Word: aback
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...Parthian shaft in more ways than one, Grey Granite closes the romantic story of Chris Colquohoun (pronounced "Gaboon") in a manner that may take its readers somewhat aback. After surviving the two husbands of the earlier books, Chris has gone with her grown-up son Ewan to the industrial town of Duncairn. There she spends her days in drudgery as partner in a boarding house, while Ewan starts work at an iron foundry. Written in the same earthy dialect as its predecessors, Grey Granite is peopled with no less salty characters, but the sign of the restless times lies heavier...
...innkeeper at Kitzbuhel in the Tyrol charged the vacationing Prince of Wales $13.10 for a bottle of whiskey and the Austrian Government, taken aback, formed a commission to control all future liquor prices...
...blatant strains of "Minnie the Moocher" faded into memories, there was a bustle backstage and the maestro of the Hi De Ho strode into his dressing room. His valet, a self-styled "secretary," was taken aback to find before him the CRIMSON reporter whom he had hoped to shunt aside for the last three days, with ominous threats and dark leers...
...comes the sad part of the tale. The accidental upsetting of a goblet, and the consequent tinkling of broken glass precipitated violent action. In a black thunder-cloud of wrath descended His Majesty harsh words rasped as lightning flared forth; and the much-taken-aback Commander of the Carrot, feeling on a par with the meanest of his spud-skinning scullions slunk with his companion out of the abode of the Mighty with his tall between his legs. That is why Waistootts and He-Men have not recently been found in especial Presidential favor...
Members of the New York Stock Exchange who chanced to walk past the corner of Madison Avenue and 43rd Street in the last month have been taken aback by what they saw. In the long narrow office where once was a dressy branch of defunct Pynchon & Co., the firm of Pirnie, Simons & Co., Inc., members of no exchange and backed by celebrated Promoter Archie Moulton Andrews, has what its salesmen call "our store...