Mumchance

2001, Paula Marshall, Lord Hadleigh's Rebellion, Harlequin (Mills & Boon), 2008, page 124, If he did, he would remain mumchance about that, too.

There is something exceedingly unpleasant in being obliged to answer "No," to a traveller's "Pray, Sir, were you ever abroad?" and to sit mum-chance all the time that he is running over the "grimoire" of outlandish technicalities. For my own part, I am convinced that man is, par excellence, a travelling animal; [...]

I wrote Miss Crane off as mediocre because although she chatted quite pleasantly and intelligently over coffee she was mostly mumpchance at the dinner table. Oh, not mumpchance tout court.

The two little children stood mumchance, but with a kindly air.

The Taker oꝛ the Verſer is the man muſt play with him, the Cardes are fetch, Mumchance oꝛ Decoy is the game: the firſt wager is Wine, the ſecond two pence in money, from two pence they riſe to a ſhilling, from that to a pound, […]

Bear and wolf, look to your prisoner—prance, hobby—hiss, dragon, and halloo, boys—we grow older every moment we stand idle, and life is too short to be spent in playing mumchance.

I'm not such a mumchance, to be sure, but I've as good a fortune