"Burglar" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... paid for by Gager, who then requested that they might be left there undisturbed for five minutes. The young lady promised to do her best, and then closed the door. "And now, Mr. 'Oward, what can I do for you?" said Mr. Cann, the burglar. ...
— The Eustace Diamonds • Anthony Trollope
... I sha'n't see him for two days at least,' she said, 'unless I'm either taken very ill or attacked by a burglar. Why, why can't a poor woman be allowed to bring up her own children in ...
— The Gold-Stealers - A Story of Waddy • Edward Dyson
... solemn importance of instilling right principles into the mind, from the first dawn of reason, cannot be too strongly enforced. Many a wretched midnight burglar commenced his career of vice and folly by stealing fruit, followed by thieving anything that he could HANDSOMELY. Pilfering, unless severely checked, is a hotbed for the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... rooms, and being convinced that a desperate scoundrel was in the house, raised the very old boy. Poor Jones, in his efforts to get out, run over pots, pans, and chairs, and through him and the servants, the police were alarmed! lights were raised, and Jones was arrested for a burglar! ...
— The Humors of Falconbridge - A Collection of Humorous and Every Day Scenes • Jonathan F. Kelley
... letter from his wife must have made some extraordinary revelation to Risler; and, in order not to disturb his hosts, he had made his escape noiselessly through the window, like a burglar. Why? With ...
— Fromont and Risler, Complete • Alphonse Daudet
... as an equivalent for L10,000," Stephen Foster replied. "But there is not much of that sort of thing done—the ordinary burglar doesn't understand the game," he went on, carelessly. "And a good thing for the dealers, too. With my knowledge of the place, I could very easily remove a picture from Lamb and ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon
... Verity, whose mind still ran on magazine stories, "to marry a fascinating man whom you'd met by chance, and then find out that he was a gentleman-burglar? What would you do?" ...
— A Popular Schoolgirl • Angela Brazil
... the burglar—maybe he hid the things under there—I'm going to find out," and before Alice could stop her, Chicken Little was disappearing under the ...
— Chicken Little Jane • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... be at least an hour before he dared to move again, and he would have to be doubly careful this time. And he was a little nervous himself now about that burglar. What if he should meet him when he went out again? He tried to forget about that by thinking of what he would put in ...
— David and the Phoenix • Edward Ormondroyd
... his confounded nose that Old England was played out; been a controlling voice already in his shipping firm; drunk five other of the best men in London under the table; broken his neck steeple-chasing; shot a burglar in the legs; been nearly drowned, for a bet; killed snipe in Chelsea; been to Court for his sins; stared a ghost out of countenance; and travelled with a lady of Spain. If this young pup had done the last, it would be all he had; ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... three days after its passage (April 5) the Governor had approved it, the Mayor had appointed Tweed to the position of most power, and Sweeny had taken the place of most lucre. Thereafter, as commissioner of public works, the Boss was to be "the bold burglar," and his silent partner "the dark plotter." A week later the departments of police and health, the office of comptroller, the park commission, and the great law bureau had passed into the control of their pals, with Connolly ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... I went alone, and in Warner's European and Egyptian absences I formed the habit of going to Clemens. By this time he was in his new house, where he used to give me a royal chamber on the ground floor, and come in at night after I had gone to bed to take off the burglar alarm so that the family should not be roused if anybody tried to get in at my window. This would be after we had sat up late, he smoking the last of his innumerable cigars, and soothing his tense nerves with a mild hot Scotch, while we both talked and talked and ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells
... a safe," replied Mrs. Blake. "It isn't a very big one, and I suppose a real burglar wouldn't have much trouble in opening it. But there aren't any burglars around here—there may be desperate men, but they're not burglars. They can't work the combination. Besides, we'll be on the lookout and watch, and you'll stay here all night, Jack, ...
— Jack of the Pony Express • Frank V. Webster
... watchdog and a garden, it might be a good idea to paint a phosphorescent and terrifying watchdog on the wall. Perhaps a watchlion would be even more terrifying—and, presumably, just as easy to paint. Any burglar would be deterred if he came across a lion suddenly in the back garden. One way or another, it should be possible to have something a little more interesting than mere bricks at the end of ...
— If I May • A. A. Milne
... mood. For this the loss of our forbidden fruit was indirectly responsible. The immediate cause of our ill-humour was the exasperating reflection that we were debarred from taking even those simple steps which lead to the restoration of lost luggage. We stood in the shoes of a burglar who has been robbed of his spoils. As like as not, our precious uniform-case was lying at the station, waiting to be claimed. Yet we dared not inquire, because of what our inquiries might bring forth. ...
— Jonah and Co. • Dornford Yates
... wringing her hands. "Didn't I say I heard a noise—I told you I heard a burglar, Rebecca," she went on, ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye
... contents on a bill file,—one of those hard-bosomed women who stump into church as they stump into a department store with an air of "Now then, what can you show me that's new," who go about with a metaphorical set of burglar's tools in a large bag with which to break open confidences and who have no ...
— Who Cares? • Cosmo Hamilton
... looked this way, and then he looked that way, to be sure that no one saw him, for what he was planning to do was a very dreadful thing, and he knew it. Happy Jack was going to turn burglar. A burglar, you know, is one who breaks into another's house or barn to steal, which is a very, very dreadful thing to do. Yet this is just what Happy Jack Squirrel was planning to do. He was going to get into that old stump, and if those big, fat hickory nuts were there, as ...
— Happy Jack • Thornton Burgess
... minding their own business, do not give much thought to their subtler enemies. A burglar, creeping in through the window, we can see and scream at; but a Public Poisoner, a whole array of Public Poisoners, creeping through the Legislature, ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
... That meant that if she plunged into the fray she might be mistaken for a woman burglar, and arrested with the guilty. Even if she lurked where she was, a prowling policeman might suppose she sought concealment, and bag her ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... alive, etc.; and by the manner in which they answered these questions—simply, regretfully, defiantly, or otherwise—he judged whether they were being adequately punished or not. Yet he could not talk to Cowperwood as he now saw or as he would to the average second-story burglar, store-looter, pickpocket, and plain cheap thief and swindler. And yet he scarcely ...
— The Financier • Theodore Dreiser
... a chuckle that Mac was "a little bewildered, like a hen with a red rag on her tail—divided in his mind like. As for Dad, he still thinks me a burglar on ...
— Money Magic - A Novel • Hamlin Garland
... Collumpsion paused, and then gave utterance to his feelings. "That's music—positively music. This is my house—there's my name on the brass-plate—that's my knocker, as I can prove by the bill and receipt; and, yet, here I am about to sneak in like a burglar. Old John sha'n't go to bed another night; I'll not indulge the lazy scoundrel any longer, Yet the poor old fellow nursed me when a child. I'll compromise the matter—I'll knock, and let myself in." So saying, Collumpsion thumped away ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, August 28, 1841 • Various
... "A burglar!" exclaimed Harley. His first thought was of Helen Anderson and her beautiful, appealing face, and without a moment's hesitation he sprang over the wall to pursue. Jimmy Grayson looked at him ...
— The Candidate - A Political Romance • Joseph Alexander Altsheler
... couldn't go to sleep, and after I'd been in bed about an hour I got up and sat by the window. I was staring down into the garden, and all of a sudden I saw something white begin to move and creep about. I watched it a few moments and I got the idea it was a burglar or a sneak thief, it kept so close to the house. I came down to call Mr. ...
— Betty Gordon at Boarding School - The Treasure of Indian Chasm • Alice Emerson
... it was a sort of reception or waiting-room, and that it was empty. The door below it was also open, and with the idea that I would surely find some one there, I walked on up the hall. I was in evening dress, and I felt I did not look like a burglar, so I had no great fear that, should I encounter one of the inmates of the house, he would shoot me on sight. The second door in the hall opened into a dining-room. This was also empty. One person had been ...
— In the Fog • Richard Harding Davis
... failed to take care of herself; a couple of chimney-sweeps with partially washed faces; a charwoman with her friend the female greengrocer, who had been burned out of the opposite side of the court; two or three coster-mongers, a burglar, several thieves, a footman in resplendent livery, a few noted drunkards, and chimney-pot Liz with her teapot—not the original teapot of course—that had perished in the flames—but one indistinguishably like it, which had been presented to her by Colonel Brentwood. She had insisted ...
— The Garret and the Garden • R.M. Ballantyne
... there was no longer any danger of being discovered. Quickening his pace, he soon reached the pier, and with the skiff boarded the Greyhound. The night was certainly favorable for the execution of dark deeds. The midnight assassin, the incendiary, or the burglar would have rejoiced in its darkness, its dense black clouds, and its ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic
... blackleg, leg, welsher [Slang]; defaulter; Autolycus^, Jeremy Diddler^, Robert Macaire, artful dodger, trickster; swell mob [Slang], chevalier d'industrie [Fr.]; shoplifter. swindler, peculator; forger, coiner; fence, receiver of stolen goods, duffer; smasher. burglar, housebreaker; cracksman^, magsman [Slang]; Bill Sikes, Jack Sheppard, Jonathan Wild. gang [group of thieves], gang of thieves, theft ring; organized crime, mafia, the Sicilian Mafia, the mob, la cosa nostra [It]. [famous thieves], ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... I admit he rides well enough for one, but many men ride besides bushmen. I know neither he nor his partner have any practical bush experience. I know that. Just as I know the man who went through the town to-night is a burglar who learned his craft in one of the big cities of the world. The way that hotel door was opened was one of the finest pieces of expert burglary I've ever seen, and there are some pretty smart men at the game in ...
— The Rider of Waroona • Firth Scott
... politically, the missionaries found their task all but too easy to suit militant Christians. As the converted drunkard and burglar at a slum pentecost pour out their stories of weakness and crime, so these Arioi, glorying in their being washed white as snow, recited to hymning congregations confessions that made the offenses of the Marquis de Sade or Jack the ...
— Mystic Isles of the South Seas. • Frederick O'Brien
... putting her mother to bed, she pinned a shawl over her head, threw her mother's cloak about her shoulders, sneaked into Maria's house, and crept up into her friend's room like a burglar. What was to be done must be ...
— Abijah's Bubble - 1909 • F. Hopkinson Smith
... wasn't doing anything of the sort, my dear Molly. He had gone off in a fright, and when my grandmother thought it over coolly, she felt convinced that he was not a regular burglar, and so it turned out. He was a man who worked at a smithy near by, and this was his first attempt at burglary. He had heard that my grandfather was to be out late, through one of the servants, whom he had persuaded not to lock the door, on the pretense that ...
— Grandmother Dear - A Book for Boys and Girls • Mrs. Molesworth
... murmured Mrs. Currie; "he thought Tacks was a nasty burglar, didn't he? He wasn't going to see master ...
— Stories By English Authors: London • Various
... honest hand, fresh from charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and hear him talk about things frankly. When he gave to the missionary collection, rest assured he gave sincerely; when he "covered swag," into the melting pot for an industrious burglar, he did so only in ...
— The Delicious Vice • Young E. Allison
... his maid-servant, though not his wife nor his ass, because I don't like his wife and he keeps no live-stock—all my sins, I say, rose up before me, for I expected every moment that a bullet would penetrate my brain, or my heart if perchance the burglar whom I suspected of levelling a clicking revolver at me aimed at ...
— The Enchanted Typewriter • John Kendrick Bangs
... used to take it, as evidence that the person smiling is either happy or kind. It then seemed to come from the heart. It now seems a formula. It is, we may admit, a pleasant and useful formula. But a man might easily be a burglar or a murderer or a Cabinet Minister and smile. Some people are supposed to smile merely in order to show what good teeth they have. William John McNabb, I ...
— The Pleasures of Ignorance • Robert Lynd
... know. Do you suppose he was afraid we might find his hiding place. By Jove! we found the burglars' tools, Jack, and now you have found the burglar ...
— The Hilltop Boys - A Story of School Life • Cyril Burleigh
... the enterprising burglar isn't burgling, When the cut-throat isn't occupied in crime, He loves to hear the little brook a-gurgling, And listen to the merry village chime. When the coster's finished jumping on his mother, He loves to lie a-basking in the sun: Ah, take one consideration with another, ...
— Bab Ballads and Savoy Songs • W. S. Gilbert
... Congress in London one of the speakers expressed a preference for the son of a husky burglar over the son of a tuberculous bishop. This is doubtless quite correct, but why should the bishop be tuberculous? The truth of the matter is, the reverse is more likely to be the case. Personally, I should prefer to be the offspring of a husky bishop. In dealing with criminals, ...
— The Meaning of Evolution • Samuel Christian Schmucker
... he did. When the trio, their hearts thumping with anticipation, reached the low door of the first cabin, they found it securely fastened on the outside, so that no burglar-beast could force an entrance, but easily opened by man. Cyrus hurriedly undid the bolts, and stepped under the log roof, followed by his comrades. The camp was in beautiful order, clean, well-stocked, and ...
— Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... stock is on tap, so to speak, here in the church itself, and the parishioners come and get some for themselves according to their need for it. Some come every day, some only once a year, some perhaps never between their baptism and their funeral. But they all have a right here, the professional burglar every whit as much as the speckless saint. The only stipulation is that they oughtn't to come under false pretences: the burglar is in honor bound not to pass himself off to his priest as the saint. But that is merely a moral obligation, established in the burglar's own interest. ...
— The Damnation of Theron Ware • Harold Frederic
... heard of the great robbery and of my dreadful fright. But there is no use crying about it. It is one of those dreadful things, I suppose, that simply have to happen. The burglar was smooth-shaven. How awful that this should have to happen in Aiken of all cities. In Aiken where we never have felt hitherto that it was ever necessary to lock the door. I suppose Mr. Powell's nice hardware store will do an enormous business now ...
— IT and Other Stories • Gouverneur Morris
... sing in the middle of the night last night—two bars, and then another. I thought at first it might be a burglar whistling to his mate in the black and ...
— A Diary Without Dates • Enid Bagnold
... and bolted out of the bank as a burglar might have done. It was five minutes to twelve when he got to the steps that led to the rooms of Mr. Von Brent. Now all his excitement seemed to have deserted him. He was as cool and calm as if he had five days, instead of so ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... and night. The stealthiest burglar in the world could not come within a stone's throw of ...
— Green Fancy • George Barr McCutcheon
... from a fruit burglar, and Tom here and my gardener were watching, but he did not come. Then he ...
— The Vast Abyss - The Story of Tom Blount, his Uncles and his Cousin Sam • George Manville Fenn
... utterly forgets his sorrows in the excitement, just as a rowing-man, all over boils and blisters, will pull a desperate race without feeling any pain. Such dogs are not easily excited by anything but a chase, and a burglar might come and rob the house and murder the inmates without arousing any excitement among them. Guarding a house is "not their pidgin" as the Chinese say. That is one great reason for the success of the dog at whatever branch of his tribe's work ...
— Three Elephant Power • Andrew Barton 'Banjo' Paterson
... the same time, he was quite aware that they had only to persist in their story to obtain legal authority to search the room upstairs, and his master had commanded "no police interference." He felt pretty confident, too, that they would hardly attempt to play the burglar game in his presence, but he was curious to see how far they would go, and he ...
— Till the Clock Stops • John Joy Bell
... through the window like a burglar. It was a good instrument, but hired. Under Lancelot's fingers it sang like a bird and growled like a beast. When the piano was done growling Lancelot usually started. He paced up and down the room, swearing audibly. Then he would sit down at the table ...
— Merely Mary Ann • Israel Zangwill
... in my former profession, it would have been criminal to touch the stuff. The worst crime a burglar can commit is to get drunk. No decent, bang-up burglar ever does it. I don't suppose there is a more self-respectin' sort of man in the world than a high-grade burglar. And it's the same with a preacher. He can't any more preach a good sermon when he is ...
— West Wind Drift • George Barr McCutcheon
... to tell us, Fred, that a desperate burglar would take all the chances of breaking into a house where he might get shot, just to steal a hat!" Colon demanded, as though suspecting they were being made the victims of a joke, although as a rule Fred seldom allowed himself to ...
— Fred Fenton Marathon Runner - The Great Race at Riverport School • Allen Chapman
... Mr. Devins, looking after him with contracted brow. "He has spent two Christmas days of twenty-three out of jail. He is a burglar, or was. His daughter has brought him round. She is a seamstress. For three months, now, she has been keeping him and the home, working nights. If I could only get him a job! He won't stay honest long without it; but who wants a burglar for a watchman? ...
— Children of the Tenements • Jacob A. Riis
... did not blush. This young fellow, although evidently not a tramp or a burglar, had caused her some moments of distinct uneasiness, and ...
— Keziah Coffin • Joseph C. Lincoln
... guessed that any sight of him would cause James to repeat his job of destruction. Brennan also envisioned a self-destructive device that would addle the heart of the machine at the touch of a button, perhaps booby-traps fitted like burglar alarms that would ruin the machine at the first touch ...
— The Fourth R • George Oliver Smith
... slenderest of margins. But after all, I concluded, if a stranger missed it only by a miracle it might have served a double purpose here; no one slept in the second story, ordinarily, and it would make a good burglar alarm, as well as a repository for the iron candlestick and ...
— The Paternoster Ruby • Charles Edmonds Walk
... living language of his country, had been one of the most skilful of prosodical proficients. Such instances may allay our alarm. There cannot be any lasting force in arguments which remind us of the pious confessions of a redeemed burglar. It needs more than the zeal of a turncoat to drive ...
— Some Diversions of a Man of Letters • Edmund William Gosse
... mankind has a sneaking sympathy with a poacher? A burglar or a pickpocket has our unmitigated contempt; he clearly is a criminal; but you will notice that the poacher in the story is generally a reckless daredevil with a large and compensatory amount of good-fellow in his make-up—yes, I almost said, ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry
... burglar, and one of Fagin's associates. Bill Sikes was a hardened, irreclaimable villian,[TN-178] but had a conscience which almost drove him mad after the murder of Nancy, who really loved him (ch. xlviii.) ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... ignorance and poverty, and have not even the apology of a precedent for their meanness. Why, one of our generous southern planters is as far above one of your stingy shave-three-cents-on-a-yard-tradesmen, as Robin Hood is above a miserable tea-spoon burglar. The south sails under false colors, does it? What flag do your platform men give to the wind, I should like to know? What do they care for the Fugitive Slave Law? Half of them would help a runaway to Canada with as good a will as they'd eat their dinner. (Coming close and sitting ...
— Autographs for Freedom, Volume 2 (of 2) (1854) • Various
... right behind me, inquiring very politely what I was trying to do! It was Ted, here, who had been out for a stroll, and happening to catch a glimpse of me at this very peculiar occupation, and naturally thinking I was a burglar, had come up unobserved to ...
— The Dragon's Secret • Augusta Huiell Seaman
... owned Stormfield Certainty Chastity, you can carry it too far. Claudius Conceit in believing that he was the Creator's pet Continuous procession of blood and slaughter and stench Costs even more to entertain a dog than a burglar Curiosities and absurdities of religious superstitions Death—the only immortal who treats us all alike Despises pretenders and charlatans of all sorts Dreaming of the past or anticipating the future Dying I don't want to be stimulated ...
— Widger's Quotations from Albert Bigelow Paine on Mark Twain • David Widger
... burglaries in the West Country, for none of which was any criminal ever arrested. The last of these, at Folkestone Court, in May, was remarkable for the cold-blooded pistoling of the page, who surprised the masked and solitary burglar. I cannot doubt that Stapleton recruited his waning resources in this fashion, and that for years he has been a desperate and ...
— Hound of the Baskervilles • Authur Conan Doyle
... which made the younger girl an acute anxiety and a perpetual delight. She was like a little plant growing in the shade—a gently good child, who never gave anybody any trouble; she continued to be a 'fraid-cat, and looked under the bed every night for a burglar. With Blair at boarding-school her life was very solitary, for of course there was no intimacy between her and her stepmother. Mrs. Maitland was invariably kind to her, and astonishingly patient with the rather dull little mind—one of those ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... on a sheet of paper stained with coffee-cup rings, "I made the acquaintance of a polite burglar, who introduced me to his lady wife, and to other courteous criminals, their spouses and families. My slight knowledge of Czech, which I had by this time acquired, enabled me to take vast pleasure in their society. Granted their sociological premises, based on Proudhon, they are too ...
— The Beloved Vagabond • William J. Locke
... blow; and in most Izumo homes there is not a lock which could resist one vigorous pull. Indeed, the Japanese themselves are so far aware of the futility of their wooden panels against burglars that all who can afford it build kura—small heavy fire-proof and (for Japan) almost burglar-proof structures, with very thick earthen walls, a narrow ponderous door fastened with a gigantic padlock, and one very small iron-barred window, high up, near the roof. The kura are whitewashed, and look very neat. They cannot be used for dwellings, ...
— Glimpses of an Unfamiliar Japan • Lafcadio Hearn
... obtained by Science are won by no mystical faculties, by no mental processes other than those which are practised by every one of us, in the humblest and meanest affairs of life. A detective policeman discovers a burglar from the marks made by his shoe, by a mental process identical with that by which Cuvier restored the extinct animals of Montmartre from fragments of their bones. Nor does that process of induction and deduction by which ...
— Thomas Henry Huxley; A Sketch Of His Life And Work • P. Chalmers Mitchell
... maybe the guy is a burglar, and that gives me another creepy feeling. But would a burglar be taking time out to ...
— It's like this, cat • Emily Neville
... general opposition to law, or even general opposition to English law. The statistics of ordinary crime are (it is said) no higher in Ireland than in other parts of the United Kingdom. A pickpocket or a burglar is as easily convicted in Ireland as elsewhere; the persons who lamentably enough are either left unpunished, or if punished may count on popular sympathy, are criminals whose offences, atrocious and cruel as they constantly are, are connected in popular opinion with political, and at bottom, it ...
— England's Case Against Home Rule • Albert Venn Dicey
... easiest thing in the world to stir humankind's ever-tense burglar-nerves into hysterical jangling. In house after house, for miles of the peaceful North Jersey region, old pistols were cleaned and loaded; window fastenings and doorlocks were inspected and new hiding-places found for ...
— Further Adventures of Lad • Albert Payson Terhune
... proceed to the practice.' Having, however, been born an honest lad—a mere chance—and being determined to use the talents which nature had given me, eight days afterward I bid my astronomer good-morning, and went to the prefecture. My fear of being a burglar drove me ...
— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau
... A burglar who broke into a Manchester wine stores made off with a large sum of money, but none of the wine was taken. This once again proves that total abstinence is ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152. January 17, 1917 • Various
... red geranium bought for fifteen cents, but it had touched with its miracle of bright life the hardened soul of the young burglar, and opened his vision to higher things than he had known. It was in this moment of open vision that his heart turned to his old companion who was uncomplainingly taking the punishment which rightfully ...
— Lo, Michael! • Grace Livingston Hill
... so; I most devoutly hope he felt it! He was most tenderly solicitous for my health; and if he had really shot me there in the garden it would have had an ugly look. Armitage, the false baron, would have been identified as a daring burglar, shot while trying to burglarize the Claiborne mansion! But I wouldn't take the Claiborne plate for ...
— The Port of Missing Men • Meredith Nicholson
... right down here!" the girl was saying excitedly. "Where do you s'pose it came from? Oh, it's just like one my sister had that was stolen by a burglar last winter—why!" as the back of the pin was disclosed, "it is hers! There's the 'B' I scratched one day, and Tip gave me an awful scolding for it! I was going to scratch my whole name, but she caught me too quick—my, ...
— Polly of Lady Gay Cottage • Emma C. Dowd
... be unprepared for their realisation. It was already with a certain pang of surprise that he beheld the mansion, standing in the eye of day, a solid among solids. The key, upon trial, readily opened the front door; he entered that great house, a privileged burglar; and, escorted by the echoes of desertion, rapidly reviewed the empty chambers. Cats, servant, old lady, the very marks of habitation, like writing on a slate, had been in these few hours obliterated. He wandered from floor to floor, and found the house of great ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to "cut the inside corner" with a fast inshoot, Forsythe's control wavered a trifle, and T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., saw the ball streaking toward him! The paralyzed youth felt like a man about to be shot by a burglar. He could feel the bail thud against him, feel the terrific shock; and yet—a thought instinctively flashed on him, he remembered, in a flash, what a tortured Monty Merriweather had shouted, as he wobbled ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... reply, uttered in the most convincing tone. "The man who shot him was a common burglar, and frightened at having been betrayed into murder, fled without looking for booty. I am sure I heard him cry out in terror and remorse: 'God! what have ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... and Adventures of Jack Sheppard,* the most noted burglar, robber, and jail breaker, that ever lived. By William Harrison Ainsworth. Embellished with Thirty-nine, full page, spirited Illustrations. Designed and engraved in the finest style of art, by George Cruikshank, Esq., of London. Price ...
— The Roman Traitor (Vol. 2 of 2) • Henry William Herbert
... was Kim who had wakened the lama—Kim with one eye laid against a knot-hole in the planking, who had seen the Delhi man's search through the boxes. This was no common thief that turned over letters, bills, and saddles—no mere burglar who ran a little knife sideways into the soles of Mahbub's slippers, or picked the seams of the saddle-bags so deftly. At first Kim had been minded to give the alarm—the long-drawn choor—choor! [thief! thief!] that sets the serai ablaze of nights; but he looked more carefully, and, hand on ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... the sole crime. Originally petty pilferers, the men of Tai-o-hae now begin to force locks and attack strong- boxes. Hundreds of dollars have been taken at a time; though, with that redeeming moderation so common in Polynesian theft, the Marquesan burglar will always take a part and leave a part, sharing (so to speak) with the proprietor. If it be Chilian coin—the island currency—he will escape; if the sum is in gold, French silver, or bank-notes, the police wait until the money begins ...
— In the South Seas • Robert Louis Stevenson
... evil, or for the better accommodation of burglars. No self-respecting burglar would think of 'burgling' without ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner
... Smith repressed Rigdon from the date of their arrival in Ohio affords strong proof of Rigdon's complicity in the Bible plot, and of Smith's realization of the fact that he stood to his accomplice in the relation of a burglar to his mate, where the burglar has both the boodle and the secret in his possession. An illustration of this occurred during their first trip to Missouri. Rigdon and Smith did not agree about the desirability of western Missouri ...
— The Story of the Mormons: • William Alexander Linn
... be a burglary I should so like to see it, Dad,' Nella pleaded. 'I've never seen a burglar ...
— The Grand Babylon Hotel • Arnold Bennett
... presumes that a burglar will commit murder, and comes prepared to commit it, rather than suffer himself to ...
— The Four Canadian Highwaymen • Joseph Edmund Collins
... annual fly, I was just as particular in my dread of an accidental one. I don't believe I ever sat down to sardines on toast at a restaurant without looking under the toast for my bugbear, though as I lifted it I felt rather like the old woman who always looks under the bed for a burglar. Ah, but since the accident this foolishly small thing HAS made me suffer! I cannot say: 'Simpson, are you sure there is not a fly in this soup?' Simpson would say: 'No—sir; no fly—sir,' and would cough behind his hand, and I ...
— The Rosary • Florence L. Barclay
... of the household had recovered their health, so that the doctor was no longer required. Still he called one day, but he was treated like a burglar who had come to spy out the land. He was a sharp man and saw at once how matters stood. Frithiof returned his call but was received coldly. This was the end of their ...
— Married • August Strindberg
... to learn whether there was more than one person in the house and what business had brought them there. His own return was not expected, so that that advantage was in his favor. He stepped lightly upon the veranda and, like a burglar in his stocking feet, passed across the porch and pushed back the door far enough to admit him. This required but a few inches, and the hinges gave out not the slightest creak. The entrance to the dining-room was closed, so that all was darkness, but he plainly saw the yellow thread along the edges ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... struck me he might be married.... Well, I'll be quiet. If she catches me now, before we're introduced, she'll take me for a burglar." ...
— The Fortune Hunter • Louis Joseph Vance
... the wedding and the breakfast. Does that suit you? No? You persist in your sinister designs? Well, good luck, lay your traps, spread your nets, rub up your weapons and grind away at the Complete Foreign-post-paper Burglar's Handbook. You'll need it. And now, good-night. The rules of open-handed and disinterested hospitality demand that I should turn you out of doors. ...
— The Crystal Stopper • Maurice LeBlanc
... false moustache, and a good deal of money and securities in a satchel, and everybody think at first he was a burglar?' ...
— Danger Signals • John A. Hill and Jasper Ewing Brady
... that series can now stand up and recite a poem of a sentimental or an heroic nature from the pens of Mr. Clement Scott or Mr. G. R. Sims without genius to back him; and no one who heard it could retain his gravity to the end. "Burglar Bill" melted almost to repentance by the innocent child who asked him to burgle her doll's house, and whose salvation was finally wrought by the gift of the baby's jamtart—killed the Young Reciter by dint of pure ridicule and honest fun. He ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... connected by telegraph with every precinct in the entire district. By means of this wonderful invention a few seconds only are required to dispatch the orders of "King Kennedy" to any part of the district. News of a robbery and description of the burglar are flashed all over the city and adjoining country before the man has fairly secured his plunder. If a child is lost a description is sent in the same way to each precinct, and in a marvellously quick time the little one ...
— The Secrets Of The Great City • Edward Winslow Martin
... will come in and find you here. She'll be coming in with our tea soon, and she said Miss Robsart was a burglar. Margot thinks everybody is a ...
— 'Me and Nobbles' • Amy Le Feuvre
... by selling something, whatever be his right to it. The burglar sells at the same time his own skill and courage and my silver plate (the whole at the most moderate figure) to a Jew receiver. The bandit sells the traveller an article of prime necessity: that traveller's life. And as for the old soldier, who stands for ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 16 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... dressing-room below assured him that his father was safe in bed, and invited him to descend on tiptoe—with his boots under his arm—into the hall. Here he placed his candle, with a box of matches by it, on a chair, and proceeded to open the house door with the noiseless dexterity of a practiced burglar—being always careful to facilitate the safe performance of this dangerous operation by keeping lock, bolt, and hinges well oiled. Having secured the key, blown out the candle, and noiselessly closed the door behind him, he left the house, and started for the Haymarket, Covent ...
— Hide and Seek • Wilkie Collins
... a stranger by the compasses, although it might be suggested if there were figures in place of compass points. But even supposing they did suspect a combination it would take a long time for them to work it out, and no one would do it but a thief. A burglar, however, would not take the time; he would pry open the door with his "jimmy" and, as I have said before, these locks are for the purpose of keeping out tramps, vagrants, and ...
— Shelters, Shacks and Shanties • D.C. Beard
... as cheerfully as I could, "if you are through with this jolly little affair, and can get down my ladder without having my housekeeper ring the burglar alarm, I ...
— The Man in Lower Ten • Mary Roberts Rinehart
... any bank to know the difference, and as for my humble dwelling in Hillsborough, who would take the trouble to rifle it when Geoffrey's palace is within an easy walk. Besides, I haven't anything worth the attention of a respectable burglar like ...
— The Burglar and the Blizzard • Alice Duer Miller
... immoral. There is no person, however morally degraded he may be, but reveals some good nature in his whole course of life. It is our daily experience that we find a faithful friend in the person even of a pickpocket, a loving father even in a burglar, and a kind neighbour even in a murderer. Faith, sympathy, friendship, love, loyalty, and generosity dwell not merely in palaces and churches, but also in brothels and gaols. On the other hand, abhorrent vices and bloody crimes often find shelter under the silk hat, or the robe, ...
— The Religion of the Samurai • Kaiten Nukariya
... every unsavoury pie. The bank robber discharged from gaol did not ask Colonel Boundary to finance him in the purchase of a new kit of tools—an up-to date burglar's kit costs something over two hundred pounds—but there were people who would lend the money, which eventually came out of the colonel's pocket. Some of the businesses he financed were on the border ...
— Jack O' Judgment • Edgar Wallace
... it was decided to set the burglar alarms in every building of the Swift plant. Some time previous, when he had been working on a number of valuable inventions, unscrupulous men had tried to steal his ideas and models. To prevent this Tom had arranged a system of burglar alarms, and had also fitted up a wizard camera that ...
— Tom Swift and his Photo Telephone • Victor Appleton
... motives which we have enumerated are plainly atavistic and pathological. They belong to a mental condition which would conduct an individual to the prison or the gallows. We do not argue seriously whether the career of the highwayman or burglar is legitimate and desirable; and it is impossible to maintain that what is disgraceful for the individual is creditable for the state. And apart from the consideration that predatory patriotism deforms its own idol and makes it hateful in the eyes of the world, subsequent history has fully ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... "'What fellow? Why, the burglar, of course. Didn't you read about it in the newspaper? There was a long piece published about it the day after it happened, with headings in big letters: "The house No. 35 Wells Avenue, residence of Thomas Tompkins, the well-known dealer in hardware, cutlery, ...
— Miss Elliot's Girls • Mrs Mary Spring Corning
... the wool over the eyes of a professional burglar, Koppy, while you stole his jemmy. But what's the idea of the meeting to-night? A crash—right ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan
... not seriously hurt,—only a twist of his left ankle, where the burglar kicked him. But your ...
— The Rover Boys out West • Arthur M. Winfield
... reactions, after one of the experiences which made days and nights out of the dreary blanks of the calendar, when his senses were deadened, Paul's head was always singularly clear. Suppose his father had heard him getting in at the window and had come down and shot him for a burglar? Then, again, suppose his father had come down, pistol in hand, and he had cried out in time to save himself, and his father had been horrified to think how nearly he had killed him? Then, again, suppose a day ...
— Youth and the Bright Medusa • Willa Cather
... the slight sound of the burglar's tool faintly heard amid the noise of the storm, then the shutter flew open, a man stepped in; at that instant a vivid flash of lightning showed the three to each other, and the ...
— Elsie's Womanhood • Martha Finley
... which I put on the table and which I have put back in my pocket. I must apologise. Had I gone away before you returned that would have been left behind to show that your room had been entered neither by a hobo nor a burglar, nor by some cad who had committed an impertinence—perhaps you will ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole
... R. B. sent for me this morning, and told me I was a felon. I didn't seem to care much for that, for he might as well have called me a murderer or a burglar, but I shall care very much indeed if I have made you angry with me. But what I most fear is the anger of some ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... retreated expeditiously from the window, for the first time realising that her presence in that house, however adventitious and innocent, wouldn't be easy to explain to one of a policeman's incredulous idiosyncrasy; the legal definition of burglar, strictly applied, fitted ...
— Nobody • Louis Joseph Vance
... feathery tail, which little Helwis fell at once to stroking. This eligible member of the family received the name of Olaf, and was clearly made to understand that he must tolerate anything from the children, and nothing from a burglar. ...
— One Snowy Night - Long ago at Oxford • Emily Sarah Holt
... There is only the card of rules hung on the door. Lockwin reads the rules and is thankful. He studies the lock history of the door, as represented in the marks of old locks and staples. Here a burglar has bored. Here a chisel has penetrated to push back the bolt. Yes, it was a burglar, for there is now a brass sheath to prevent another entry. Most of these breakages, however, have been made by the hotel people, as can be seen by the ...
— David Lockwin—The People's Idol • John McGovern
... streaming out across the street, and the lovers know that if they try to pass they will be seen. And while they are helping each other think what they can do, somebody else comes slowly down the street, walking in the shadows and looking around to see if he is watched, like a burglar. It is the town clerk, and he has come here just to sing under the window of the goldsmith's daughter the song that he means to sing to-morrow, to see if she will like it and if she will probably give it the prize. Oh, he is a good, honest poet and faithful lover, and he means to leave ...
— The Wagner Story Book • Henry Frost
... course no more sleep for us that night, and the remainder of it was passed by Jane in examining the house from top to bottom every half hour or so, owing to a rooted conviction on her part that a burglar might still be lurking on the premises, concealed in the cellaret, or the jam cupboard, or ...
— The Danvers Jewels, and Sir Charles Danvers • Mary Cholmondeley
... passed quietly at Verner's Pride. Not, for all its inmates, pleasantly. Faithful Tynn bolted and barred the doors and windows with his own hand, as he might have done on the anticipated invasion of a burglar. He then took up his station to watch the approaches to the house, and never stirred until morning light. There may have run in Tynn's mind some vague fear of violence, should his master and Frederick ...
— Verner's Pride • Mrs. Henry Wood |
