We have termed Gerry “soft-minded.” He was also soft-hearted, soft-eyed, soft-voiced, soft-haired, soft-skinned, and soft-mannered—the kind of youth women who own to years of discretion15 like to pet and bully16, the kind of man schoolgirls call a “duck.” True, his neckties aroused indignation in the breasts of intolerant elderly gentlemen, the patterns of his tweeds afforded exquisite17 amusement to members of the Household Brigade, and his jewelry18 could not be gazed at without winking19 by the unseasoned eye; but, despite these drawbacks, Gerry was a gentleman. Without the stamp of a public school or a select club, without the tone of the best society—for, with the exception of a turfy baronet or so and a couple of sporting peers, Gerry knew nobody who was anybody—Gerry was decidedly a gentleman, whose progress to the dogs was arrested, luckily for the young prodigal21, when he fell in love with the famous burlesque22 actress, Miss Lottie Speranza, of the Levity23 Theater.
Of theaters and theatrical24 people Gerry may be said to have known little or nothing until the enchanting25 Lottie blazed upon his field of vision. Gerry’s worthy26 parents, strict moralists both, had considered the theater as the temple of Satan, and had exacted from their only child a solemn promise that he would never enter one. This promise Gerry had actually kept, contenting himself with the entertainments offered by the music halls, which his father had omitted to stigmatize27 and his mother knew not of. But at the close of a festive28 dinner, given by Gerry to a select party of “pals,” in a private 83room at the Levity Restaurant, when a brief, lethargic29 slumber30 obscured the senses of the youthful host, the brilliant idea of conveying him to a box in the theater upstairs occurred to one of his guests, and was forthwith carried out. Emerging from a condition of coma31, Gerry found himself staring into a web of crossing and intersecting limelights of varying hues32, in which a dazzling human butterfly, entangled34, was beating quivering wings. The butterfly had lustrous35 eyes, encircled with blue rims36, a complexion37 of theatrical red and white, and masses of golden hair. Her twinkling feet beat out a measure to which Gerry’s pulses began to dance madly. He sent the goddess an invitation to supper, which was promptly38 declined. He forwarded a stack of roses, which were not acknowledged, and a muff-chain, turquoise40 and peridot, which were returned to the address upon his card. He felt hurt but happy at these rebuffs, which proved to him that Miss Speranza was above reproach; and when a bosom41 friend of his own age hinted that the prudish42 fair one was playing the big game, and advised him to try her with a motor-car, Gerry promptly converted the bosom friend into a stranger by the simple process of asking him to redeem43 a few of his I O U’s. This got about, and caused Gerry’s other friends to turn sharp round corners, or jump into hansoms when they saw Gerry coming. Gerry hardly missed them, though the man who could have afforded an introduction to his charmer would have been welcomed with open arms. He occupied the same box at the Levity nightly now, and made up, in its murkiest44 corner, a good deal of the nightly rest of which his clamant passion deprived him. But he awakened45, as by instinct, whenever Miss Speranza tripped upon the stage; and the large-eyed, vacuous46, gorgeously-attired47 beauties who “went on” with the Chorus—the Lotties, Maries, Daisies, Topsies of the noble houses of Montague, Talbot, De Crespigny, and Delamere,—would 84languidly nudge each other at the passionately48 prolonged plaudits of a particular pair of immaculate white gloves, and wonder semi-audibly what the man saw in Speranza, dear, to make such a bloomin’ silly fuss about?
Gerry had occupied his watch-tower at the Levity for six weeks or so, and was beginning to deteriorate49 in appetite and complexion (so powerful are the effects of passion unreturned), when Undertherose Cottage at Sunningwater, a charming Thames-side residence of the bijou kind, with small grounds and a capacious cellar, a boat-house, and a house-boat, a pigeon-cote and a private post-box, became suddenly vacant. The tenant50, a lady of many charms and much experience, who had passed over to Gerry with the property, returned to her native Paris to open a bonnet-shop; and Gerry, as he wandered over the dwelling52 with the sanitary53 engineer and decorator, who had carte blanche to do-up the place, found himself strolling on the tiny lawn (in imagination) by the visioned side of the enchantress who had enthralled54 him, supping (also in imagination) with the same divine creature in the duodecimo oak dining-room, and smoking a cigarette in her delightful55 company upon the balcony of the boudoir. Waking from these dreams was a piquant56 anguish57. Gerry indeed possessed58 the cage, one of the most ideal nests for a honeymooning59 pair imaginable; but in vain for the airy feminine songster might the infatuated fowler spread nets and set springs.
“If we didn’t live in this confoundedly proper twentieth century,” thought disconsolate60 Gerry, “a chappie might hire a coach and eight, bribe61 a few bruisers to repress attempts at rescue, snap her up respectfully as she came out at the stage door, and absquatulate—no! abduct’s the word. Not that I’d behave like a brute62; I’d marry her to-morrow if she’d only give me a chance 85to ask her. Marquises do that sort of thing, and their families come round a bit and bless the young people. She must have shown the door to dozens of ’em.” He sighed, for where the possessor of a ripe old peerage had failed, how could Gerald Gandelish, Esq., hope to triumph? “And she’s so awfully63 proper and standoffish, too,” he reflected. He wondered how many years it had taken those privileged persons whom the lady permitted to rank as her friends to attain64 that enviable distinction. “I’ve never met a man who could, or would, introduce me,” he added, pulling his mustache, which from happily turning up at the corners had recently acquired a decided20 tendency to droop65. “Seemed to shy at it, somehow; and so I shall take the initi—what-you-call—myself. She shall know from the start that my intentions are honorable, and, hang it! the name’s a good one.... There’s been a Gandelish of Horshundam ever since Henry the Eighth hanged the abbot and turned out the monks66, and put my ancestor Gorbred in to keep the place warm. Gorbred was His Majesty’s principal purveyor67 of sack and sugar, ‘and divers68 dainty cates beside,’ as the Chronicle has it, and must have given the Tudor unlimited tick, I gather. Anyhow, if four centuries of landlording don’t make a tradesman a gentleman, they ought to; and I can’t see——”
Gerry climbed into his “Runhard” thirty horse-power roadster, pulled down the talc mask of his driving cap to preserve his eyes and complexion, and ran back to town. That night, as he quitted his box at the conclusion of the Levity performance (you will remember the phenomenal run of The Idiot Girl in 19—!), he turned up his coat collar with the air of a man resolved to do or die, and boldly plunged69 into the little entry leading to the stage door. The bemedaled military guardian70 of those rigid71 portals, who had absorbed several of 86Gerry’s sovereigns without winking, regarded him with a glazed72 eye and a stiff upper lip.
But the stage-doorkeeper paid no heed74, busily engaged as he was in delivering letters from a rack on the wall, lettered S, into the hands of a slight little woman in a rather shabby tweed ulster and plain felt hat. Gerry’s heart jumped as he recognized his own handwriting upon one of the envelopes.... Surely the tiny tin gods had favored him! The little woman in the ulster and the plain felt hat must be lady’s maid to the brilliant Speranza. As she thrust the letters into her pockets, nodded familiarly to the commissionaire, and came out of the stage-door office, Gerry, his heart in his mouth and his hat in his hand, stood in her way.
“Miss—Madam——” he began. “If I might ask you——”
“What’s that?” shouted the commissionaire. As the little woman stepped quickly backwards75, Cerberus emerged, purple and growling76, from his den7 and reared his huge body as a barrier before her. “Annoying the lady, are ye?” he roared, with a fine forgetfulness of Gerry’s sovereigns. “Wait till I knock your mouth round to the back of your head, you kid-gloved young blaggyard, you! Wait till——”
“Be quiet, O’Murphy!” said the little woman in a tone and with an accent which raised her to the level of lady’s companion in Gerry’s estimation. And as the crestfallen77 O’Murphy retreated into his den, she said, turning a plain little clever face, irradiated by a pair of brilliant eyes, upon the crimson78 Gerry, “Did you wish to speak to me?”
“I certainly do, if you are any relative—or a member of the household—of Miss Speranza,” Gerry stuttered.
There was a flash of eyes and teeth in the plain, insignificant79 face.
87“Oh, yes,” said the little woman, “I live with Miss Speranza.”
Gerry’s tongue grew large, impeding80 utterance81, and his palate dried up. Of all creatures upon earth this little tweed-ulstered woman, in the well-worn felt hat with the fatigued82 feather, seemed to him the most to be envied.
“You—you’re lucky,” he said lamely83, and blushed up to the roots of his hair, and down to the tips of his toes.
“I’ve known her ever since she knew herself,” said the little companion. “We were girls together.” Gerry could have laughed in her middle-aged84 face, but he only handed her his card. “Oh yes,” she said after she had glanced at it. “I seem to know the name. You have written to her, haven’t you?”
“A great many other young gentlemen have taken it too,” observed Miss Speranza’s companion.
Then, as the swing doors behind her opened to let out a blast of hot air and several grimy stage carpenters, and the swing doors before her parted to let in a blast of cold air as the men shouldered out, “Excuse me,” she said, and shivered, and moved as though to pass. “It is very cold here, and the brougham is waiting.”
“Beggin’ pardon!” said O’Murphy, looking out of his hole, “the groom88 sent his jooty, an’ the pole av a ’bus had gone clane through the back panel av the broom in a block off the Sthrand.... The horse kicked wan51 av his four shoes off, an’ they’ve gone back wid themselves to the stables to get the landau an’ pair——”
“Call a hansom,” said the plain little woman. “I—we can’t wait here all night!”
As O’Murphy saluted89 and went outside, she stepped into his vacant hutch, and Gerry daringly followed.
88“If I might venture to offer,” he began. “My cab—place disposal—Miss Speranza—too much honored——” He trailed off into a morass90 of polite intentions, rudimentarily expressed. The little companion maintained a preoccupied91 air; she was probably expecting her mistress, Gerry thought, but the conviction was no sooner formed than banished92.
“You are very kind,” she said, “but Miss Speranza cannot avail herself of your offer. She sometimes leaves quite early, and by the private door, and, as it happens, I am going home alone.”
“Oh!” cried Gerry earnestly, “if you knew how awfully I want to speak to you, you would let me drive you there—wherever it is!”
Tears stood in the soft eyes of the somewhat soft-headed young man, and the heart of the little lady in the ulster was softened93, for she looked upon him with a smile, saying:
“Here comes O’Murphy to say my hansom is waiting.... You may drive with me part of the way, and say what you have to say, if it is so very important,” she said, with a brilliant gleam of mockery in her remarkable eyes.
Need one say that the enamored Gerry jumped at the proposal, and they went out into the plashy night together.
“Give the driver the address, O’Murphy,” ordered the little ulstered woman. “Jump in!” she said to Gerry, and, presto94! they were rattling95 together up a stony96 thoroughfare leading from the roaring midnight Strand97, which in the present year of grace presents a smooth face of macadam.
“Will you have the glass down?” said Gerry.
“Too warm!” cried the little ulstered woman. “Now, what have you to say?”
“How this trap rattles98!” shouted Gerry. “One can 89hardly hear oneself speak. But with regard to Miss Speranza——”
“Madly!” bellowed100 Gerry. “Been so for weeks. Hold up, you brute!” This to the cab-horse, a dilapidated equine wreck101, which had stumbled.
“Oh, you boys! You’re all alike!” cried his companion.
“Mine is a man’s love,” roared Gerry. “I would lay the world at her feet, if I had it; and I want you to tell her so.” The rattling of the crazy cab nearly drowned his accents. “Oh! what do you think she will say?” he bellowed, his lips close to the little woman’s ear.
“She would say—Oh! do you think this man is sober?” screamed the little woman. “I mean the driver,” she added, meeting Gerry’s indignant glare.
“I don’t think he is too drunk to drive,” yelled Gerry. “Tell me, if you have a heart,” he howled, “have I any chance with her?”
“Ah! we’re off the cobblestones now!” said his companion, leaning back with an air of relief.
“And you can answer my question,” pressed Gerry. “I—I needn’t explain my views are honorable—straight as a fellow’s can be. Love like mine is——”
“So dreadfully greasy102!” commented his companion anxiously, as the debilitated103 steed recovered himself with difficulty at the end of a long slide.
“When I have been sitting, night after night, in that box looking at her, thinking of her, worshiping her, by George!” went on Gerry, “she must have sometimes noticed me, and said to herself——”
“I knew he would go down!” cried the little woman, clutching Gerry’s arm, as the steed disappeared and the shaft-ends bumped on the asphalt. “Let’s get out!”
90“Don’t be alarmed, lydy,” said a hoarse87 voice, through the trap overhead, as the panting steed heaved and struggled to regain104 his hoofs105. “’E won’t do it agen this journey. One fall is ’is allowance, an’ ’e never goes beyond.”
“And we’re quite close to Pelgrave Square,” said Gerry.
“How do you know Miss Speranza lives in Pelgrave Square?” said his companion with a keen look.
“Because I’ve seen photogravings of her house in an illustrated106 interview,” replied Gerry.
“Ah, of course,” said the little lady, with a thoughtful smile. The steed, bearing out his driver’s recommendation, was now jogging along reassuringly107 enough. “And did the portraits remind you of no one?” she added, with another of those flashing smiles that invested her little fatigued features with transient youth.
“They weren’t half beautiful enough for her,” said Gerry fervently108. Then a ray of light broke upon him, and he jumped. “You—you’re a little bit like her!” he exclaimed. “What a blind duffer I am! I’ve been taking you for her companion, and all the while you’re a relative.”
“Yes, I am a relative,” nodded the little lady.
“Her aunt!” hazarded Gerry.
“Her mother!” said the little lady, with a dazzling flash of eyes and teeth. “How stupid you were not to guess it before!”
“I’ve said nothing, madam, that I should not, I trust,” remarked Gerry, with quite a seventeenth-century manner. “And, therefore, when I entreat109 you to allow me an interview with your daughter, I trust you will not refuse to grant my—my prayer.”
“Hear the boy!” cried the little woman, with a trill of laughter, as the cab pulled up before a large lighted house in a large darkish square. “Well,” she added, “I 91think I can promise you that Lottie will see you at least for a minute or two to-morrow. Not here—at the theater, seven o’clock sharp. Lend me a pencil and one of your cards.” She scribbled110 a word or two on the bit of pasteboard, paid the cab in spite of Gerry’s protestations, and ran lightly up the solemn doorsteps, turned to the enraptured111 young man standing112, hat in hand, below, waved her hand, plunged a Yale key into the keyhole—and instantly vanished from view.
Behind Gerry’s shirt-front throbbed113 tumultuous delight. To have driven in a cab with her mother—talked of her, told his tale of love—albeit with interruptions—and won the promise of an interview at seven sharp upon the morrow.... Unprecedented114 fortune! incomparable luck! Did Time itself cease he would not fail to keep the tryst115 with punctuality. He caught a passing cab, drove home to his Piccadilly chambers116, and went to bed so blissfully happy that he spent a wretchedly bad night. The card he kept beneath his pillow; and true to the promise made by the mother of the enchantress of his soul—when, punctually to the stroke of seven, Gerry, dressed with the most excruciating care, and clammy with repressed emotion, presented himself at the stage door of the Levity—the scrawled117 hieroglyphics118 on the blessed piece of pasteboard admitted him behind the scenes. Led by a smartly-aproned maid, he climbed stairs, he crossed the stage, was jostled by baize-aproned men in paper caps, and begged their pardon. He followed his guide down a short passage, fell up three steps—and knocked with his burning brow against the door—her door! A voice he knew said, “Come in!” and in he went, to find, not the adored, the worshiped Lottie, but the little plainish lady of the previous night, sitting at a lace-veiled dressing-table, attired in a Japanese gown.
“Oh, I say!” murmured Gerry.
92“Ah! there you are!” The little lady looked at him over her shoulder, and nodded kindly. “Don’t be too disappointed at not finding Lottie here,” she said cheerfully; “she won’t be long.”
“I’m so awfully obliged for all your kindness,” said Gerry, sheepishly smiling over a giant bouquet119.
“You shall be really grateful to me one of these days, I promise you,” said the little lady. “Let my maid take that haysta—that bouquet, and sit down, do!”
Gerry took the indicated chair beside the dressing-table, and noted120, as he sucked the top of his stick, how pitilessly the relentless121 radiance of the electric light accentuated122 the worn lines of the little lady’s face and the gray streaks123 in her still soft and pretty brown hair.
“Cheer up!” she said, turning one of her flashing smiles upon him as he sadly sucked his stick. “You won’t have long to wait for Lottie!”
“No!” said Lottie’s mother, pulling off some very handsome rings and hanging them upon the horns of a coral lobster125 that adorned126 the dressing-table. “She takes about twenty minutes to make up.” Her pretty, white, carefully-manicured fingers busied themselves, as she talked, with various little pots and bottles and rolls of a mysterious substance of a pinky hue33, not unlike the peppermint127 suck-stick of Gerry’s youth. “And are you as much in love with her to-day,” she continued, “as you were last night?”
“So much in love,” said Gerry, uncorking himself, “that to call her my wife I would sacrifice everything.”
“To call her your wife?” The little lady pushed her hair back from her face, twisted it tightly up behind, and pinned it flat with a relentless hairpin128.
“Ah!” said the little lady, who had covered her 93entire countenance130, ears, and neck with a shiny mask of pinkish paste. “A word makes such a difference.” She dipped a hare’s-foot into a saucer of rouge131, and with this compound impartially132, as it seemed to Gerry, incarnadined her cheeks and chin. “Of course,” she went on, dipping a disemboweled powder-puff into a pot of French chalk and deftly133 applying it, “you are aware that she possesses in years the advantage of yourself.”
“I am twenty-three,” said Gerry proudly.
“She owns to more than that!” said the lovely Lottie’s mother. She had reddened her mouth, hitherto obliterated134 by the paste, into an alluring135 Cupid’s bow, and darkened in, above her wonderfully brilliant eyes, a pair of arch-provoking eyebrows136. Now, as some inkling of the fateful revelation in store clamped Gerry’s jaws137 upon his stick and twined his legs in a death-grip about the supports of his chair, she rapidly, with a blue pencil, imparted to those brilliant eyes the Oriental languor138, the divinely alluring, almond-lidded droop that distinguished Lottie’s, seized a tooth-brush, dipped it into a bottle, apparently139 of liquid soot140, rapidly blackened her eyelashes, indicated with rose-pink a dimple on her chin, groped for a moment in a cardboard box that stood upon the ledge39 of her toilet table, produced a golden wig141 of streaming tresses, dexterously142 assumed it, pulled here, patted there, twisted a brow-tendril into shape—and turning, shed upon the paralyzed Gerry the smile that had enchained his heart.
“I told you Lottie would not be long,” said Lottie, “and I’ve made up under twenty minutes. You dear, silly, honorable, romantic boy, don’t stare in that awful way. Twenty-three indeed! And I told you I owned to more! I ought to, for I have a son at Harrow, and a daughter of seventeen besides.... Do try and shut your mouth. Why, you poor dear goose, I was making 94my bow to the boys in the gallery when you were playing with a Noah’s Ark. Shake hands, and go round in front and see me do my piece, as usual. I’ve got used to that nice fresh face of yours up in Box B, and applause is the breath of my nostrils143, if I am old enough to be your mother. Leave your flowers; my girl at home has got quite to look out for them—and be off with you, because this”—she indicated the French chalk—“has got to go farther!” She gave Gerry her pretty hand and one of the brilliant smiles, as he blundered up from his chair, gasping144 apologies.
“Come and lunch with us to-morrow. You know my address, and I’ve told the Professor all about you. You’ll like the Professor—my husband. One of the best, though his wife says it. And the children——”
“Can I come in, mother?” said a clear voice outside.
“All right, pet!” called back Gerry’s late goddess, and a girl of seventeen came into the room. She was all that Gerry had dreamed.... His frozen blood began to thaw145, and his tongue found words. Here was the ideal.
“But her name isn’t Lottie!” said his dethroned goddess, with a twinkle of the wondrous146 eyes. “However, you’re coming to lunch to-morrow, aren’t you?”
“With the greatest pleasure,” said Gerry. And as he went round to his box he carefully obliterated the name from the portrait cherished in his bosom for so many weeks, with the intention of filling it in with another to-morrow.
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mansions
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| n.宅第，公馆，大厦( mansion的名词复数 ) | |
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undoubtedly
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| adv.确实地，无疑地 | |
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distinguished
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| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
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strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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pious
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| adj.虔诚的；道貌岸然的 | |
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unlimited
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| adj.无限的，不受控制的，无条件的 | |
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den
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| n.兽穴；秘密地方；安静的小房间，私室 | |
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remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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dabbled
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| v.涉猎( dabble的过去式和过去分词 )；涉足；浅尝；少量投资 | |
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sundry
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| adj.各式各样的，种种的 | |
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diminution
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| n.减少；变小 | |
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nibbled
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| v.啃，一点一点地咬（吃）( nibble的过去式和过去分词 )；啃出（洞），一点一点咬出（洞）；慢慢减少；小口咬 | |
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entailed
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snugly
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| adv.紧贴地；贴身地；暖和舒适地；安适地 | |
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discretion
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bully
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| n.恃强欺弱者，小流氓；vt.威胁，欺侮 | |
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exquisite
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jewelry
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winking
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| n.瞬眼，目语v.使眼色( wink的现在分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
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decided
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prodigal
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burlesque
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levity
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theatrical
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enchanting
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worthy
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stigmatize
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festive
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lethargic
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slumber
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coma
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hues
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| 色彩( hue的名词复数 )； 色调； 信仰； 观点 | |
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hue
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entangled
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| adj.卷入的；陷入的；被缠住的；缠在一起的v.使某人（某物/自己）缠绕，纠缠于（某物中），使某人（自己）陷入（困难或复杂的环境中）( entangle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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lustrous
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rims
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| n.（圆形物体的）边( rim的名词复数 )；缘；轮辋；轮圈 | |
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37
complexion
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| n.肤色；情况，局面；气质，性格 | |
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38
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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39
ledge
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| n.壁架，架状突出物；岩架，岩礁 | |
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40
turquoise
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| n.绿宝石；adj.蓝绿色的 | |
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41
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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42
prudish
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| adj.装淑女样子的，装规矩的，过分规矩的；adv.过分拘谨地 | |
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43
redeem
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| v.买回，赎回，挽回，恢复，履行（诺言等） | |
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44
murkiest
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| adj.阴暗的( murky的最高级 )；昏暗的；（指水）脏的；混浊的 | |
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45
awakened
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| v.（使）醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）觉醒；弄醒；（使）意识到 | |
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46
vacuous
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| adj.空的，漫散的，无聊的，愚蠢的 | |
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47
attired
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| adj.穿着整齐的v.使穿上衣服，使穿上盛装( attire的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
passionately
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| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
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49
deteriorate
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| v.变坏；恶化；退化 | |
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50
tenant
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| n.承租人；房客；佃户；v.租借，租用 | |
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51
wan
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| (wide area network)广域网 | |
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52
dwelling
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| n.住宅，住所，寓所 | |
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53
sanitary
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| adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的 | |
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54
enthralled
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| 迷住，吸引住( enthrall的过去式和过去分词 )； 使感到非常愉快 | |
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55
delightful
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| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
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56
piquant
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| adj.辛辣的，开胃的，令人兴奋的 | |
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57
anguish
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| n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦，烦恼 | |
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58
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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59
honeymooning
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| 度蜜月（honeymoon的现在分词形式） | |
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60
disconsolate
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| adj.忧郁的，不快的 | |
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61
bribe
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| n.贿赂；v.向…行贿，买通 | |
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62
brute
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| n.野兽，兽性 | |
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63
awfully
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| adv.可怕地，非常地，极端地 | |
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64
attain
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| vt.达到，获得，完成 | |
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65
droop
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| v.低垂，下垂；凋萎，萎靡 | |
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66
monks
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| n.修道士，僧侣( monk的名词复数 ) | |
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67
purveyor
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| n.承办商，伙食承办商 | |
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68
divers
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| adj.不同的；种种的 | |
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69
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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70
guardian
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| n.监护人；守卫者，保护者 | |
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71
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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72
glazed
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| adj.光滑的，像玻璃的；上过釉的；呆滞无神的v.装玻璃( glaze的过去式)；上釉于，上光；（目光）变得呆滞无神 | |
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73
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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74
heed
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| v.注意，留意；n.注意，留心 | |
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75
backwards
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| adv.往回地，向原处，倒，相反，前后倒置地 | |
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76
growling
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| n.吠声, 咆哮声 v.怒吠, 咆哮, 吼 | |
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77
crestfallen
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| adj. 挫败的，失望的，沮丧的 | |
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78
crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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79
insignificant
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| adj.无关紧要的，可忽略的，无意义的 | |
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80
impeding
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| a.(尤指坏事)即将发生的，临近的 | |
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81
utterance
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| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
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82
fatigued
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| adj. 疲乏的 | |
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83
lamely
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| 一瘸一拐地，不完全地 | |
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84
middle-aged
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| adj.中年的 | |
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85
acquiesced
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| v.默认，默许( acquiesce的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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86
hoarsely
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| adv.嘶哑地 | |
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87
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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88
groom
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| vt.给（马、狗等）梳毛，照料，使...整洁 | |
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89
saluted
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| v.欢迎，致敬( salute的过去式和过去分词 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
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90
morass
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| n.沼泽，困境 | |
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91
preoccupied
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| adj.全神贯注的，入神的；被抢先占有的；心事重重的v.占据（某人）思想，使对…全神贯注，使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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92
banished
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| v.放逐，驱逐( banish的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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93
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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94
presto
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| adv.急速地；n.急板乐段；adj.急板的 | |
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95
rattling
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| adj. 格格作响的, 活泼的, 很好的 adv. 极其, 很, 非常 动词rattle的现在分词 | |
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96
stony
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| adj.石头的，多石头的，冷酷的，无情的 | |
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97
strand
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| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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98
rattles
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| （使）发出格格的响声， （使）作嘎嘎声( rattle的第三人称单数 )； 喋喋不休地说话； 迅速而嘎嘎作响地移动，堕下或走动； 使紧张，使恐惧 | |
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99
shrieked
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| v.尖叫( shriek的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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100
bellowed
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| v.发出吼叫声，咆哮（尤指因痛苦）( bellow的过去式和过去分词 )；（愤怒地）说出（某事），大叫 | |
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101
wreck
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| n.失事，遇难；沉船；vt.(船等)失事，遇难 | |
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102
greasy
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| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
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103
debilitated
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| adj.疲惫不堪的，操劳过度的v.使（人或人的身体）非常虚弱( debilitate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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104
regain
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| vt.重新获得，收复，恢复 | |
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105
hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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106
illustrated
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| adj. 有插图的，列举的 动词illustrate的过去式和过去分词 | |
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107
reassuringly
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| ad.安心，可靠 | |
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108
fervently
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| adv.热烈地，热情地，强烈地 | |
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109
entreat
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| v.恳求，恳请 | |
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110
scribbled
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| v.潦草的书写( scribble的过去式和过去分词 )；乱画；草草地写；匆匆记下 | |
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111
enraptured
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| v.使狂喜( enrapture的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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112
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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113
throbbed
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| 抽痛( throb的过去式和过去分词 )； （心脏、脉搏等）跳动 | |
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114
unprecedented
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| adj.无前例的，新奇的 | |
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115
tryst
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| n.约会；v.与…幽会 | |
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116
chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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117
scrawled
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| 乱涂，潦草地写( scrawl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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118
hieroglyphics
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| n.pl.象形文字 | |
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119
bouquet
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| n.花束，酒香 | |
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120
noted
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| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
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121
relentless
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| adj.残酷的，不留情的，无怜悯心的 | |
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122
accentuated
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| v.重读( accentuate的过去式和过去分词 )；使突出；使恶化；加重音符号于 | |
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123
streaks
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| n.（与周围有所不同的）条纹( streak的名词复数 )；（通常指不好的）特征（倾向）；（不断经历成功或失败的）一段时期v.快速移动( streak的第三人称单数 )；使布满条纹 | |
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124
vacuously
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| adv.无意义地，茫然若失地，无所事事地 | |
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125
lobster
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| n.龙虾，龙虾肉 | |
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126
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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127
peppermint
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| n.薄荷，薄荷油，薄荷糖 | |
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128
hairpin
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| n.簪,束发夹，夹发针 | |
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129
Amended
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| adj. 修正的 动词amend的过去式和过去分词 | |
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130
countenance
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| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
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131
rouge
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| n.胭脂，口红唇膏；v.(在…上)擦口红 | |
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132
impartially
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| adv.公平地，无私地 | |
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133
deftly
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| adv.灵巧地，熟练地，敏捷地 | |
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134
obliterated
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| v.除去( obliterate的过去式和过去分词 )；涂去；擦掉；彻底破坏或毁灭 | |
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135
alluring
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| adj.吸引人的，迷人的 | |
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136
eyebrows
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| 眉毛( eyebrow的名词复数 ) | |
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137
jaws
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| n.口部；嘴 | |
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138
languor
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| n.无精力，倦怠 | |
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139
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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140
soot
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| n.煤烟，烟尘；vt.熏以煤烟 | |
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141
wig
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| n.假发 | |
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142
dexterously
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| adv.巧妙地，敏捷地 | |
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143
nostrils
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| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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144
gasping
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| adj. 气喘的, 痉挛的 动词gasp的现在分词 | |
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145
thaw
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| v.（使）融化，（使）变得友善；n.融化，缓和 | |
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146
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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