While still in the anteroom Prince Andrew heard loud voices and a ringing
staccato laugh- a laugh such as one hears on the stage.
She was a little frightened, not only by his thoughts, but by his
staccato way of expressing them.
What he said we could not hear for the deep-drawn blast and the high
staccato crackle of the blazing hold.
As he stood thus, peering out into the darkness of the cloud-enshrouded night, there came to him from across the water, like a slap in the face, so sudden and unexpected was it, the sharp
staccato of an exchange of shots and then the scream of a woman.
A series of
staccato taps on the west window brought Anne flying in from the yard, eyes shining, cheeks faintly flushed with pink, unbraided hair streaming behind her in a torrent of brightness.
As if too hot for her lips, she filled her saucer with the greasy-looking, nondescript fluid, and continued her set glare, her breast rising and falling with
staccato, mechanical movement.
"What they must have cost at this season--though of course it's the sentiment one cares about!" the lady was saying in a sighing
staccato as Archer came in.
As they arose the girl's revolver spoke in sharp
staccato and one sank back to the deck again to rise no more.
Instantly the soundless waste was torn with the quick
staccato of guns upon every hand.
A little
staccato cry of pain; a cry which seemed to spring into life from a tortured heart, broke from her lips.
Electric lights, a shed-covered wharf, mountains of luggage and freight, the noisy toil of 'longshoremen and sailors, the
staccato snorts of donkey engines and the whining sheaves as running lines ran through the blocks, a crowd of white-coated stewards carrying hand-baggage, the quartermaster at the gangway foot, the gangway sloping steeply up to the Umatilla's promenade deck, more quartermasters and gold-laced ship's officers at the head of the gangway, and more crowd and confusion blocking the narrow deck-- thus Michael knew, beyond all peradventure, that he had come back to the sea and its ships, where he had first met Steward, where he had been always with Steward, save for the recent nightmare period in the great city.
Through the closed doors came the sounds of the discreet
staccato accompaniment of the orchestra, and a single female voice rendering distinctly a musical phrase.