half-absent

For years, she will have the same half-absent look, the same taut expression.

James Elkins: How Long Does it Take To Look at a Painting? James Elkins 2010

"Link with me, Dar-ian, " he ordered, but in a half-absent voice.

Elephant in the City 2010

For years, she will have the same half-absent look, the same taut expression.

James Elkins: How Long Does it Take To Look at a Painting? James Elkins 2010

She did most of the talking, her mother listening with a half-absent air, as she picked up fragments of red-hot wood ember with the tongs, and piled them upon the brands.

Wessex Tales 2006

He continued, looking at her with a half-absent fixity,

Lay Morals 2005

‘But this is very sad, Jasper,’ said Mrs Milvain, in her half-absent way.

New Grub Street 2003

This gave him courage, and soon he found himself talking, freely for him, without noticing how Arthur's apparently half-absent questioning led him through all the details, not just of the killing of Gabran, but of his own story from the beginning.

The Wicked Day Stewart, Mary, 1916- 1983

"No," said he, in a half-absent tone; "I have just come up, and I've not thought of looking into picture-galleries yet."

Master of His Fate J. Mclaren Cobban

But Hepsey's look was now riveted on the chairman, and except for a half-absent smile of pleasure, the keenest anxiety showed in her expression.

Hepsey Burke

She would watch them, as the maid took off her carriage shoes; pleasantly take her turn at the mirror, exchange a shy, half-absent greeting with the few she knew; wish, with all her heart, that she dared put herself under their protection.

Saturday's Child Kathleen Thompson Norris 1923