pretext

They were going, on some business or pretext, to the front door.

Thus we had no pretext for going to war with her.

He made a pretext and then left the country too.

One could see how that might be made a pretext.

Were the women within likely to open a door for me, under whatever pretext I came?

No one to go in and out of here under any pretext whatever.

He does business, too, his trade here is no pretext.

Democracy was never anything more than a pretext for war.

The final step is coming up with a pretext for your decision.

It was far too good a pretext to pass up.

If only he could find a pretext to try it out They came to a river.

There was, despite the pretext for the meeting, very little talk.

The worst thing you can do is give them a pretext.

"You must have had some pretext for asking all those questions."

Find out why it was taken and under what pretext it's being held.

"Not if you have news, or was that a pretext to get me to rest?"

On this pretext she has left you; but that is not her real reason.

Of finding a pretext if there was not a cause?

But other top officials have used almost any pretext for escape.

He took Joan into the next room on some pretext.

And that pretext in such an important matter made him angry.

He had not been with us the whole time, but in and out of the apartment on some pretext or other.

The company uses this as a pretext to fire her.

The young man who had left his father's house nearly an hour and a half earlier on the pretext that he was going to town!

However, those seem to have been pretexts rather than the true reasons.