captiousness
nounEtymology From captious + -ness.
1
Usually The state of being captious.
- "Yes— and I suppose you want to know why," she replied with dry captiousness.1867, Fyodor Dostoyevsky, chapter V, in The Gambler, translated by C. J. Hogarth^(https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Gambler_(1867)/V):
2
Usually Captious behaviour.