The Unspeakable Gentleman Author:John Phillips Marquand General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1922 Original Publisher: C. Scribner's Sons Subjects: Fiction / General Fiction / Classics Fiction / Literary Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books editi... more »on of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: VIII Of all the people I had expected to see that morning he was the last. Almost unconsciously I recalled the little kindnesses he had rendered me. Busy as he had been with commercial ventures, there was never a time when he had not stood ready with his help. And even my father's name -- he had never recalled it, except with regretful affection in his sad little reminiscences of older, pleasanter days. I thought I detected a trace of that affection, a trace of appeal, almost, in the look he gave us as we entered. They made a strange contrast, my uncle, and my father, in his gay coat and laces, his slender, upright figure, and his face, almost youthful beneath his powdered hair. For my uncle was an older man, and years and care had slightly bowed him. The wrinkles were deep about his mouth and eyes. His brown hair, simply dressed, was gray already at the temples. His plain black coat and knee breeches were wrinkled from travel. As he often put it, he had no time to care for clothes. Yet his cheeks glowed from quietliving, and there was a sly, good humored twinkle in his brown eyes which went well with his broad shoulders and his strongly knit body. His reputation for genial good nature was with him still. He stretched forth a hand, but the moment was inopportune. My father had given his undivided attention to the shutters on the east windows. He walked swiftly over and drew them to, snapping a bolt to hold them in place. Then he turned and rubbed his hands together slowly, examining my uncle th...« less