, the other against the wall for support, he would hobble over to the chair waiting for him, usually by the window for he loved to look out on the river, and there, seldom moving except to stand ...
— Nights - Rome, Venice, in the Aesthetic Eighties; London, Paris, in the Fighting Nineties • Elizabeth Robins Pennell
... side he left the bushes thick for concealment, entering by a narrow path he and Duncan had cleared in setting up the case. He called this the front door, though he used every precaution to hide it. He built rustic seats between several of the trees, leveled the floor, and thickly carpeted it with rank, heavy, woolly-dog moss. Around the case he planted wild clematis, bittersweet, and wild-grapevines, ...
— Freckles • Gene Stratton-Porter
... the matter now? You will naturally think that it was an appointment with his ladylove which he had forgotten; this was certainly my supposition as I turned again to the front door. There stood one of the waitresses, glaring with her white eyes half out of her black face at the already distant back of ...
— Lady Baltimore • Owen Wister
... town mansion stood in a commanding corner position, with its front door in the side street; and from the glimpse that Dale obtained of its hall, its staircase, and its vast depth, he judged that it was quite worthy of the owner of that noble countryseat, the ...
— The Devil's Garden • W. B. Maxwell
... and in a few moments the old man came out at the front door. He carried the rifle on his shoulder, but Harley attributed the fact to his haste at the mention of ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... the broad front door that stood open from morning to night, winter and summer, and paused there to light his cigar. All his characteristics were accented in the lustre of the vivid day, albeit for the most part they were of a null, negative tendency, for he had an inexpressive, ...
— The Phantom Of Bogue Holauba - 1911 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... walked hitherward after parting from Tess, opened the front door, crossed the downstairs room, which was in deep gloom, and then unfastened the stair-door like one whose fingers knew the tricks of the latches well. Her ascent of the crooked staircase was a slower process, and ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... by the front door, going that way not because she wanted to go to Hickleybrow (her goal was Cheasing Eyebright, where her married daughter resided), but because the back door was impassable on account of the canary creeper that had been, growing so furiously ever since she upset the can of food near its roots. ...
— The Food of the Gods and How It Came to Earth • H.G. Wells
... saw him throw open the front door, step without, and fire instantly. Then, dropping his rifle on his arm, he began to use his revolver. She rushed to his side and saw the mob, at least three hundred strong, scattering as if swept away by ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe
... moment." She crossed the room and stood at the end of the big desk. He reached mechanically for his check-book, but she smiled and stopped him. "No; it isn't money, this time: it's something that money can't buy. I met Mr. Edward Raymer at the front door a few minutes ago; does he have an account ...
— The Price • Francis Lynde
... front door, came in collision with a boy taller and stouter than himself, brown and sunburned. But, changed as he was, he was not slow in recognizing his old ...
— Brave and Bold • Horatio Alger, Jr.
... extends back to about 1827, and I recall him, returning home on horseback, when all the boys used to run and contend for the privilege of riding his horse from the front door back to the stable. On one occasion, I was the first, and being mounted rode to the stable; but "Old Dick" was impatient because the stable-door was not opened promptly, so he started for the barn of our neighbor Mr. King; there, also, no one was ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan
... Of course!" agreed Mrs. Marshall-Smith. "Who doesn't hope so?" She paused, her loquacity run desperately thin. There was the sound of a car, driving up to the front door. Sylvia rose in apprehension. Her aunt motioned a reassurance. "I told Tojiko to tell every one that we are not ...
— The Bent Twig • Dorothy Canfield
... o' addressin' the scenery, but still plenty cynical, 'what be they except a fleetin' show to man's deloosion given. Also, thar's nothin' to 'em. You opens their front door, an' you're in their ...
— Faro Nell and Her Friends - Wolfville Stories • Alfred Henry Lewis
... I don't know is at the front door. I opened it with the chain on, and a man said he must see ...
— The Unclassed • George Gissing
... The front door stood open, and the light from the hall chandelier shone upon something that glittered on the door-mat. The servant was not in sight; the merriment in the parlors was increasing; the way was open to any child who might see and covet ...
— Harper's Young People, August 17, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... the front door with a great deal of ceremony the instant the rickety elevator came to a stop at the seventh floor, and gave greeting to the five Sykeses on the dark, narrow landing. He mentioned each by name and very gravely shook their red-mittened paws as they sidled past him with eager, bulging ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... the entry. Closing the front door and turning the key, as before, she threw open the door of the adjoining room and asked him to walk in. Wildeve entered, the room appearing to be empty; but as soon as he had advanced a few steps he started. On the hearth rug lay Clym asleep. Beside him were the leggings, thick boots, leather ...
— The Return of the Native • Thomas Hardy
... parts of it, four or five times before it became a definite thing to him. Before he could stop, let us say, before the Browns' house and take pleasure in the trim of their front door, before he could see the heliotrope growing in the snow-white jardiniere in the living-room window, before he knew that Mrs. Brown made cookies every Friday, and that if you went round to the kitchen door and were very hungry and polite she gave them away while they were still hot ...
— If You Touch Them They Vanish • Gouverneur Morris
... half-hour, to be sure, when five of the Happy Hexagons sat a little quietly on the front gallery and tried to talk as if there were no such thing as a windmill, and no such person as a girl who could climb to the top of it; but after Genevieve and Mrs. Kennedy, arm in arm, came through the front door—with eyes indeed, a little misty, but with lips cheerfully smiling—every vestige of constraint fled. Genevieve, once more in her pretty linen frock, was again the alert little hostess, and very soon they were all off to inspect the flower garden, the vegetable garden, the cow corral, the sheds, ...
— The Sunbridge Girls at Six Star Ranch • Eleanor H. (Eleanor Hodgman) Porter
... sight. For instance, he says he stood in the passage in front of the nine bells watching them ring, with both the servants close by. Once in particular he watched the housemaid on her knees in the middle of the wash-house scrubbing the tiles, while the front door, area door, and bath-room bells were pealing violently. The ringing was also heard by tradesmen, and by men working in the gardens near. The wires of the bells were distinctly moved, not only the bells and the ...
— Psychic Phenomena - A Brief Account of the Physical Manifestations Observed - in Psychical Research • Edward T. Bennett
... he roared as he leaped across the room toward the front door. At the harsh tone of his voice, the whimpering sounds in the room suddenly burst forth in full volume as the ten pollywogs raised their hoarse ...
— Narakan Rifles, About Face! • Jan Smith
... and my curiosity aroused, I consented, and followed the man back to a great stone-built mansion about fifty yards away. The front door in its deep portico stood open, just as the servant had left it when, apparently, he had dashed out into the street to accost ...
— The Stretton Street Affair • William Le Queux
... the familiar chugging of the motor was heard at the front door in Cavendish Square, John hurried out. Just as he was examining all the chauffeur's arrangements for the trip, and looking with approval over the entire automobile, the whir of the engine suddenly gasped, struggled to catch its breath, and then ...
— John and Betty's History Visit • Margaret Williamson
... of a considerable property, heavily mortgaged to one friend, and a wife of some attraction, on whose affections another friend held an encumbering lien. One day it was found that he had secretly dug, or caused to be dug, a deep trap before the front door of his dwelling, into which a few friends in the course of the evening casually and familiarly dropt. This circumstance, slight in itself, seemed to point to the existence of a certain humor in the man, which might eventually get into ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. X (of X) - America - II, Index • Various
... noticing, to his surprise, the heavy shutters which their folds had partly concealed. Then he made his way out along the passage to the front door, which from the inside he was able to open easily enough. Leaving it carefully ajar, he went out with the intention of making an examination of the outside of the place. Instead, however, he paused ...
— The Vanished Messenger • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... interrupted by a ring at the front door. The three looked at each other. It was late for a caller, and Mrs. Baggert had ...
— Tom Swift and his Electric Runabout - or, The Speediest Car on the Road • Victor Appleton
... all about him at the front door, in the hall, and extending far into the rooms, a truly depressing chaos of packing boxes, swathed tables, chairs, bureaus, and barrels of china. Nor was this all; for even as I loitered up to the door the dray of Sam Murdock halted in ...
— The Boss of Little Arcady • Harry Leon Wilson
... parlor. She had sat there almost all day, in an agony of fear. At four o'clock the smallest Wilkinson had hammered at the front door, and on being admitted had made ...
— A Poor Wise Man • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... than that the house was haunted. Figures with something singularly unfamiliar about them were seen by crowds on the sidewalk to pass in and out. No one could say just where they appeared upon the open lawn on their way to the front door by which they entered, nor at exactly what point they vanished as they came out; or, rather, while each spectator was positive enough about these matters, no two agreed. They were all similarly at variance in their descriptions ...
— Present at a Hanging and Other Ghost Stories • Ambrose Bierce
... room; and as I did so, I found the front door open, and Mr Barclay on the step, looking across at Miss Adela Mimpriss, who was just tripping up the steps of the house opposite; and I saw her use a latchkey, open the door, and look round as she was going in, to give ...
— Begumbagh - A Tale of the Indian Mutiny • George Manville Fenn
... and luxurious, with red panels and an expensive alien chauffeur, met Jimmy at the station. Mrs. Marlow hurried down to the hall as she heard the throbbing of the engine outside the front door, and greeted her brother with emotion ...
— People of Position • Stanley Portal Hyatt
... noiselessly at the miracle of old oak that must be called the front door, and slipped aside to put on his hat. She stood looking at me with open blue eyes in which no sight lay, and I saw for the first time that ...
— Traffics and Discoveries • Rudyard Kipling
... the yard now, a big, black hack from the Inn, with a white horse. Judith liked white horses best. The front door opened, and her father, very tall and blond, with his shirt-front showing white, and her mother, with something shiny in her black ...
— The Wishing Moon • Louise Elizabeth Dutton
... The front door of a large house in Harley Street stood hospitably open, and leaning against the plaster pillars (which were of a very miscellaneous architecture) were two individuals, who appeared as if they had been set there expressly to invite the passengers to walk in. Beyond the red door ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... us, was crippled. The lessons he gave us were no longer required with the former exactness; and we tried to gratify our curiosity for military and other public proceedings as much as possible, not only at home, but also in the streets, which was the more easily done, as the front door, open day and night, was guarded by sentries who paid no attention to the running to ...
— Autobiography • Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
... front door to see Mr Colclough depart homewards in his automobile. The two great acetylene head-lights sent long glaring shafts of light down the side street. Mr Colclough, throwing the score of the Sinfonia Domestica into the tonneau of the immense car, put on a pair of gloves and ...
— The Grim Smile of the Five Towns • Arnold Bennett
... where he lived, and went to see him. He was the wealthiest man within a hundred miles of that place, and had a wife and seven beautiful children. Just as I reached his gate, I saw him coming out of the front door. I stepped up to ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various
... been told in Mr. Ray's family. "One summer morning, a loud rap with the knocker at the front door arrested the attention and the door being opened, a man entered, who after asking, 'Does the Rev. Mr. Ray live here?' and receiving an affirmative answer, whistled as a signal to attract the notice of his comrades, ...
— The Journal of Negro History, Volume 4, 1919 • Various
... carpet should be provided from curb to house. A man should be stationed at the curb to open carriage doors and call them when the guests leave, and another African Teas man should be in attendance at the front door to open it the moment a guest appears at the top step and to direct him ...
— The Book of Good Manners • W. C. Green
... now, anyway," Mrs. Lawrence declared. "She's gone for good, and no mistake. Walked right out of the house. I heard her slam the front door." ...
— The Tempting of Tavernake • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... of something to say, but before the right thing occurred he heard Cameron's cheerful whistle cut off by the closing of the heavy front door. ...
— The Shield of Silence • Harriet T. Comstock
... creature running up those long ascents after her, and pursuing her through the dark passages—which, after all, might lead to no tower! That thought was too much. Her heart failed her, and, turning from the stair, she rushed along to the hall, whence, finding the front door open, she darted into the court pursued—at least she thought so—by the creature. No one happening to see her, on she ran, unable to think for fear, and ready to run anywhere to elude the awful creature with the stilt-legs. ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald
... front door and let in Bunny, Sue and their mother, the two children wondering what could have happened to the boy next door, for they did not see him, and it seemed the trouble ...
— Bunny Brown and His Sister Sue on an Auto Tour • Laura Lee Hope
... Greek visitors, that they had given rise to the story of the "labyrinth," the name which we give to a structure with so many complicated passages that it is almost impossible to find our way out, once the front door has closed upon our ...
— The Story of Mankind • Hendrik van Loon
... to be seen, up-stairs and down, at the parsonage; but Anna did not wonder at this. She managed to reach the front door ...
— A Little Maid of Old Maine • Alice Turner Curtis
... punch his head. By the same post I wrote for a particular model,—a retired pugilist. As soon as he arrived next morning I placed him at the window of my studio facing the opposite house, now and then sending him down to the front door to stand on the doorstep to await some imaginary person, and to keep his eye on the house opposite. I went on with my work in peace. Presently a ...
— The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Harry Furniss
... back more than a century, yet it had nothing imposing about it except its site. It was a simple, glaringly white cottage. There was a center front door with two windows on each side; there was a low slant of roof, pierced by unpicturesque dormers. On the left of the house was an ell, which had formerly been used as a shoemaker's shop, but now served as a kitchen. In the low ...
— The Copy-Cat and Other Stories • Mary E. Wilkins Freeman
... is supposed to have lived in one of the cob cottages that used to be on the front. Like the Lords with Reform, so was Mrs. Partington with the Atlantic Ocean, which she tried to keep out of her front door with a mop. "She was excellent at slop or puddle, but should never have meddled with a tempest." If she was an actual character the good dame's house probably stood where now the fine esplanade runs its straight course between Peak Hill and the Alma Bridge ...
— Wanderings in Wessex - An Exploration of the Southern Realm from Itchen to Otter • Edric Holmes
... at the jetty. March off to it and sit there, lie down there, do anything but go to sleep there—till you hear my call, and then fly here. Them's your orders. March! Get, vamos! No, not that way—out through the front door. No sulks!" ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad
... down near her mother, they both heard a sudden slamming of the front door, two flights of stairs below. Their eyes flew in an exchanged glance that held trepidation. It was probably dad, and at this time on a Saturday night dad was usually the worse for wear. Both listened. There was a heavy ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... thrusting its branches out between the pickets, ran a head-high hedge of lilac bushes, so that, unless you stood directly in front of the gate, all you saw of the first story were the tops of the front door and the close-shuttered windows. Between house and hedge there was the remains of a tiny formal garden. Rows of box, winter-killed in spots, circled and angled about grass-grown spaces which had once been flower-beds. The dozen feet of path from gate to steps ...
— The Lilac Girl • Ralph Henry Barbour
... and chattering, vanished through the front door to disperse to their different homes, and then, in a minute, the inner door opened again, and a small figure appeared; a nun followed, but she remained in the background, whilst Madelon came forward with a look of eager expectation ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter
... taking the family life to the rear of the house, no one noticed that soft footsteps were passing through the open front door, that Jane, who was sweeping the vestibule, had left ajar to run and tell Dick that she had not let the bird out of the dining-room. So the uninvited guest to the household let himself up easily to the scene of his hopes—the location of the ...
— Five Little Peppers Midway • Margaret Sidney
... are more than twenty carriages before the front door. Our coachman is driving round, and we will go out by the ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet
... chief McIntosh knew his fate, and, repairing to the apartment of his guest and son, told them he was about to die, and directing his son to escape from the rear of the house, and across the river, said he would meet his fate as a warrior. Taking his rifle, he went to the front door, and throwing it open, fired upon the array of warriors as he gave the war-whoop, and, in an instant after, fell dead; pierced with twenty balls. Chillie, at this moment, sprang from the window, leaped into the river, and made his escape, though ...
— The Memories of Fifty Years • William H. Sparks
... humiliating," continued the lady. "When the minister called yesterday and rang the bell a big card appeared on the front door on which was printed the words: 'Busy; Call Again.' Fortunately Helen saw him and let him in, but when I reproved Robert for the act he said he was just trying the sign to see if it ...
— The Master Key - An Electrical Fairy Tale • L. Frank Baum
... out-door amusement that my father enjoyed was shooting at a mark with a Snider rifle. The nature of the grounds made it easy to get a safe hundred yards' range within three minutes' walk of the front door, and three or four hundred yards by going a little farther. We practised in this way pretty often, and I think the judge was, on the whole, a better shot than any of his sons. In the year 1883 the household was increased, a good deal to my father's ...
— The Life of Sir James Fitzjames Stephen, Bart., K.C.S.I. - A Judge of the High Court of Justice • Sir Leslie Stephen
... shingles stained a dark gray by long exposure to wind and weather. Faded green shutters hung on the windows of the lower story. Behind it grew a thick wood of spruces. The little yard in front of it was grassy and prim and flowerless; but over the low front door a luxuriant early-flowering rose vine clambered, in a riot of blood-red blossom which contrasted strangely with the general bareness of its surroundings. It seemed to fling itself over the grim old house as if intent on bombarding it with ...
— Kilmeny of the Orchard • Lucy Maud Montgomery
... following day the elephant-driver appeared at the front door, but without the elephant. I immediately foreboded some disaster, which was soon explained. Mr. Perkes had kept up the pace for fifteen miles, to Rambodde, when, finding that the elephant was not required, he took a little refreshment in the shape of brandy and water, and ...
— Eight Years' Wandering in Ceylon • Samuel White Baker
... and a front dormer-window relieved it from the appearance of disproportion. Its gable ends were surmounted by two enormous brick chimneys, carried up on the outside, in the fashion of the South, and its high, broad windows were ornamented with Venetian blinds. Its front door opened directly into the 'living-room,' and at the threshold we met its mistress. As the image of that lady has still a warm place in a pleasant corner of my memory, I will describe her. She was about thirty years of age, and had a fresh, cheerful face. To ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 2, No. 2, August, 1862 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various
... was just established in the big reclining chair in the living room when a peremptory knock called Barbara to the front door. ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright
... Yasha, laden with bags and boxes, go downstairs from the hotel room to the front door to get into a sledge and drive to the station. They are seen off by the hotel-keeper, the waiter, and various women. The old man is touched. He thrusts ten-kopeck pieces in all directions, and says ...
— The Schoolmistress and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... stables was completed it was time for the host to feed his stock, and, saying good-by at the barn, he left Benton to make his way alone to the cabin. Passing through the house from the back, the man halted suddenly and with abrupt wonderment at the front door. ...
— The Lighted Match • Charles Neville Buck
... to tell no one where he took her, Patty bought a ticket for Fern Falls, and in a few hours amazed Adele Kenerley by walking in at her front door. ...
— Patty Blossom • Carolyn Wells
... politeness unusual in him towards men. Raut went out, and then, after a wordless look at her, her husband followed. She stood motionless while Raut's light footfall and her husband's heavy tread, like bass and treble, passed down the passage together. The front door slammed heavily. She went to the window, moving slowly, and stood watching, leaning forward. The two men appeared for a moment at the gateway in the road, passed under the street lamp, and were hidden by the black masses of the shrubbery. ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... music was drowned by the crunch of gravel; there was the quick step of somebody coming up the drive; then the wooden steps gave hollow notice. The visitor's advent was announced again by the brass knocker on the front door. ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser |
