As he lowered himself gingerly onto a wooden bench, the lights of Manhattan just starting to gleam to his left, he seemed rattled by the workout and disappointed in his performance.
As Ladytron's circuits settle, however, they begin to gleam.
Slowly he pulled out a slender, gleaming knife and started to survey his kingdom: Chib unconscious on the floor, blood trickling from his ear; Johnno still lying in a heap, conscious but wishing otherwise; and the five trussed figures in their chairs.
Sure enough, the money soon started to flow to Buffalo, leading to new waterfront parks, gleaming modern factories and a cluster of medical and technology facilities.
And the gleam in his eye when he started to explain his development philosophy and overall vision for Miami and South Florida only confirmed what I'd already surmised.
A fresh wave of migrants is starting to bring a gleam to Belleville and Ménilmontant, turning this scruffy nexus of the 10th, 11th, 19th and 20th Arrondissements into one of the city's newest destinations for night life and the arts.
And, as gardeners everywhere start to develop that mad gleam, I feel it myself, that quickening, that pulsing desire.
But sometimes you can sense the join, the moment when gleam starts to fade, and there will be many who feel that a special time is slipping away when Kauto Star walks into the parade ring at Cheltenham before the Gold Cup on Friday afternoon.
And even though we live just a few miles from the World Trade Center and often see the construction there, my boys have no idea about the destruction and violence that precipitated the vast empty space where new, gleaming forms are starting to take shape.
When he starts to talk and fixes you with his gleaming eyes, you realise he is an operator of enormous charisma and shrewdness.
