She absolutely declined to be puzzled; she turned her eyes to the flame of the candle as if the question were as irrelevant, or at any rate as impers… - Henry James

..her smile, which was her pretty feature, was never so pretty as when her sprightly phrase had a scratch lurking in it.

He had picked up his hat, which he had brought in, and stood twirling it in a way that gave me, even as I was just nearly reaching port, a perverse horror of what I was doing. To do it in ANY way was an act of violence, for what did it consist of but the obtrusion of the idea of grossness and guilt on a small helpless creature who had been for me a revelation of the possibilities of beautiful intercourse? Wasn't it base to create for a being so exquisite a mere alien awkwardness? I suppose I now read into our situation a clearness it couldn't have had at the time, for I seem to see our poor eyes already lighted with some spark of a prevision of the anguish that was to come.

"I should think that to hear such lovely music as that would really make him feel better."
The lady gave a discriminating smile.
“I am afraid there are moments in life when even Beethoven has nothing to say to us. We must admit, however, that they are our worst moments.