Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to compromise, to act in a cowardly or weak manner.

1903		Atlanta Constitution 20 Mar. 3: Vice-President Charles Warren Fairbanks is pussy-footing it around Washington [DA].
1916		L. Pound ‘Word-List From Nebraska’ in DN IV:iv 279: pussy-foot, v. To be sly, intriguing, or underhand. ‘That girl goes pussy-footing around.’.
1917		A.G. Empey Over the Top 130: No doubt, at this writing he is ‘somewhere in Blighty’ pussy footing it on a bridge or along the wall of some munition plant with the ‘G. R,’ or Home Defence Corps.
1922		Appeal (St Paul, MN) 14 Jan. 1/7: The President’s mental barometer is unerring in pussyfooting on the race question.
1929		J. Lait Broadway Melody 46: You ain’t comin’ on Broadway pussyfootin’, take that from me. You’re in the big league.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 7: Strange looking men were pussyfooting in.
1948		(con. 1944) N. Mailer Naked and Dead 70: They pussyfoot around as if they were the Good Lord himself.
1959		D. Hewett Bobbin Up (1961) 150: Greenie, the foreman, pussy-footing down the aisles to catch you glancing at the Women’s Weekly.
1959		C. Himes Crazy Kill 68: You don’t have to pussyfoot about what you mean.
1963		F. Kohner Affairs of Gidget 72: Don’t pussy-foot, will ya?
1972		J.B. Keane Letters of Irish Parish Priest 60: Speak to him or I will. Have it out to the end with him and no pussy-footing.
1977		‘John le Carré’ Honourable Schoolboy 275: And do we go for his jugular? [...] Do we hell. We pussyfoot. We stand on the sidelines.
1988		Beano Comic Library No. 146 18: Stop pussy-footing around.
1990		(con. early 1950s) J. Ellroy L.A. Confidential 255: We’ve pussyfooted long enough, dear reader.
1993		D. Jarman diary 6 Jan. Smiling in Slow Motion (2000) 287: The television news pussyfooted around the subject.
2000		Guardian 6 Jan. 7: It might be government policy, but it seems to me that it is pussyfooting around, to be quite honest.
2010		K. Richards Life 167: When they had to deal with us, they didn’t know quite which way to pussyfoot.
2010		L. Redhead Thrill City [ebook] I was tired of all the pussyfooting around.
2013		T. Dorsey Riptide Ultra-Glide 143: ‘I was pussyfooting around before [...] but seriously, what is your malfunction?’.
2020		G. Disher Consolation 159: [T]he four of them would pussyfoot around talking in riddles and wasting time.

2. to walk softly.

1913		S.F. Call 11 May 33/3: Peter’s ghost pussyfooting about the stage and making bum jokes.
1915		Omaha Dly Bee (NE) 28 Feb. 2: Goodbye to ‘buttons’ who used to come pussyfooting trough the halls of hotels at all hours .
1957		‘Weldon Hill’ Onionhead (1958) 97: The c.o. came pussyfooting into the galley.
2000		W.D. Myers ‘The Streak’ in 145th Street 56: ‘I dropped the bottle, it broke on the floor, and everybody had to pussyfoot around the floor so they wouldn’t get cut’.