Two opposite feelings strove for dominance as Stephen found herself on the hilltop, alone. One a feeling natural enough to any one, and especially to a girl, of relief that a dreaded4 hour had been postponed5; the other of chagrin6 that she was the first.
After a few moments, however, one of the two militant7 thoughts became dominant8: the feeling of chagrin. With a pang9 she thought if she had been a man and summoned for such a purpose, how she would have hurried to the trysting-place; how the flying of her feet would have vied with the quick rapturous beating of her heart! With a little sigh and a blush, she remembered that Leonard did not know the purpose of the meeting; that he was a friend almost brought up with her since boy and girl times; that he had often been summoned in similar terms and for the most trivial of social purposes.
For nearly half an hour Stephen sat on the rustic10 seat under the shadow of the great oak, looking, half unconscious of its beauty and yet influenced by it, over the wide landscape stretched at her feet.
In spite of her disregard of conventions, she was no fool; the instinct of wisdom was strong within her, so strong that in many ways it ruled her conscious efforts. Had any one told her that her preparations for this interview were made deliberately11 with some of the astuteness12 that dominated the Devil when he took Jesus to the top of a high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the earth at His feet, she would have, and with truth, denied it with indignation. Nevertheless it was a fact that she had, in all unconsciousness, chosen for the meeting a spot which would evidence to a man, consciously or unconsciously, the desirability for his own sake of acquiescence13 in her views and wishes. For all this spreading landscape was her possession, which her husband would share. As far as the eye could reach was within the estate which she had inherited from her father and her uncle.
The half-hour passed in waiting had in one way its advantages to the girl: though she was still as high strung as ever, she acquired a larger measure of control over herself. The nervous tension, however, was so complete physically14 that all her faculties15 were acutely awake; very early she became conscious of a distant footstep.
To Stephen’s straining ears the footsteps seemed wondrous16 slow, and more wondrous regular; she felt instinctively17 that she would have liked to have listened to a more hurried succession of less evenly-marked sounds. But notwithstanding these thoughts, and the qualms19 which came in their turn, the sound of the coming feet brought great joy. For, after all, they were coming; and coming just in time to prevent the sense of disappointment at their delay gaining firm foothold. It was only when the coming was assured that she felt how strong had been the undercurrent of her apprehension20 lest they should not come at all.
Very sweet and tender and beautiful Stephen looked at this moment. The strong lines of her face were softened21 by the dark fire in her eyes and the feeling which glowed in the deep blushes which mantled22 her cheeks. The proudness of her bearing was no less marked than ever, but in the willowy sway of her body there was a yielding of mere23 sorry pride. In all the many moods which the gods allow to good women there is none so dear or so alluring24, consciously as well as instinctively, to true men as this self-surrender. As Leonard drew near, Stephen sank softly into a seat, doing so with a guilty feeling of acting25 a part. When he actually came into the grove26 he found her seemingly lost in a reverie as she gazed out over the wide expanse in front of her. He was hot after his walk, and with something very like petulance27 threw himself into a cane28 armchair, exclaiming as he did so with the easy insolence29 of old familiarity:
‘What a girl you are, Stephen! dragging a fellow all the way up here. Couldn’t you have fixed30 it down below somewhere if you wanted to see me?’
Strangely enough, as it seemed to her, Stephen did not dislike his tone of mastery. There was something in it which satisfied her. The unconscious recognition of his manhood, as opposed to her womanhood, soothed31 her in a peaceful way. It was easy to yield to a dominant man. She was never more womanly than when she answered him softly:
‘It was rather unfair; but I thought you would not mind coming so far. It is so cool and delightful32 here; and we can talk without being disturbed.’ Leonard was lying back in his chair fanning himself with his wide-brimmed straw hat, with outstretched legs wide apart and resting on the back of his heels. He replied with grudging33 condescension34:
‘Yes, it’s cool enough after the hot tramp over the fields and through the wood. It’s not so good as the house, though, in one way: a man can’t get a drink here. I say, Stephen, it wouldn’t be half bad if there were a shanty35 put up here like those at the Grands Mulets or on the Matterhorn. There could be a tap laid on where a fellow could quench36 his thirst on a day like this!’
Before Stephen’s eyes floated a momentary37 vision of a romantic chalet with wide verandah and big windows looking over the landscape; a great wide stone hearth38; quaint1 furniture made from the gnarled branches of trees; skins on the floor; and the walls adorned39 with antlers, great horns, and various trophies40 of the chase. And amongst them Leonard, in a picturesque41 suit, lolling back just as at present and smiling with a loving look in his eyes as she handed him a great blue-and-white Munich beer mug topped with cool foam42. There was a soft mystery in her voice as she answered:
‘I wish it was here now. Some day seems a long way off!’
This seemed a good opening for Stephen; for the fear of the situation was again beginning to assail44 her, and she felt that if she did not enter on her task at once, its difficulty might overwhelm her. She felt angry with herself that there was a change in her voice as she said:
‘Some day may mean—can mean everything. Things needn’t be a longer way off than we choose ourselves, sometimes!’
‘I say, that’s a good one! Do you mean to say that because I am some day to own Brindehow I can do as I like with it at once, whilst the governor’s all there, and a better life than I am any day? Unless you want me to shoot the old man by accident when we go out on the First.’ He laughed a short, unmeaning masculine laugh which jarred somewhat on her. She did not, however, mean to be diverted from her main purpose, so she went on quickly:
‘You know quite well, Leonard, that I don’t mean anything of the kind. But there was something I wanted to say to you, and I wished that we should be alone. Can you not guess what it is?’
‘No, I’ll be hanged if I can!’ was his response, lazily given.
Despite her resolution she turned her head; she could not meet his eyes. It cut her with a sharp pain to notice when she turned again that he was not looking at her. He continued fanning himself with his hat as he gazed out at the view. She felt that the critical moment of her life had come, that it was now or never as to her fulfilling her settled intention. So with a rush she went on her way:
‘Leonard, you and I have been friends a long time. You know my views on some points, and that I think a woman should be as free to act as a man!’ She paused; words and ideas did not seem to flow with the readiness she expected. Leonard’s arrogant45 assurance completed the dragging her back to earth which her own self-consciousness began:
‘Drive on, old girl! I know you’re a crank from Crankville on some subjects. Let us have it for all you’re worth. I’m on the grass and listening.’
Stephen paused. ‘A crank from Crankville!’—this after her nights of sleepless46 anxiety; after the making of the resolution which had cost her so much, and which was now actually in process of realisation. Was it all worth so much? why not abandon it now? . . . Abandon it! Abandon a resolution! All the obstinacy47 of her nature—she classed it herself as firmness—rose in revolt. She shook her head angrily, pulled herself together, and went on:
‘That may be! though it’s not what I call myself, or what I am usually called, so far as I know. At any rate my convictions are honest, and I am sure you will respect them as such, even if you do not share them.’ She did not see the ready response in his face which she expected, and so hurried on:
‘It has always seemed to me that a—when a woman has to speak to a man she should do so as frankly48 as she would like him to speak to her, and as freely. Leonard, I—I,’ as she halted, a sudden idea, winged with possibilities of rescuing procrastination49 came to her. She went on more easily:
‘I know you are in trouble about money matters. Why not let me help you?’ He sat up and looked at her and said genially50:
‘Well, Stephen, you are a good old sort! No mistake about it. Do you mean to say you would help me to pay my debts, when the governor has refused to do so any more?’
‘It would be a great pleasure to me, Leonard, to do anything for your good or your pleasure.’
There was a long pause; they both sat looking down at the ground. The woman’s heart beat loud; she feared that the man must hear it. She was consumed with anxiety, and with a desolating51 wish to be relieved from the strain of saying more. Surely, surely Leonard could not be so blind as not to see the state of things! . . . He would surely seize the occasion; throw aside his diffidence and relieve her! . . . His words made a momentary music in her ears as he spoke52:
‘And is this what you asked me to come here for?’
The words filled her with a great shame. She felt herself a dilemma53. It had been no part of her purpose to allude54 his debts. Viewed in the light of what was to follow, it would seem to him that she was trying to foreclose his affection. That could not be allowed to pass; the error must be rectified55. And yet! . . . And yet this very error must be cleared up before she could make her full wish apparent. She seemed to find herself compelled by inexorable circumstances into an unlooked-for bluntness. In any case she must face the situation. Her pluck did not fail her; it was with a very noble and graceful56 simplicity57 that she turned to her companion and said:
‘Leonard, I did not quite mean that. It would be a pleasure to me to be of that or any other service to you, if I might be so happy! But I never meant to allude to your debts. Oh! Leonard, can’t you understand! If you were my husband—or—or going to be, all such little troubles would fall away from you. But I would not for the world have you think . . . ’
Her very voice failed her. She could not speak what was in her mind; she turned away, hiding in her hands her face which fairly seemed to burn. This, she thought, was the time for a true lover’s opportunity! Oh, if she had been a man, and a woman had so appealed, how he would have sprung to her side and taken her in his arms, and in a wild rapture59 of declared affection have swept away all the pain of her shame!
But she remained alone. There was no springing to her side; no rapture of declared affection; no obliteration60 of her shame. She had to bear it all alone. There, in the open; under the eyes that she would fain have seen any other phase of her distress61. Her heart beat loud and fast; she waited to gain her self-control.
Leonard Everard had his faults, plenty of them, and he was in truth composed of an amalgam62 of far baser metals than Stephen thought; but he had been born of gentle blood and reared amongst gentlefolk. He did not quite understand the cause or the amount of his companion’s concern; but he could not but recognise her distress. He realised that it had followed hard upon her most generous intention towards himself. He could not, therefore, do less than try to comfort her, and he began his task in a conventional way, but with a blundering awkwardness which was all manlike. He took her hand and held it in his; this much at any rate he had learned in sitting on stairs or in conservatories63 after extra dances. He said as tenderly as he could, but with an impatient gesture unseen by her:
‘Forgive me, Stephen! I suppose I have said or done something which I shouldn’t. But I don’t know what it is; upon my honour I don’t. Anyhow, I am truly sorry for it. Cheer up, old girl! I’m not your husband, you know; so you needn’t be distressed64.’
Stephen took her courage à deux mains. If Leonard would not speak she must. It was manifestly impossible that the matter could be left in its present state.
‘Leonard,’ she said softly and solemnly, ‘might not that some day be?’
Leonard, in addition to being an egotist and the very incarnation of selfishness, was a prig of the first water. He had been reared altogether in convention. Home life and Eton and Christchurch had taught him many things, wise as well as foolish; but had tended to fix his conviction that affairs of the heart should proceed on adamantine lines of conventional decorum. It never even occurred to him that a lady could so far step from the confines of convention as to take the initiative in a matter of affection. In his blind ignorance he blundered brutally66. He struck better than he knew, as, meaning only to pass safely by an awkward conversational67 corner, he replied:
‘No jolly fear of that! You’re too much of a boss for me!’ The words and the levity68 with which they were spoken struck the girl as with a whip. She turned for an instant as pale as ashes; then the red blood rushed from her heart, and face and neck were dyed crimson69. It was not a blush, it was a suffusion70. In his ignorance Leonard thought it was the former, and went on with what he considered his teasing.
‘Oh yes! You know you always want to engineer a chap your own way and make him do just as you wish. The man who has the happiness of marrying you, Stephen, will have a hard row to hoe!’ His ‘chaff’ with its utter want of refinement71 seemed to her, in her high-strung earnest condition, nothing short of brutal65, and for a few seconds produced a feeling of repellence. But it is in the nature of things that opposition72 of any kind arouses the fighting instinct of a naturally dominant nature. She lost sight of her femininity in the pursuit of her purpose; and as this was to win the man to her way of thinking, she took the logical course of answering his argument. If Leonard Everard had purposely set himself to stimulate73 her efforts in this direction he could hardly have chosen a better way. It came somewhat as a surprise to Stephen, when she heard her own words:
‘I would make a good wife, Leonard! A husband whom I loved and honoured would, I think, not be unhappy!’ The sound of her own voice speaking these words, though the tone was low and tender and more self-suppressing by far than was her wont74, seemed to peal58 like thunder in her own ears. Her last bolt seemed to have sped. The blood rushed to her head, and she had to hold on to the arms of the rustic chair or she would have fallen forward.
The time seemed long before Leonard spoke again; every second seemed an age. She seemed to have grown tired of waiting for the sound of his voice; it was with a kind of surprise that she heard him say:
‘You limit yourself wisely, Stephen!’
‘How do you mean?’ she asked, making a great effort to speak.
‘You would promise to love and honour; but there isn’t anything about obeying.’
As he spoke Leonard stretched himself again luxuriously75, and laughed with the intellectual arrogance76 of a man who is satisfied with a joke, however inferior, of his own manufacture. Stephen looked at him with a long look which began in anger—that anger which comes from an unwonted sense of impotence, and ends in tolerance77, the intermediate step being admiration78. It is the primeval curse that a woman’s choice is to her husband; and it is an important part of the teaching of a British gentlewoman, knit in the very fibres of her being by the remorseless etiquette79 of a thousand years, that she be true to him. The man who has in his person the necessary powers or graces to evoke80 admiration in his wife, even for a passing moment, has a stronghold unconquerable as a rule by all the deadliest arts of mankind.
Leonard Everard was certainly good to look upon as he lolled at his ease on that summer morning. Tall, straight, supple81; a typical British gentleman of the educated class, with all parts of the body properly developed and held in some kind of suitable poise82.
As Stephen looked, the anxiety and chagrin which tormented83 her seemed to pass. She realised that here was a nature different from her own, and which should be dealt with in a way unsuitable to herself; and the conviction seemed to make the action which it necessitated84 more easy as well as more natural to her. Perhaps for the first time in her life Stephen understood that it may be necessary to apply to individuals a standard of criticism unsuitable to self-judgment. Her recognition might have been summed up in the thought which ran through her mind:
Stephen, when once she had allowed the spirit of toleration to work within her, felt immediately its calming influence. It was with brighter thoughts and better humour that she went on with her task. A task only, it seemed now; a means to an end which she desired.
‘Leonard, tell me seriously, why do you think I gave you the trouble of coming out here?’
‘Upon my soul, Stephen, I don’t know.’
‘You don’t seem to care either, lolling like that when I am serious!’ The words were acid, but the tone was soft and friendly, familiar and genuine, putting quite a meaning of its own on them. Leonard looked at her indolently:
‘I like to loll.’
‘But can’t you even guess, or try to guess, what I ask you?’
‘I can’t guess. The day’s too hot, and that shanty with the drinks is not built yet.’
‘Or may never be!’ Again he looked at her sleepily.
‘Never be! Why not?’
‘Because, Leonard, it may depend on you.’
‘All right then. Drive on! Hurry up the architect and the jerry-builder!’
A quick blush leaped to Stephen’s cheeks. The words were full of meaning, though the tone lacked something; but the news was too good. She could not accept it at once; she decided87 to herself to wait a short time. Ere many seconds had passed she rejoiced that she had done so as he went on:
‘I hope you’ll give me a say before that husband of yours comes along. He might be a blue-ribbonite; and it wouldn’t do to start such a shanty for rot-gut!’
Again a cold wave swept over her. The absolute difference of feeling between the man and herself; his levity against her earnestness, his callous88 blindness to her purpose, even the commonness of his words chilled her. For a few seconds she wavered again in her intention; but once again his comeliness89 and her own obstinacy joined hands and took her back to her path. With chagrin she felt that her words almost stuck in her throat, as summoning up all her resolution she went on:
‘It would be for you I would have it built, Leonard!’ The man sat up quickly.
‘For me?’ he asked in a sort of wonderment.
‘Yes, Leonard, for you and me!’ She turned away; her blushes so overcame her that she could not look at him. When she faced round again he was standing18 up, his back towards her.
She stood up also. He was silent for a while; so long that the silence became intolerable, and she spoke:
‘Leonard, I am waiting!’ He turned round and said slowly, the absence of all emotion from his face chilling her till her face blanched90:
‘I don’t think I would worry about it!’
Stephen Norman was plucky91, and when she was face to face with any difficulty she was all herself. Leonard did not look pleasant; his face was hard and there was just a suspicion of anger. Strangely enough, this last made the next step easier to the girl; she said slowly:
‘All right! I think I understand!’
He turned from her and stood looking out on the distant prospect92. Then she felt that the blow which she had all along secretly feared had fallen on her. But her pride as well as her obstinacy now rebelled. She would not accept a silent answer. There must be no doubt left to torture her afterwards. She would take care that there was no mistake. Schooling herself to her task, and pressing one hand for a moment to her side as though to repress the beating of her heart, she came behind him and touched him tenderly on the arm.
‘Leonard,’ she said softly, ‘are you sure there is no mistake? Do you not see that I am asking you,’ she intended to say ‘to be my husband,’ but she could not utter the words, they seemed to stick in her mouth, so she finished the sentence: ‘that I be your wife?’
The moment the words were spoken—the bare, hard, naked, shameless words—the revulsion came. As a lightning flash shows up the blackness of the night the appalling93 truth of what she had done was forced upon her. The blood rushed to her head till cheeks and shoulders and neck seemed to burn. Covering her face with her hands she sank back on the seat crying silently bitter tears that seemed to scald her eyes and her cheeks as they ran.
Leonard was angry. When it began to dawn upon him what was the purpose of Stephen’s speech, he had been shocked. Young men are so easily shocked by breaches94 of convention made by women they respect! And his pride was hurt. Why should he have been placed in such a ridiculous position! He did not love Stephen in that way; and she should have known it. He liked her and all that sort of thing; but what right had she to assume that he loved her? All the weakness of his moral nature came out in his petulance. It was boyish that his eyes filled with tears. He knew it, and that made him more angry than ever. Stephen might well have been at a loss to understand his anger, as, with manifest intention to wound, he answered her:
‘What a girl you are, Stephen. You are always doing something or other to put a chap in the wrong and make him ridiculous. I thought you were joking—not a good joke either! Upon my soul, I don’t know what I’ve done that you should fix on me! I wish to goodness—’
If Stephen had suffered the red terror before, she suffered the white terror now. It was not injured pride, it was not humiliation95, it was not fear; it was something vague and terrible that lay far deeper than any of these. Under ordinary circumstances she would have liked to have spoken out her mind and given back as good as she got; and even as the thoughts whirled through her brain they came in a torrent96 of vague vituperative97 eloquence98. But now her tongue was tied. Instinctively she knew that she had put it out of her power to revenge, or even to defend herself. She was tied to the stake, and must suffer without effort and in silence.
Most humiliating of all was the thought that she must propitiate99 the man who had so wounded her. All love for him had in the instant passed from her; or rather she realised fully100 the blank, bare truth that she had never really loved him at all. Had she really loved him, even a blow at his hands would have been acceptable; but now . . .
She shook the feelings and thoughts from her as a bird does the water from its wings; and, with the courage and strength and adaptability101 of her nature, addressed herself to the hard task which faced her in the immediate86 present. With eloquent102, womanly gesture she arrested the torrent of Leonard’s indignation; and, as he paused in surprised obedience103, she said:
‘That will do, Leonard! It is not necessary to say any more; and I am sure you will see, later on, that at least there was no cause for your indignation! I have done an unconventional thing, I know; and I dare say I shall have to pay for it in humiliating bitterness of thought later on! But please remember we are all alone! This is a secret between us; no one else need ever know or suspect it!’
She rose as she concluded. The quiet dignity of her speech and bearing brought back Leonard in some way to his sense of duty as a gentleman. He began, in a sheepish way, to make an apology:
‘I’m sure I beg your pardon, Stephen.’ But again she held the warning hand:
‘There is no need for pardon; the fault, if there were any, was mine alone. It was I, remember, who asked you to come here and who introduced and conducted this melancholy104 business. I have asked you several things, Leonard, and one more I will add—’tis only one: that you will forget!’
As she moved away, her dismissal of the subject was that of an empress to a serf. Leonard would have liked to answer her; to have given vent3 to his indignation that, even when he had refused her offer, she should have the power to treat him if he was the one refused, and to make him feel small and ridiculous in his own eyes. But somehow he felt constrained105 to silence; her simple dignity outclassed him.
There was another factor too, in his forming his conclusion of silence. He had never seen Stephen look so well, or so attractive. He had never respected her so much as when her playfulness had turned to majestic106 gravity. All the boy and girl strife107 of the years that had gone seemed to have passed away. The girl whom he had played with, and bullied108, and treated as frankly as though she had been a boy, had in an instant become a woman—and such a woman as demanded respect and admiration even from such a man.
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1
quaint
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| adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的 | |
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tryst
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| n.约会；v.与…幽会 | |
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vent
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| n.通风口，排放口；开衩；vt.表达，发泄 | |
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dreaded
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| adj.令人畏惧的；害怕的v.害怕，恐惧，担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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postponed
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| vt.& vi.延期，缓办，（使）延迟vt.把…放在次要地位；[语]把…放在后面（或句尾）vi.（疟疾等）延缓发作（或复发） | |
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chagrin
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| n.懊恼；气愤；委屈 | |
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militant
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| adj.激进的，好斗的；n.激进分子，斗士 | |
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dominant
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| adj.支配的，统治的；占优势的；显性的；n.主因，要素，主要的人(或物)；显性基因 | |
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pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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rustic
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| adj.乡村的，有乡村特色的；n.乡下人，乡巴佬 | |
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deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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astuteness
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| n.敏锐；精明；机敏 | |
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acquiescence
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| n.默许；顺从 | |
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physically
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| adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律 | |
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faculties
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| n.能力( faculty的名词复数 )；全体教职员；技巧；院 | |
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wondrous
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| adj.令人惊奇的，奇妙的；adv.惊人地；异乎寻常地；令人惊叹地 | |
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instinctively
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| adv.本能地 | |
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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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qualms
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| n.不安；内疚 | |
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apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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mantled
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| 披着斗篷的，覆盖着的 | |
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mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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alluring
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| adj.吸引人的，迷人的 | |
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acting
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| n.演戏，行为，假装；adj.代理的，临时的，演出用的 | |
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grove
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| n.林子，小树林，园林 | |
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petulance
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| n.发脾气，生气，易怒，暴躁，性急 | |
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cane
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| n.手杖，细长的茎，藤条；v.以杖击，以藤编制的 | |
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insolence
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| n.傲慢；无礼；厚颜；傲慢的态度 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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soothed
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| v.安慰( soothe的过去式和过去分词 )；抚慰；使舒服；减轻痛苦 | |
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delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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grudging
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| adj.勉强的，吝啬的 | |
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condescension
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| n.自以为高人一等，贬低(别人) | |
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35
shanty
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| n.小屋，棚屋；船工号子 | |
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36
quench
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| vt.熄灭，扑灭；压制 | |
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37
momentary
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| adj.片刻的，瞬息的；短暂的 | |
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38
hearth
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| n.壁炉炉床，壁炉地面 | |
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adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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40
trophies
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| n.（为竞赛获胜者颁发的）奖品( trophy的名词复数 )；奖杯；（尤指狩猎或战争中获得的）纪念品；（用于比赛或赛跑名称）奖 | |
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41
picturesque
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| adj.美丽如画的，（语言）生动的，绘声绘色的 | |
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foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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43
grumble
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| vi.抱怨；咕哝；n.抱怨，牢骚；咕哝，隆隆声 | |
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44
assail
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| v.猛烈攻击，抨击，痛斥 | |
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45
arrogant
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的 | |
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46
sleepless
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| adj.不睡眠的，睡不著的，不休息的 | |
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47
obstinacy
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| n.顽固；（病痛等）难治 | |
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frankly
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| adv.坦白地，直率地；坦率地说 | |
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49
procrastination
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| n.拖延，耽搁 | |
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genially
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| adv.亲切地，和蔼地；快活地 | |
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desolating
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| 毁坏( desolate的现在分词 )； 极大地破坏； 使沮丧； 使痛苦 | |
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52
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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53
dilemma
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| n.困境，进退两难的局面 | |
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54
allude
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| v.提及，暗指 | |
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rectified
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| [医]矫正的，调整的 | |
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graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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simplicity
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| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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58
peal
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| n.钟声；v.鸣响 | |
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59
rapture
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| n.狂喜；全神贯注；着迷；v.使狂喜 | |
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obliteration
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| n.涂去，删除；管腔闭合 | |
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distress
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| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
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amalgam
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| n.混合物；汞合金 | |
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63
conservatories
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| n.（培植植物的）温室，暖房( conservatory的名词复数 ) | |
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distressed
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| 痛苦的 | |
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brutal
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| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
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brutally
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| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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conversational
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| adj.对话的，会话的 | |
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levity
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| n.轻率，轻浮，不稳定，多变 | |
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crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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suffusion
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| n.充满 | |
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refinement
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| n.文雅；高尚；精美；精制；精炼 | |
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opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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stimulate
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| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
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wont
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| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
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luxuriously
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| adv.奢侈地，豪华地 | |
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arrogance
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| n.傲慢，自大 | |
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77
tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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admiration
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| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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etiquette
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| n.礼仪，礼节；规矩 | |
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evoke
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| vt.唤起，引起，使人想起 | |
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supple
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| adj.柔软的，易弯的，逢迎的，顺从的，灵活的；vt.使柔软，使柔顺，使顺从；vi.变柔软，变柔顺 | |
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poise
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| vt./vi. 平衡，保持平衡；n.泰然自若，自信 | |
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83
tormented
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| 饱受折磨的 | |
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84
necessitated
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| 使…成为必要，需要( necessitate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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85
lenient
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| adj.宽大的，仁慈的 | |
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86
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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87
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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88
callous
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| adj.无情的，冷淡的，硬结的，起老茧的 | |
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89
comeliness
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| n. 清秀, 美丽, 合宜 | |
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90
blanched
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| v.使变白( blanch的过去式 )；使（植物）不见阳光而变白；酸洗（金属）使有光泽；用沸水烫（杏仁等）以便去皮 | |
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plucky
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| adj.勇敢的 | |
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92
prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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93
appalling
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| adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的 | |
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94
breaches
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| 破坏( breach的名词复数 )； 破裂； 缺口； 违背 | |
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95
humiliation
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| n.羞辱 | |
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96
torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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97
vituperative
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| adj.谩骂的；斥责的 | |
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98
eloquence
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| n.雄辩；口才，修辞 | |
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99
propitiate
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| v.慰解，劝解 | |
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100
fully
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| adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地 | |
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101
adaptability
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| n.适应性 | |
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102
eloquent
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| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
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103
obedience
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| n.服从，顺从 | |
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104
melancholy
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| n.忧郁，愁思；adj.令人感伤（沮丧）的，忧郁的 | |
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constrained
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| adj.束缚的,节制的 | |
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106
majestic
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| adj.雄伟的，壮丽的，庄严的，威严的，崇高的 | |
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107
strife
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| n.争吵，冲突，倾轧，竞争 | |
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108
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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