They wanted me to sign a new contract, and to this end they invented all sorts of pretexts to keep me where I was.
"In Search of a Son"
William Shepard Walsh
Then it was all to go over again, day after day, until at last Amalia gave up, and allowed her mother the comfort of her belief: but all the more she had to invent pretexts for keeping her on the mountain.
"The Eye of Dread"
Payne Erskine
One of her chief objects in choosing a situation on the outskirts of Paris had been to avoid the flow of idle visitors who in the city itself were a real annoyance to religious houses, and she refused to receive those who came on idle and frivolous pretexts.
"Henrietta Maria"
Henrietta Haynes