It was a charming house in the suburbs of Newcastle, the abode4 of charming people, where Egidia was staying, and Mrs. Elles deeply appreciated the friendship with the fashionable lecturer, which had gained her the entry into this home of modernity and culture.
“Yes, if you once saw Mortimer,” Mrs. Elles went on, “you would understand all!”
“I want you to come and dine—will you? What day shall it be? Tell me, and I’ll fix it. Then you will see him, and judge for yourself.{26}”
“My dear,” said the novelist, slowly, “I will come to your dinner with pleasure, but I shall not know any more than you have told me.”
“Yes; I have been very, very frank,” said Mrs. Elles. “And there is another thing”—she sighed vaguely6. She was alluding7 to her husband’s habit of tippling, to which as a loyal wife she forbore from a more direct allusion8.
“As a general rule,” Egidia went on, a little didactically, in her capacity of mentor9, “no husband understands any wife. If he did, he wouldn’t have cared to marry her. It is the mutual10 antagonism11 between the sexes which makes them interesting to each other in the beginning. But, afterwards—if they are unable to play the game—exciting enough, I should think—of observing, of adjusting, of utilizing12 their mutual divergences13 of character and getting amusement out of them—if she finds no pleasure in the exercise of tact14, if he none in the further analysis of the feminine vagaries15 that he began by finding so charming—then, they begin to jar mutually on each other, and turn that into tragedy which should be the comedy of life for both of them.”
“I understand,” said Mrs. Elles, humbly16; “but then—there is not, and could not be, any comedy of life with Mortimer, or tragedy either! There never was. I don’t seem to care to appreciate his character, I know it—it is quite simple—I see it all spread out before me like a map—of a country I don’t care to travel over.{27}”
“But perhaps he can say the same of you,” hazarded Egidia.
“No, Mortimer has never understood me, never! I am a sealed book to him,” said the wife, airily, although Miss Giles’ suggestion had indeed given her a little shock.
“Don’t flatter yourself, my dear, that you are a sealed book to anyone. It is the common delusion17.” (Another shock to Mrs. Elles!) “One is always so much less interesting, so much less complicated, so much less of a sphinx than one thinks.”
“But I have always thought of mine as a very complicated nature,” Mrs. Elles rejoined, pouting18; “I am sure I can’t tell you how many thoughts pass through my mind in a day, and I seem to have a perfectly19 new mood every minute.”
“So we all have, but we don’t take cognizance of them or act on them all. I should say that you are one of those people who begin with a radical20 mistake—that of expecting too much of life. You think you have a right to be happy. Good Heavens! You seek for midi à quatorze heures, you love change for its own sake; you positively21 enjoy hot water. You would rather have a painful emotion than none at all, you would like to cry, with Sophie Arnould, ‘Oh, le bon temps, j’etais si malheureuse!’ You have not mastered the great fact, that emotions are not to the emotional; to them is generally awarded the dreary22 crux23 of the commonplace, and that I think is hardest to bear of all, that one’s cross should come in the way{28} of material comfort and spiritual uneventfulness, and when it comes to the point, instead of action to be taken there is only temper—to be kept!”
“I always scorn to nag,” said Mrs. Elles, “it seems so ungraceful.”
“I am sure, my dear, that whatever you may feel, you always manage to look decorative24!” said the other, smiling. “Still, you expect too much and give too little to be what I call easy to live with!”
“That is what I say,” cried Mrs. Elles, triumphantly25. “I call that being complicated.”
“Do you?” said the authoress, drily. “I should be tempted26 to call it want of social tact—an almost culpable27 ignorance of the science of give and take, a—you must really forgive me for my brutal28 frankness”—she broke off suddenly and laughed confusedly—“but, you know, you asked me to speak freely.”
“I love it,” declared Ph?be Elles, adjusting a cushion behind her head. “I think I like to talk about myself, even if it is disagreeable,” she added, with unusual frankness.
Egidia smiled irresistibly29. It was impossible for her to help liking30 this unconscious egotist, who confessed to her failings with such a grace, and took plain speaking with such aplomb31.
“I think,” she said, trying to give a less serious turn to the conversation, “what you really wanted, in marriage, was a man who would have dominated you—have beaten you, perhaps.{29}”
“Yes, I do really believe I should,” said Mrs. Elles; “that is, if I loved him desperately32 at the time and he loved me desperately—afterwards! But,” she went on, seriously, “you have given me your views on marriage, and my marriage in particular, but, now you know all my life, what do you advise me to do?”
“Do? Do nothing! What can you do? What can any woman do?” asked Egidia, raising her well-marked eyebrows33, and with an air of dismissing an impracticable subject.
Then, seeing the unmistakable look of disappointment in the eyes of her feminine Telemachus, she added kindly34, “Ah, you see, when we outsiders come to the domain35 of practical politics, we are mere36 theorists—all at sea, and just as helpless and resourceless as any of you slaves of the ring can possibly be. I should advise you to make the best of it, and pray that you may never meet anybody you like better than the man you have got!”
Mrs. Elles rose to go, it was late. She had had a good time. She had enjoyed the personal discussion, but there was a wilful37 twist about her mouth, as of one which had swallowed much advice, but had swallowed it the wrong way.
“After this, I must not ask you to come and stop with me in London, I am afraid,” added Egidia.
“Oh, please do, and I will promise to wear blinkers.”
“Blue spectacles would be nearer the mark!” said the novelist. “Do that, and I will engage to introduce you to Edmund Rivers with impunity38.{30}”
“Yes, but I never implied that women found it impossible to fall in love with him!” answered Egidia, quite gravely. “He is handsome and indifferent, and I know of no combination more dangerous to the peace of our sex!”
. . . . . . . .
Mrs. Elles’ little dinner was arranged; the invitations, written on beautiful rough note paper with an artistic40 ragged41 edge, sent out. Mrs. Elles had conscientiously42 consulted her husband’s list of engagements and saw that he was free, and put down a large cross for the eleventh. Mortimer would see that he was engaged, and would, as usual, be too lazy or careless to enquire43 further. On the evening in question, he would necessarily see “what was up,” and would grumblingly44 admit that he was “let in for one of Ph?be’s confounded dinners” instead of a happy gathering45 at the Continental46 Club with the “fellows.”
His wife would, of course, have got on far better without him, as far as the success of her party was concerned, only society so far considers the husband, even if his social capacities are nil47, as a necessary adjunct to the dinner table. He has not yet gone out with the épergne, and therefore must be tolerated. But with regard to Mrs. Poynder and Charles, the mistress of the house had put her foot down. She was famous for her little dinners, the entrain of which the presence of her husband did not seem, so{31} far, to have materially diminished. But that of the other two would have been fatally destructive of charm. The pair had been induced to see the matter in somewhat of the same light—four members of a family were a little overwhelming—and the question of economy had weight with Mrs. Poynder. Aunt and nephew were in the habit of considerately inviting48 themselves out to high tea at the house of a relation of Mortimer’s in Newcastle on these occasions. Mrs. Poynder, indeed, owned to a want of sympathy with the “people Fibby contrived50 to get together,” and she was not informed that Miss Giles, for whom she had developed an unaccountable fancy, was to be of the party.
“My old woman of the sea,” so Mrs. Elles sometimes spoke51 of her to her intimates, in whose eyes the ways and speeches of the terrible old lady amply justified52 the want of reticence53 implied in her niece’s indiscreet sobriquet54. Why must she form part of the Elles household? Everybody wondered, but Mrs. Elles knew.
For on this point the husband was immutable55. He saw plainly that on Mrs. Poynder did his manly56 bourgeois57 comfort depend. His wife only attended to the show side of housekeeping; she saw that there was always plenty of flowers in the drawing-room, winter and summer—but Mrs. Poynder attended to his shirts and their proper complement58 of buttons. Mrs. Elles ordered dinner, but Mrs. Poynder kept the books and interviewed the tradesmen. His wife{32} paid the smart calls, but Mrs. Poynder looked up his dull and important relations, and, in her rough undiplomatic way, advanced his affairs. She exercised a certain modest supervision59 over the whisky bottle, and without saying much, curbed61 Mortimer’s drunken tendencies a good deal.
Mrs. Elles herself was vaguely cognizant of the advantages of this system, and realized that Mrs. Poynder’s presence in the ménage gave her leisure to attend to the cultivation62 of the graces of her own mind and person, and exonerated63 her from the thankless task of confronting Mortimer on the tedious matters of servants, wages, and housekeeping and partial abstention.
“Aunt Poynder goes down into the arena64 for me, and fights with wild beasts in the kitchen,” the ungrateful young woman used to say. “She likes it, I verily believe.—But some of their roughness rubs off on her,” she would add, and nobody would gainsay65 her. Mrs. Poynder was the professed66 Disagreeable Woman of Newcastle, and people were apt to fly up side alleys67 and into shops when they saw her come sailing majestically68 down Granger Street.
“Oh, Mortimer, why did you go and have such awful relations?” Mrs. Elles exclaimed casually69 to her husband, one afternoon, when she came back from a visit to Egidia at Jesmond. She was impelled70 to say it. Mrs. Poynder’s coarseness and Charles’ roughness seemed now-a-days more obtrusive71 by contrast with the pleasant manners of the people with{33} whom, by the accident of her friendship with Egidia, she had been almost daily thrown into contact. This had been her farewell visit. Egidia was going back to town; but, in the course of many and many a long talk, she had sown a plentiful72 crop of ideas in this wayward head—a seed whose harvest was to prove a very different one to that which she had expected.
Mortimer Elles was not seriously discomposed by his wife’s remark. “That’s a nice remark to make to a man!” was his not ungentle rejoinder. He had ceased to expect Ph?be to curb60 any expression of opinion out of respect to his feelings, and in return permitted himself his full measure of brutality73 towards her.
“Well, aren’t they?” she repeated, yawning; “when is Charles going to pass his examination and relieve us of his presence? I did not bargain for Charles as a permanent lodger74 when I married you, nor Aunt Poynder indeed, for that matter, but I suppose all is for the worst, in this dreariest75 of all possible households!”
She expected no answer. These two always wrangled76 at cross purposes. There was very seldom a positive engagement between them. Mrs. Elles knew that Charles could not leave just yet, knew, too, that Mrs. Poynder would never go, was not positively sure that she wanted her to go, but just now, when her normal state of discontent was quadrupled by the new influences that had lately come into her{34} life, she could not resist a repetition of an oft-repeated complaint.
She went on in a soft but irritating voice.
“I have no objection to Aunt Poynder’s engaging all the servants and managing them, but I must say I wish she would let Jane alone. I have reserved the right of choosing my own parlour-maid, and when I have succeeded in getting one that suits me, I don’t want her bullied77 and the place made impossible for her.”
“There, you see, you don’t like her.”
“No, I don’t,” he replied brutally79. “I don’t like her style. She copies you, and you’re not a particularly good model.”
“Ah, how miserable80 I am!” she exclaimed, irrelevantly81. “Mortimer, tell me, why can’t we get on? It is not my fault, is it?”
“Oh! no,” he replied ironically. “You are always in the right. There is nothing more tiresome82 in a woman.”
“You are frank, Mortimer, and almost epigrammatic!”
“Shut up, can’t you?” he exclaimed, in accents of annoyance83. “I wonder why it is that you always contrive49 to rub me up the wrong way. Here you are abusing me—abusing my relations—why can’t you let them alone? I don’t abuse yours.”
“Mine are all dead!” she said, pathetically. “Fair game for you!{35}”
“And a nice lot they were!” said the man, now thoroughly84 roused to ill-temper. “That is, if you have told me the truth about them. You’re pretty good at drawing the long bow, you know.”
At this point in the discussion, Mrs. Elles withdrew. Her relations were—or had been—a weak point, and Mortimer had suffered—in his purse—from claims of a ne’er-do-well father-in-law, and a foolish, extravagant85 mother. Ph?be had been brought up badly as a child, had been neglected in her girlhood, and her marriage with Mortimer Elles had been the making of her—as her people said, and as she had agreed at the time—but it was a grievance86 with her that, try as she might, she could not give her history a romantic turn in her husband’s eyes. He knew all about her, was full of preconceived notions about her, and she resented the impossibility of keeping up a consistent pose with him, being one of those who reverse the proverb and expect to be heroes to their valets de chambre and heroines to their husbands.
This weakness of hers entailed87 the other weakness to which her husband had alluded—her consistent ambiguity88 of phrase, her frequent lapses89 from truth. These lapses were for the most part unconscious, they were the good face she put on every matter, her artistic presentment of incidents relating to herself and other people, for, to do her justice, she applied90 the same method to her fellow-creatures, and was never known to retail91 a spiteful or unpicturesque version of another woman’s affairs.{36}
She considered herself the soul of honour, it is true; she literally92 would not have told a lie to save her life; but to save her pose and her dramatic presentment from discomfiture93, she shrank from no form of embellishment or extenuation94. So she “doctored” facts—served up the plain “roast and boiled” of everyday existence with a sauce piquante of her own devising, and thought of herself as one who, compassing under difficulties the whole duty of woman, makes herself as charming, as romantic, as mysterious as circumstances will allow.
. . . . . . . .
Half an hour later she looked into the study, where Mortimer was sitting, a revolting picture of middle-class ease, with his legs on the table, drinking whisky and water.
“I thought I heard someone crying?”
“So you did. Jane. I have told her to go.”
“What?” she screamed.
“Yes; we’ve had a row, Jane and I. I have sent her packing. I paid her her wages—told her to pack up and go—not later than to-morrow. She was cheeky to me—you teach them all to be damned cheeky to me—and I won’t stand it.” He filled his glass again, pouring with a want of precision that spoke of many previous attacks on the bottle.
“Jane cannot have meant”—his wife murmured humbly, cowed by the enormity of the misfortune that had befallen her. Jane was her ally, her confidante, her all.{37}
“Oh, yes; Jane meant it fast enough. Don’t talk to me about it. To-morrow she goes!”
He brought his fist heavily down upon the table. His wife started, a start partly real, partly affected95.
“If Jane goes, I go.”
“Nonsense, you are not a servant—I have not dismissed you!”
“Dismiss!” She tossed her head. Then the real, imminent96 need of propitiating97 Mortimer occurred to her. She must keep Jane at the cost of all humiliation98. “Mortimer, listen—it puts me out very much. I have a dinner party of twelve next week!”
“The deuce you have! What a woman you are for kick-ups! And I don’t suppose there is a soul coming that I shall care twopence for! Well, you must put it off, that’s all!”
“One doesn’t do these things!”
“Oh, I do. I’ll write the excuses for you, if you like.”
She stamped her foot. “Mortimer—I will not be put to shame before my friends! You have no right to do this to me! Oh, what shall I do, what shall I do, tied to a perfect beast like you for the rest of my life?”
“Grin and bear it, I suppose. You won’t make me any better by swearing at me!”
“I don’t swear at you! How you speak to me! To me! to me! Your wife! How dared you marry me, Mortimer?”
“I don’t know about dare,” he said, growing red.{38} “When all is said and done, I don’t think you did much to prevent me!”
“That’s enough!” she raised her hand with a theatrical99 gesture as if to stop him, and, sinking into an armchair, hid her face in her hands. “Insulting! No—I see now—you never loved me! Never! Never!”
He ostentatiously turned his back on her tragic pose.
“There you go! Always in extremes—always injured—always making the worst of it! You couldn’t live without a grievance, I do believe! Of course I married you for love—if you must use the absurd word—and now you pay me back by plaguing my life out! And then begin to talk damned sentimental100 rot about my never having loved you, and so on! Now, really, don’t you think we are both a bit too old for that sort of thing?”
“Oh, you are—impossible!” she moaned. It was what she felt. It was the one word which fitted the situation, which was no situation, except to herself. Mortimer kicked a coal out of the grate savagely101 with his carpet-slippered foot, and, her sense assaulted by the sickening smell of singed103 wool, she left the room.
. . . . . . . .
Mortimer was drunk—he often was; it was the least heinous104 of his crimes. She went upstairs crying, and went to bed, but she knew she could not sleep that night, and yet she took no bromide or sulphonal. She wanted to think—she meant to think{39} things out—so she lay, and thought, and thought, with extreme intensity105 and vigour106, if with little coherence107. So intent was she that she lay quite straight out and still, and did not toss, while the trains of thought succeeded each other with extraordinary rapidity. The tall clock on the stairs outside her door ticked loudly and monotonously108, and the whole problem of her life arrayed itself and measured out its phases to the beat of the pendulum109, which seemed to balance them, as it were.
Mortimer was impossible! He had always been impossible! His conduct this evening was of a piece with his whole conduct to her, ever since a few weeks after marriage. Halcyon110 weeks, which every woman has a right to expect, while they in no wise concern or affect the life that follows after. His taunt111 about the circumstances of her marriage to him she dismissed, she knew quite well that she had provoked him to it, he had not meant it, there was no foundation for it. He had wooed and won her in the usual, commonplace way, been timid and attentive112, and had begged her for locks of her hair. And she had been complaisant113 and loving, and had treasured his photograph and made excuses for its ugliness, just like any other foolish girl with her first sweetheart.
Why had she done all this? Why had she bought that rose-coloured satin dress last Christmas, that she had taken such a dislike to, since, that she had only worn it twice? Her marriage was a very nearly parallel case, only she had been able to afford to throw{40} aside the one bad bargain, and she had been obliged to abide114 by the other.
“Yes, I can’t say I did not know my own mind, such as it was, when I took Mortimer, but, unfortunately, it isn’t the same mind that I have now. It was a child’s mind. The whole fabric115 of our bodies alters every seven years, they say—well, that means our minds, too—body and soul are one in my creed116. It was not this me that was glad to marry Mortimer, as he so politely put it—” she laughed bitterly. “It was another me, who had not read Ibsen.” She laughed again. “Books alter one—reading alters one—life alters one, after all! I married Mortimer like a blind puppy, not knowing, not seeing. I am nothing wonderful, but I do think I am too good for him! Why did I not see it then? Why is a girl such a fool? Why does nobody tell her? It is very hard. They say, as one has made one’s bed, so one must lie on it.... But suppose I decline to lie on it?”
She almost leaped in her bed with the shock of this crude presentment of a new idea. Then she rose, lit a candle and walked out of her room, and across a landing, and straight into Mortimer’s room. She softly approached the bed on which he lay, and, like Psyche117 over again, held the light up on high, and looked critically down upon her sleeping husband.
She felt an indefinable pleasure in thus surveying him helpless who was technically118 her master. This coarse, clumsy-fibred creature who had yet his full complement of the shrewdness and acuteness that{41} gave him dominion119 over his fellow-men, and made him known as a “tough customer” in business, slept the sleep—well, if not precisely120 that of the just, at any rate that of the man whose balance at his bank is secure and his investment sound. He slept like a savage102 who has laid aside his clubs, and enjoys the dreamless, primitive121 sleep that he has earned by his feats122 of arms. His thick, broad eyelids123 rested peacefully on the cold, blue eyes whose empty glare his wife knew and detested124. His lips were closed on his cruel little teeth in a firm, inexpressive line, pacific and meaningless, and his clumsy hands, with their short, square-nailed finger tips, lay palm outwards125 on the coverlet, as innocently as a child’s.
She might stare at him as long as she pleased, with those burning, insistent126 eyes of hers, and not fear to break his sleep; his simple nervous system would surely withstand the hypnotism of her enquiring127 gaze.
But next morning, he would be “all there” as usual; the hectoring, bantering128, exacerbating129 personality would re-assert itself, and make its hundred and one demands on her self-control all through the day, till sometimes it seemed as if she could not look at him or hear his voice without screaming.
“Why should I bear it? Why should I?” she asked herself, passionately131, aloud; and the pettish132 exclamation133 was significant of the great revulsion that was taking place in her, a result of the passionate130, elucidating134 fortnight she had passed.{42}
She went back to her room and lay down again, but she closed her eyes no more that night, and by the time the pallid135 dawn of Newcastle had begun to filter through the window curtains, a whole plan of action had shaped itself in her mind. She came down punctually to the eight o’clock breakfast which was exacted by Mortimer and which he had never allowed her to forego, putting some constraint136 on herself to appear perfectly composed, for her heart was beating violently, and she felt the suspicious flush mounting to her cheek, which had so often given unkind friends occasion to say that she painted. But Mrs. Poynder, who was presiding over the tea and coffee, looked her over with some approval.
“Now, that’s the first decent dress I have seen you in, Fibby, for many a long day!” she observed, contemplating137 the plain dress of blue serge—not very new, not very smart—in which Mrs. Elles had chosen to array herself.
“I am glad you are pleased, Aunt Poynder,” replied her niece, demurely138, gracefully139 accepting her cup of coffee from the stout140, red fingers where the submerged wedding-ring, planted there by the late Mr. Poynder, glittered. Charles Elles, who could get more noise out of a cup of coffee than anybody, was drinking his and enjoying it thoroughly. Mrs. Poynder somehow contrived to knock her knife and fork together on the rim3 of her plate with vigour every time she took a morsel141. Mortimer’s carpet slippers142, and the dish of bacon which his aunt had{43} set down by the fire to keep warm for him, stood by the fire in grotesque143 proximity144.
“I am going to put off my dinner on the thirty-first,” Mrs. Elles announced, quietly. “Jane is going, and I couldn’t attempt it with a new parlour-maid.”
“I am glad, Fibby, to see you in such a peaceable frame of mind,” Mrs. Poynder rejoined. “Mortimer says you were fairly put out at first about his sending Jane away.”
“So I was, Aunt, but——”
“Ye’re quite right, Fibby, to take it calm. Husbands must have their way. I never thought much of the girl myself; she’s lazy and wears far too much fringe. Besides, a man must be master in his own house, and if he can’t send away his own housemaid when it pleases him——”
“Yes, Aunt.” Mrs. Elles was playing at meekness145, and the sensation was so unusual that she found it rather amusing so far. Mrs. Poynder could not make it out at all.
“Are ye ill, my dear?” she enquired146, with some show of solicitude147. “To look at ye, I should say that your digestion148 was not in just apple-pie order.”
“I am all right, Aunt,” replied Mrs. Elles, with forced composure, stamping her foot, however, under the table. Her colour was high, as Mrs. Poynder had remarked, but very clear and bright, and she looked quite ten years younger. Her aunt continued to make little onslaughts of this kind on her through{44} breakfast, but she did not retort. Her lips formed themselves every now and again into the words, “I am going—I am going—I am going!” as a kind of secret satisfaction. When her husband came down, she actually got up and fetched the terribly plebeian149 dish of bacon from the fender and put it down in front of him. He thanked her drily.
“If you will excuse me,” she said to them all, “I will go and write some notes that have to be attended to at once.”
She left the room, and the scratching of a feverish150 pen within the drawing-room was heard for the next twenty minutes through the open door, while Mortimer Elles, having eaten an enormous breakfast in the short time he had devoted151 to that purpose, went into the hall and began to rummage152 for his stick and hat and struggle into his coat. His wife knew the sound well.
“Good-bye, Mortimer!” she called out. There was a slight suspicion of mockery in her tone that he perceived and resented. He did not answer her, but went out, banging the door behind him loudly and aggressively.
“Helmer bangs the door; not Nora!” she smiled to herself. She felt extraordinarily153 gay. The more serious aspects of the step she was taking were not obvious to her at the present moment. She was for the time merely possessed154 by an irrepressible zeal155 for the assertion of self, and its disassociation from all trammelling human responsibilities.{45}
Presently Mrs. Poynder went out too, to attend some Busybodies’ committee meeting, and Mrs. Elles took three five-pound notes out of a drawer in her desk, locked it, and, going downstairs, ordered lunch and dinner very carefully. This duty accomplished156, she went up to her room, and presented Jane, whom she found there, with a very handsome cloth dress she had hardly worn, and her blessing157. The affectionate and devoted Jane wept, and it was with difficulty that her mistress prevented herself from crying too.
Then Jane went about her business, and Mrs. Elles locked herself in. She undid158 the complicated arrangement of her hair and with a comb parted it as severely159 as she could resign herself to do, and with a brush dipped in water smoothed out the little curls on her forehead, sighing deeply the while. Then she went to a cupboard, and from its most recondite160 recesses161 produced a box containing a pair of blue spectacles—her husband’s. She put them on, and standing162 resolutely163 in front of a cheval glass, surveyed her appearance.
“Good God, can I bear it?” she said aloud, in tones of the very deepest anguish164. Her face grew sombre for the first time since the conception of flight had become an established fact in her mind. She desperately tugged165 down a lock and disposed it becomingly on her forehead as usual, and then put it back again.——
“No!... Yes!... I must do it like this.... It is the only way I can do it without blame.... It shows that my intentions are honourable166.... I am going away to be free, not to flirt167.... I must make all that an absolute impossibility!”
She flung a lace scarf over the glass and busied herself with a few necessary preparations. She got out a Gladstone bag—just the size she could manage to carry herself—and threw in a few clothes, including a fine white muslin dress she had worn at her “at home” that day, so fine that it would go through a ring almost and took up no room to speak of. A rather valuable sapphire168 ring she put on her finger, and on second thoughts added a diamond one. Then she opened the door of her room, and leaning over the banisters called out, “Jane!”
Jane replied.
“Jane, will you go and draw down those blinds in the drawing-room—all of them—half down. The sun is getting so strong. And then, will you take the heap of letters you will see lying on the bureau, and go and post them at once.”
She put on a sailor hat and a white lace veil over her blue spectacles, and was downstairs and out in the street before Jane had got to the fourth blind of the drawing-room, which happened to look out on the back of the house. Nora was gone!
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mound
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| n.土墩，堤，小山；v.筑堤，用土堆防卫 | |
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expatiating
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| v.详述，细说( expatiate的现在分词 ) | |
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rim
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| n.(圆物的)边，轮缘；边界 | |
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abode
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| n.住处，住所 | |
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tragic
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| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
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vaguely
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| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
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alluding
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| 提及，暗指( allude的现在分词 ) | |
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allusion
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mentor
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| n.指导者，良师益友；v.指导 | |
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mutual
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| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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11
antagonism
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| n.对抗，敌对，对立 | |
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12
utilizing
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| v.利用，使用( utilize的现在分词 ) | |
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13
divergences
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| n.分叉( divergence的名词复数 )；分歧；背离；离题 | |
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14
tact
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| n.机敏，圆滑，得体 | |
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15
vagaries
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| n.奇想( vagary的名词复数 )；异想天开；异常行为；难以预测的情况 | |
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16
humbly
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| adv. 恭顺地，谦卑地 | |
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17
delusion
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| n.谬见，欺骗，幻觉，迷惑 | |
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18
pouting
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| v.撅（嘴）( pout的现在分词 ) | |
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19
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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20
radical
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|
| n.激进份子，原子团，根号；adj.根本的，激进的，彻底的 | |
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21
positively
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| adv.明确地，断然，坚决地；实在，确实 | |
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22
dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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23
crux
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| adj.十字形；难事，关键，最重要点 | |
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24
decorative
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| adj.装饰的，可作装饰的 | |
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25
triumphantly
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| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
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26
tempted
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| v.怂恿（某人）干不正当的事；冒…的险（tempt的过去分词） | |
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27
culpable
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| adj.有罪的，该受谴责的 | |
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28
brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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29
irresistibly
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| adv.无法抵抗地，不能自持地；极为诱惑人地 | |
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30
liking
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| n.爱好；嗜好；喜欢 | |
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31
aplomb
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| n.沉着，镇静 | |
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32
desperately
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| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
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33
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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34
kindly
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| adj.和蔼的，温和的，爽快的；adv.温和地，亲切地 | |
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35
domain
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| n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围 | |
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36
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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37
wilful
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|
| adj.任性的，故意的 | |
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38
impunity
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| n.(惩罚、损失、伤害等的)免除 | |
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39
incapable
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|
| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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40
artistic
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|
| adj.艺术(家)的，美术(家)的；善于艺术创作的 | |
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41
ragged
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| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
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42
conscientiously
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|
| adv.凭良心地；认真地，负责尽职地；老老实实 | |
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43
enquire
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|
| v.打听，询问；调查，查问 | |
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44
grumblingly
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| 喃喃报怨着，发牢骚着 | |
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45
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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46
continental
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|
| adj.大陆的，大陆性的，欧洲大陆的 | |
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47
nil
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| n.无，全无，零 | |
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48
inviting
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|
| adj.诱人的，引人注目的 | |
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49
contrive
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|
| vt.谋划，策划；设法做到；设计，想出 | |
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50
contrived
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|
| adj.不自然的，做作的；虚构的 | |
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51
spoke
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|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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52
justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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53
reticence
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|
| n.沉默，含蓄 | |
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54
sobriquet
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| n.绰号 | |
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55
immutable
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| adj.不可改变的，永恒的 | |
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56
manly
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|
| adj.有男子气概的；adv.男子般地，果断地 | |
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57
bourgeois
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|
| adj./n.追求物质享受的(人)；中产阶级分子 | |
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58
complement
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| n.补足物，船上的定员；补语；vt.补充，补足 | |
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59
supervision
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| n.监督，管理 | |
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60
curb
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| n.场外证券市场，场外交易；vt.制止，抑制 | |
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61
curbed
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| v.限制，克制，抑制( curb的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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62
cultivation
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| n.耕作，培养，栽培（法），养成 | |
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63
exonerated
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|
| v.使免罪，免除( exonerate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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64
arena
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| n.竞技场，运动场所；竞争场所，舞台 | |
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65
gainsay
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| v.否认，反驳 | |
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66
professed
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| 公开声称的，伪称的，已立誓信教的 | |
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67
alleys
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| 胡同，小巷( alley的名词复数 )； 小径 | |
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68
majestically
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| 雄伟地； 庄重地； 威严地； 崇高地 | |
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69
casually
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| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
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70
impelled
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|
| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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71
obtrusive
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|
| adj.显眼的；冒失的 | |
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72
plentiful
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|
| adj.富裕的，丰富的 | |
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73
brutality
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|
| n.野蛮的行为，残忍，野蛮 | |
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74
lodger
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|
| n.寄宿人，房客 | |
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75
dreariest
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|
| 使人闷闷不乐或沮丧的( dreary的最高级 )； 阴沉的； 令人厌烦的； 单调的 | |
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76
wrangled
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|
| v.争吵，争论，口角( wrangle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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77
bullied
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|
| adj.被欺负了v.恐吓，威逼( bully的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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78
bullies
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|
| n.欺凌弱小者, 开球 vt.恐吓, 威胁, 欺负 | |
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79
brutally
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|
| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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80
miserable
|
|
| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
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81
irrelevantly
|
|
| adv.不恰当地，不合适地；不相关地 | |
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82
tiresome
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|
| adj.令人疲劳的，令人厌倦的 | |
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83
annoyance
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|
| n.恼怒，生气，烦恼 | |
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84
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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85
extravagant
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|
| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
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86
grievance
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|
| n.怨愤，气恼，委屈 | |
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87
entailed
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|
| 使…成为必要( entail的过去式和过去分词 )； 需要； 限定继承； 使必需 | |
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88
ambiguity
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|
| n.模棱两可；意义不明确 | |
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89
lapses
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|
| n.失误，过失( lapse的名词复数 )；小毛病；行为失检；偏离正道v.退步( lapse的第三人称单数 )；陷入；倒退；丧失 | |
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90
applied
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|
| adj.应用的；v.应用，适用 | |
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91
retail
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|
| v./n.零售；adv.以零售价格 | |
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92
literally
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|
| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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93
discomfiture
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|
| n.崩溃；大败；挫败；困惑 | |
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94
extenuation
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| n.减轻罪孽的借口；酌情减轻；细 | |
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95
affected
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|
| adj.不自然的，假装的 | |
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96
imminent
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|
| adj.即将发生的，临近的，逼近的 | |
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97
propitiating
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|
| v.劝解，抚慰，使息怒( propitiate的现在分词 ) | |
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98
humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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99
theatrical
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|
| adj.剧场的，演戏的；做戏似的，做作的 | |
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100
sentimental
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|
| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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101
savagely
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| adv. 野蛮地，残酷地 | |
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102
savage
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| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
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103
singed
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|
| v.浅表烧焦( singe的过去式和过去分词 )；（毛发）燎，烧焦尖端[边儿] | |
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104
heinous
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| adj.可憎的，十恶不赦的 | |
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105
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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106
vigour
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| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
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107
coherence
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| n.紧凑；连贯；一致性 | |
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108
monotonously
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| adv.单调地，无变化地 | |
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109
pendulum
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| n.摆，钟摆 | |
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110
halcyon
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| n.平静的，愉快的 | |
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111
taunt
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| n.辱骂，嘲弄；v.嘲弄 | |
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112
attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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113
complaisant
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| adj.顺从的，讨好的 | |
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114
abide
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| vi.遵守；坚持；vt.忍受 | |
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115
fabric
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| n.织物，织品，布；构造，结构，组织 | |
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116
creed
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| n.信条；信念，纲领 | |
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117
psyche
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| n.精神；灵魂 | |
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118
technically
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| adv.专门地，技术上地 | |
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119
dominion
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| n.统治，管辖，支配权；领土，版图 | |
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120
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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121
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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122
feats
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| 功绩，伟业，技艺( feat的名词复数 ) | |
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123
eyelids
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|
| n.眼睑( eyelid的名词复数 )；眼睛也不眨一下；不露声色；面不改色 | |
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124
detested
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| v.憎恶，嫌恶，痛恨( detest的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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125
outwards
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| adj.外面的，公开的，向外的；adv.向外；n.外形 | |
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126
insistent
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| adj.迫切的，坚持的 | |
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127
enquiring
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| a.爱打听的，显得好奇的 | |
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128
bantering
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|
| adj.嘲弄的v.开玩笑，说笑，逗乐( banter的现在分词 )；（善意地）取笑，逗弄 | |
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129
exacerbating
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|
| v.使恶化，使加重( exacerbate的现在分词 ) | |
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130
passionate
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| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
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131
passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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132
pettish
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| adj.易怒的，使性子的 | |
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133
exclamation
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| n.感叹号，惊呼，惊叹词 | |
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134
elucidating
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|
| v.阐明，解释( elucidate的现在分词 ) | |
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135
pallid
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| adj.苍白的，呆板的 | |
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136
constraint
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| n.(on)约束，限制；限制(或约束)性的事物 | |
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137
contemplating
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|
| 深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想 | |
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138
demurely
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|
| adv.装成端庄地，认真地 | |
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139
gracefully
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|
| ad.大大方方地；优美地 | |
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141
morsel
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| n.一口，一点点 | |
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142
slippers
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| n. 拖鞋 | |
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143
grotesque
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| adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物） | |
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proximity
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| n.接近，邻近 | |
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meekness
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| n.温顺，柔和 | |
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enquired
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| 打听( enquire的过去式和过去分词 )； 询问； 问问题； 查问 | |
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solicitude
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| n.焦虑 | |
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digestion
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| n.消化，吸收 | |
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149
plebeian
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| adj.粗俗的；平民的；n.平民；庶民 | |
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feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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151
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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rummage
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| v./n.翻寻，仔细检查 | |
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153
extraordinarily
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| adv.格外地；极端地 | |
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possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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156
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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157
blessing
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| n.祈神赐福；祷告；祝福，祝愿 | |
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Undid
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| v. 解开, 复原 | |
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severely
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| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
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recondite
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| adj.深奥的，难解的 | |
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recesses
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| n.壁凹( recess的名词复数 )；（工作或业务活动的）中止或暂停期间；学校的课间休息；某物内部的凹形空间v.把某物放在墙壁的凹处( recess的第三人称单数 )；将（墙）做成凹形，在（墙）上做壁龛；休息，休会，休庭 | |
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standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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resolutely
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| adj.坚决地，果断地 | |
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anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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tugged
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| v.用力拉，使劲拉，猛扯( tug的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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honourable
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| adj.可敬的；荣誉的，光荣的 | |
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flirt
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| v.调情，挑逗，调戏；n.调情者，卖俏者 | |
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sapphire
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| n.青玉，蓝宝石；adj.天蓝色的 | |
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