Topical Guide 459
Mark Dorset
Foreshadowing
Reservations Recommended, Chapter 3:
“Are you ready, Matthew?” calls Belinda from the top of the stairs.
He takes another swallow of the drink, throws a grin at Leila. “Now I am,” he says. “Shall I close my eyes?”
“No, no. I want to make an entrance.”
So it’s clothing, Matthew thinks. A dress, probably, something daring that she wouldn’t ordinarily buy herself. Good. Great. He has often wished she would wear something slinky now and then, and this is the perfect night for it.
Language: Idioms: Tug the (One’s) Forelock
Reservations Recommended, Chapter 3:
The cabdriver, who has been watching for them, gets out of the cab — it would be fair to say that he leaps out of the cab — and comes around to open the door. This has never happened to Matthew before in his life. The driver begins sweeping at the seat with his hand, and saying something in so low a voice that Matthew can’t be quite sure what it is, but it sounds to him like “’Scuse me, ’scuse me. Sorry, sorry. Dirty, dirty.” Matthew and Belinda get into the cab, astonished. They look at each other, raise their eyebrows, struggle to keep themselves from laughing.
“If he were wearing a cap,” Matthew whispers, “he would have touched it. And if he weren’t bald, he would have tugged his forelock.”
Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary:
tug/touch one’s forelock
idiom
British, disapproving
: to be too concerned with pleasing someone whom one thinks is powerful or important
See also:
Foreshadowing TG 63; TG 84; TG 127; TG 128; TG 140; TG 142; TG 147
Language TG 11; Language: Dialect, Slang, Idiolect, Shibboleths, Jargon TG 137; Language: Slang, Insults, Terms of Abuse TG 140; Slang TG 169; Language and Languages: Learning and Translating TG 393; Language: Idiolect, Private Meanings and References, Code Words TG 373
In the evening, via the Metropolitan Museum of Art:
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