In which the yo-yo string is revealed as a state of mind
I
The passage to Malta took place in late September, over an Atlantic whose sky never showed a sun. The ship was Susanna Squaducci, which had figured once before in Profane2's long-interrupted guardianship3 of Paola. He came back to the ship that morning in the fog knowing that Fortune's yo-yo had also returned to some reference-point, not unwilling4, not anticipating, not anything; merely prepared to float, acquire a set and drift wherever Fortune willed. If Fortune could will.
A few of the Crew had come to give Profane, Paola and Stencil5 bon voyage; those who weren't in jail, out of the country or in the hospital. Rachel had stayed away. It was a weekday, she had a job. Profane supposed so.
He was here by accident. While weeks back, off on the fringes of the field-of-two Rachel and Profane had set up, Stencil roamed the city exerting "pull," seeing about tickets, passports, visas, inoculations for Paola and him, Profane felt that at last he'd come to dead center in Nueva York; had found his Girl, his vocation6 as watchman against the night and straight man for SHROUD7, his home in a three-girl apartment with one gone to Cuba, one about to go to Malta, and one, his own, remaining.
He'd forgotten about the inanimate world and any law of retribution. Forgotten that the field-of-two, the twin envelope of peace had come to birth only a few minutes after he'd been kicking tires, which for a schlemihl is pure wising-off.
It didn't take Them long. Only a few nights later Profane sacked in at four, figuring to get in a good eight hours of Z's before he had to get up and go to work. When his eyes finally did come open he knew from the quality of light in the room and the state of his bladder that he'd overslept. Rachel's electric clock whined10 merrily beside him, hands pointing to 1:30. Rachel was off somewhere. He turned on the light, saw that the alarm was set for midnight, the button on the back switched to ON. Malfunction11. "You little bastard"; he picked the clock up and heaved it across the room. On hitting the bathroom door the alarm went off, a loud and arrogant12 BZZZ.
Well, he got his feet in the wrong shoes, cut himself shaving, token he had wouldn't fit into the turnstile, subway took off about ten seconds ahead of him. When he arrived downtown it was not much south of three and Anthroresearch Associates was in an uproar14. Bergomask met him at the door, livid. "Guess what," the boss yelled. It seemed an all-night, routine test was on. Around 1:15, one of the larger heaps of electronic gear had run amok; half the circuitry fused, alarm bells went off, the sprinkler system and a couple of CO2 cylinders15 kicked in, all of which the attendant technician had slept through peacefully.
"Technicians," Bergomask snorted, "are not paid to wake up. This is why we have night watchmen." SHROUD sat over against the wall, hooting16 quietly.
Soon as it had all come through to Profane he shrugged17. "It's stupid, but it's something I say all the time. A bad habit. So. Anyway. I'm sorry." Getting no response, turned and shuffled18 off. They'd send him severance19 pay, he reckoned, in the mail. Unless they intended to make him cover the cost of the damaged gear. SHROUD called after him:
Bon voyage.
"What is that supposed to mean."
We'll see.
Keep cool. Keep coal but care. It's a watchword, Profane, far your side of the morning. There, I've told you too much as it is.
"I'll bet under that cynical21 butyrate hide is a slob. A sentimentalist."
There's nothing under here. Who are we kidding?
The last words he ever had with SHROUD. Back at 112th Street he woke up Rachel.
"Back to pounding the pavements, lad." She was trying to be cheerful. He gave her that much but was mad with himself for going flabby enough to forget his schlemihl birthright. She being all he had to take it out on,
"Fine for you," he said. "You've been solvent22 all your life."
"Solvent enough to keep us going till me and Space/Time Employment find something good for you. Really good."
Fina had tried to shove him along the same path. Had it been her that night at Idlewild? Or only another SHROUD, another guilty conscience bugging23 him over a baion rhythm?
"Maybe I don't want to get a job. Maybe I'd rather be a bum24. Remember? I'm the one that loves bums25."
She edged over to make room for him, having now those inevitable26 second thoughts. "I don't want to talk about loving anything," she told the wall. "It's always dangerous. You have to con13 each other a little, Profane. Why don't we go to sleep."
No: he couldn't let it go. "Let me warn you, is all. That I don't love anything, not even you. Whenever I say that - and I will - it will be a lie. Even what I'm saying now is half a play for sympathy."
She made believe she was snoring.
"All right, you know I am a schlemihl. You talk two-way. Rachel O., are you that stupid? All a schlemihl can do is take. From the pigeons in the park, from a girl picked up on any street, bad and good, a schlemihl like me takes and gives nothing back."
"Can't there be a time for that later," she asked meekly27. "Can't it wait on tears sometime, a lovers' crisis. Not now, dear Profane. Only sleep."
"No," he leaned over her, "babe I am not showing you anything of me, anything hidden. I can say what I've said and be safe because it's no secret, it's there for anybody to see. It's got nothing to do with me, all schlemihls are like that."
She turned to him, moving her legs apart: "Hush28 . . ."
"Can't you see," growing excited though it was now the last thing he wanted, "that whenever I, any schlemihl lets a girl think there is a past, or a secret dream that can't be talked about, why Rachel that's a con job. Is all it is." As if SHROUD were prompting him: "There's nothing inside. Only the scungille shell. Dear girl -" saying it as phony as he knew how - "schlemihls know this and use it, because they know most girls need mystery, something romantic there. Because a girl knows her man would be only a bore if she found out everything there was to know. I know you're thinking now: the poor boy, why does he put himself down like that. And I'm using this love that you still, poor stupe, think is two-way to come like this between your legs, like this, and take, never thinking how you feel, caring about whether you come only so I can think of myself as good enough to make you come . . ." So he talked, all the way through, till both had done and he rolled on his back to feel traditionally sad.
"You have to grow up," she finally said. "That's all: my own unlucky boy, didn't you ever think maybe ours is an act too? We're older than you, we lived inside you once: the fifth rib9, closest to the heart. We learned all about it then. After that it had to become our game to nourish a heart you all believe is hollow though we know different. Now you all live inside us, for nine months, and when ever you decide to come back after that."
He was snoring, for real.
"Dear, how pompous29 I'm getting. Good night. . ." And she fell asleep to have cheerful, brightly colored, explicit30 dreams about sexual intercourse31.
Next day, rolling out of bed to get dressed, she continued. "I'll see what we've got. Stand by. I'll call you." Which of course kept him from going back to sleep. He stumbled around the apartment for a while swearing at things. "Subway," he said, like the hunchback of Notre Dame32 yelling sanctuary33. After a day of yo-yoing he came up to the street at nightfall, sat in a neighborhood bar and got juiced. Rachel met him at home (home?) smiling and playing the game.
"How would you like to be a salesman. Electric shavers for French poodles."
"Nothing inanimate," he managed to say. "Slave girls, maybe." She followed him to the bedroom and took off his shoes when he passed out on the bed. Even tucked him in.
Next day, hung over, he yo-yoed on the Staten Island ferry, watching juveniles-in-love neck, grab, miss, connect. Day after that he got up before her and journeyed down to the Fulton Fish Market to watch the early-morning activity. Pig Bodine tagged along. "I got a fish," said Pig, "I would like to give Paola, hyeugh, hyeugh." Which Profane resented. They moseyed by Wall Street and watched the boards of a few brokers35. They walked uptown as far as Central Park. This took them till mid-afternoon. They dug a traffic light for an hour. They went into a bar and watched a soap opera on TV.
They came rollicking in late. Rachel was gone.
Out came Paola though, sleepy-eyed, benightgowned. Pig began to shuffle furrows36 in the rug. "Oh," seeing Pig. "You can put coffee on," she yawned. "I'm going back to bed."
"Right," Pig muttered, "right you are." And glaring at the small of her back, followed zombielike to the bedroom and closed the door behind them. Soon Profane, making coffee, heard screams.
"Wha." He looked into the bedroom. Pig had managed to get atop Paola and seemed linked to her pillow by a long string of drool which glittered in the fluorescent37 light from the kitchen.
"Help?" Profane puzzled. "Rape39?"
"Get this pig off of me," Paola yelled.
"Pig, hey. Get off."
"I want to get laid," protested Pig.
"Off," said Profane.
"Up thine," snarled40 Pig, "with turpentine."
"Nope." So saying, Profane grabbed the big collar on Pig's jumper and pulled.
"You are strangling me, hey," said Pig after a while.
"True," said Profane. "But I saved your life once, remember."
Which was the case. Back in the Scaffold days, Pig had long announced, to anybody in ship's company who'd listen, his refusal ever to don a contraceptive unless it was a French tickler. This device being your common rubber ornamented41 in bas-relief (often with a figurehead on the end) to stimulate42 female nerve ends not stimulated43 by the usual means. From Kingston Jamaica last cruise Pig had brought back 50 Jumbo the Elephant and 50 Mickey Mouse French ticklers. The night finally came when Pig ran out, his last having been expended44 in the memorable45 battle with his onetime colleague Knoop, LtJG, a week before on the Scaffold's bridge.
Pig and his friend Hiroshima the electronics technician had a going thing on the beach with radio tubes. ET's an a destroyer like the Scaffold keep their own inventory46 of electronic components47. Hiroshima could therefore finagle, which as soon as he'd found a discreet48 outlet49 in downtown Norfolk he proceeded to do. Every so often Hiroshima would heist a few tubes and Pig would stow them in an AWOL bag and run them ashore50.
One night Knoop had OOD watch. All an OOD usually does is stand on the quarterdeck and salute51 people going on and off. He is also a sort of monitor, making sure that everybody leaves with their neckerchief straight, fly zipped and wearing their own uniform; also that nobody is swiping anything from the ship or bringing anything on board they shouldn't. Lately old Knoop had been getting hawkeyed. Howie Surd the drunken yeoman, who had two grooves52 worn bare in the hair of his leg from adhesive-taping pints53 of various booze under one bellbottom by way of providing the crew with something tastier than torpedo54 juice, had almost made it the two steps from quarterdeck to ship's office when Knoop like a Siamese boxer55 fetched him an agile56 kick in the calf57. And there stood Howie with Schenley Reserve and blood running over his best liberty shoes. Knoop of course crowed in triumph. He'd also caught Profane trying to take over 5 pounds of hamburger swiped from the galley58. Profane escaped legal action by splitting the loot with Knoop who was having marital59 difficulties and had somehow come up with the notion that 2-1/2 pounds of hamburger might serve as a peace-offering.
So only a few nights after that Pig was understandably nervous, trying simultaneously60 to salute, produce ID and liberty cards, and keep one eye on Knoop and another on the tube-laden AWOL bag.
"Request permission to go ashore, sir, hey," said Pig.
"Permission granted. What is in the AWOL bag."
"In the AWOL bag."
"That one, yes."
"What is in it." Pig pondered.
"Change of skivvies," suggested Knoop, "douche kit38, magazine to read, duty laundry for Mom to wash -"
"Now that you mention it, Mr. Knoop -"
"Radio tubes, also."
"Wha."
"Open the bag."
"I would like, I think," said Pig, "maybe to just dash in ship's office there for a minute to read the Naval61 Regulations, sir, and see if maybe what you are ordering me to do might not be a little, how would you say it, illegal . . ."
Grinning horribly, Knoop made a sudden leap in the air and came down square on the AWOL bag, which went crunch62, tinkle63 in a sickening way.
"Aha," said Knoop.
Pig came up for captain's mast a week later and got restricted. Hiroshima was never mentioned. Normally larceny64 of this sort is rewarded with a court-martial, the brig, a dishonorable discharge, all of which strengthen morale65. It seemed however that the Scaffold's old man, one C. Osric Lych, commander, had gathered round him an inner circle of enlisted66 men, all of whom you could call habitual67 offenders68. This troupe69 included Baby Face Falange, the machinist mate striker, who periodically would put on a babushka and let the members of the A gang line up in the compartment70 to pinch his cheek; Lazar the deck ape who wrote foul71 sayings on the Confederate monument downtown and was usually brought back off liberty in a strait jacket; Teledu his friend who one time avoiding a work detail had gone to hide in a refrigerator, decided72 he liked it and lived there for two weeks on raw eggs and frozen hamburger until the master-at-arms and a posse dragged him away; and Groomsman the quartermaster, whose second home was sick bay, being as how he was constantly infested74 by a breed of crabs75 which unhappily only thrived on the chief corpsman's super-formula crab-killer.
The captain, having seen this element of the crew at every mast, came to look on them fondly as His Boys. He pulled strings76 and indulged in all manner of extra-legal procedure to keep them in the Navy and on board the Scaffold. Pig, being a charter member of the Captain's (so to speak) Own Men, got off with no liberty for a month. Time soon hung heavy. So it was of course toward the crab-ridden Groomsman that Pig gravitated.
Groomsman was the agent in Pig's near-fatal involvement with the airline stewardesses77 Hanky and Panky, who along with half a dozen more of their kind, shared a large pad out near Virginia Beach. The night after Pig's restriction78 ended, Groomsman took him out there after stopping by a state liquor store for booze.
Well, it was Panky Pig went for, Hanky being Groomsman's girl. Pig after all had a code. He never did find out their real names, though did it make any difference? They were virtually interchangeable; both unnatural79 blondes, both between twenty-one and twenty-seven, between 5' 2" and 5' 7" (weights in proportion), clear complexions80, no eyeglasses or contact lenses. They read the same magazines, shared the same toothpaste, soap and deodorant; swapped81 civilian82 clothes when off duty. One night Pig did in fact end up in bed with Hanky. Next morning he pretended to've been drunk out of his mind. Groomsman was apologized to easily enough, having it turned out hit the sack with Panky under the same misapprehension.
Things cruised along all idyllic83; spring and summer brought hordes84 to the beach and Shore Patrolman (now and again) to chez Hanky Panky to quell riots and stay for coffee. It came out under incessant85 questioning by Groomsman that there was something Panky "did" during the act of love which turned Pig, as Pig put it, on. What this was nobody ever found out. Pig, not normally reticent86 in these matters, now acted like a mystic after a vision; unable, maybe unwilling, to put in words this ineffable87 or supernal88 talent of Panky's. Whatever it was it drew Pig out to Virginia Beach all his liberty and a few duty nights. One duty night, Scaffold bound, he wandered down to C&O compartment after the movie to find the quartermaster swinging from the overhead whooping89 like an ape. "After-shave lotion," Groomsman yelled down to Pig, "is the only thing that gets to the little bastards:" Pig winced90. "They get drunk on it and fall asleep:" He descended91 to tell Pig about his crabs, having lately developed the theory that they held barn dances among the forest of his pubic hair on Saturday nights.
"Enough," said Pig. "What about our Club." This was the Prisoners-at-Large and Restricted Men's Club, formed recently for the purpose of hatching plots against Knoop, who was also Groomsman's division officer.
"One thing," Groomsman said, "that Knoop cannot stand is water. He can't swim, he owns three umbrellas."
They discussed ways of exposing Knoop to water, short of throwing him over the side. A few hours after lights out Lazar and Teledu joined the plot after a blackjack game (payday stakes) in the mess hall. Both had been losers. As were all the Captain's Men. They had a fifth of Old Stag conned from Howie Surd.
Saturday Knoop had the duty. At sundown the Navy has this tradition called Evening Colors, which around the Convoy92 Escort Piers93 in Norfolk is impressive. Looking at it from any destroyer's bridge you would see all motion - afoot and vehicular - stop; everyone come to attention, turn and salute the American flags going down on dozens of fantails.
Knoop had the first dog watch, 4 to 6 P.M., as OOD. Groomsman was to pass the word "Now on deck attention to colors." The destroyer tender U.S.S. Mammoth94 Cave, alongside which the Scaffold and its division were moored95, had recently acquired a trumpet96 player from shore duty in Washington, D. C., so tonight there was even a bugle97 to play retreat.
Meanwhile Pig was lying on top of the pilot house, a pile of curious objects beside him. Teledu was down at the water tap aft of the pilot house, filling up rubbers - among them Pig's French ticklers - and passing them to Lazar who was putting them next to Pig.
"Now on deck," said Groomsman. From over the way came the first note of Taps. A few tin cans down the line, jumping the gun, started lowering their own flags. Out on the bridge came Knoop to supervise. "Attention to colors." Splat, went a rubber, two inches from Knoop's foot. "Oh, oh," said Pig. "Get him while he's still saluting," Lazar whispered, frantic98. The second rubber landed on Knoop's hat, intact. From out of the corner of one eye Pig saw that great nightly immobility, dyed orange by the sun, grip the entire C.E. Piers area. The bugle knew what he was doing, and played Taps clear and strong.
The third rubber missed completely, going over the side. Pig had the shakes. "I can't hit him," he kept saying. Lazar, exasperated99, had picked up two and fled. "Traitor," Pig snarled and threw one after him. "Aha," said Lazar from down among the 3-inch mounts, and lobbed one back at Pig. Bugle blew a riff. "Carry on," said Groomsman. Knoop brought his right hand smartly to his side and with his left removed the water-filled rubber from his hat. He started calmly up the ladder on the pilot house after Pig. The first person he saw was Teledu, crouching100 by the water tap, still filling rubbers. Down on the torpedo deck Pig and Lazar were having a water fight, chasing each other among the gray tubes now highlighted vermilion by the sunset. Arming himself with the stockpile Pig had abandoned, Knoop joined the struggle.
They ended up drenched101, exhausted102 and swearing mutual103 fealty104. Groomsman even named Knoop to honorary membership in the PAL105 and Restricted Men's Club.
The reconciliation106 came as a surprise to Pig, who'd expected to get the book thrown at him. He felt let down and saw no other way to improve his outlook but to get laid. Unfortunately he was now afflicted107 by contraceptivelessness. He tried to borrow a few. It was that horrible and cheerless time just before payday when everybody is out of everything: money, cigarettes, soap, and especially rubbers, much less French ticklers. "Gawd," moaned Pig, "what do I do?" To his rescue came Hiroshima, ET3.
"Didn't anybody ever tell you," said this worthy108, "about the biological effects of r-f energy?"
"Wha," said Pig.
"Stand in front of the radar109 antenna110," said Hiroshima, "while it is radiating, and what it will do is, it will make you temporarily sterile111."
"Indeed," said Pig. Indeed. Hiroshima showed him a book which said so.
"I am scared of heights?" said Pig.
"It is the only way out," Hiroshima told him. "What you do is, you climb up the mast and I will go light off the old SPA 4 Able."
Already tottering112, Pig made his way topside and prepared to climb the mast. Howie Surd had come along and solicitously113 offered a shot of something murky in an unlabeled bottle. On the way up, Pig passed Profane swinging like a bird in a boatswain's chair hooked to the spar. Profane was painting the mast. "Dum de dum, de dum," sang Profane. "Good afternoon, Pig." My old buddy, thought Pig. His are probably the last wards114 I will ever hear.
Hiroshima appeared below. "Yo, Pig," he yelled. Pig made the mistake of looking down. Hiroshima gave him the thumb-and-index-finger-in-a-circle sign. Pig felt like vomiting115.
"What are you doing in this neck of the woods," Profane said.
"Oh, just out for a stroll," said Pig. "I see you are painting the mast, there."
"Right," said Profane, "deck gray." They examined at length the subject of the Scaffold's color scheme, as well as the long-standing116 jurisdictional dispute which had Profane, a deck ape, painting the mast when it was really the radar gang's responsibility.
Hiroshima and Surd impatient, started yelling. "Well," said Pig, "good-bye old buddy."
"Be careful walking around on that platform," Profane said. "I robbed some more hamburger out of the galley and stowed it up there. I figure on sneaking117 it off over the 01 deck." Pig, nodding, creaked slowly up the ladder.
At the top be latched118 his nose over the platform like Kilroy and cased the situation. There was Profane's hamburger all right. Pig started to climb on the platform when his ultra-sensitive nose detected something. He lifted it off the deck.
"How remarkable," said Pig out loud, "it smells like hamburger frying." He looked a little closer at Profane's cache. "Guess what," he said, and started backing quickly down the ladder. When he got level with Profane he yelled over: "Buddy, you just saved my life. You got a piece of line?"
"What are you going to do," said Profane, tossing him a piece of line: "hang yourself?"
Pig made a noose119 on one end and headed up the ladder again. After a couple-three tries he managed to snare120 the hamburger, pulled it over, dragged off his white hat and dumped the hamburger in it, being careful all the time to stay as much as he could out of any line-of-sight with the radar antenna. Down at Profane again he showed him the hamburger.
"Amazing," Profane said. "How did you do it?"
"Someday," Pig said, "I will have to tell you about the biological effects of r-f energy." And so saying inverted121 the white hat in the direction of Hiroshima and Howie Surd, showering them both with cooked hamburger.
"Anything you want," Pig said then, "just ask, buddy. I have a code and I don't forget."
"OK," Profane said a few years later, standing by Paola's bed in an apartment on Nueva York's 112th Street and twisting Pig's collar a little "I'm collecting that one now."
"A code is a code," Pig choked. Off he got, and fled sadly.
When he was gone, Paola reached out for Profane, drew him down and in against her.
"No," said Profane, "I'm always saying no, but no."
"You have been gone so long. So long since our bus ride:"
"Who says I'm back."
"Rachel?" She held his head, nothing but maternal122.
"There is her, yes, but . . ."
She waited.
"Anyway I say it is nasty. But I'm not looking for any dependents, is all."
"You have them," she whispered.
No, he thought, she's out of her head. Not me. Not a schlemihl.
"Then why did you make Pig go away?"
He thought about that one for a few weeks.
II
All things gathered to farewell.
One afternoon, close to the time Profane was to embark123 for Malta, he happened to be down around Houston Street, his old neighborhood. It was cooler, fall: dark came earlier and little kids out playing stoop ball were about to call it a day. For no special reason, Profane decided to look in on his parents.
Around two corners and up the stairs, past apartments of Basilisco the cop whose wife left garbage in the hallway, past Miss Angevine who was in business in a small way, past the Venusbergs whose fat daughter had always tried to lure124 young Profane into the bathroom, past Maxixe the drunk and Flake125 the sculptor126 and his girl, and old Min De Costa who kept orphan127 mice and was a practicing witch; past his past though who knew it? Not Profane.
Standing before his old door he knocked, though knowing from the sound of it (like we can tell from the buzz in the phone receiver whether or not she's home) that inside was empty. So soon, of course, he tried the knob; having come this far. They never lacked doors: on the other side of this one he wandered automatic into the kitchen to check the table. A ham, a turkey, a roast beef. Fruit: grapes, oranges, a pineapple, plums. Plate of knishes, bowl of almonds and Brazil nuts. String of garlic tossed like a rich lady's necklace across fresh bunches of fennel, rosemary, tarragon. A brace128 of baccale, dead eyes directed at a huge provolone, a pale yellow parmigian and God knew how many fish-cousins, gefulte, in an ice bucket.
No his mother wasn't telepathic, she wasn't expecting Profane. Wasn't expecting her husband Gino, rain, poverty, anything. Only that she had this compulsion to feed. Profane was sure that the world would be worse off without mothers like that in it.
He stayed in the kitchen an hour, while night came along, wandering through this field of inanimate food, making bits and pieces of it animate8, his own. Soon it was dark and the baked outsides of meats, the skins of fruits only highlighted all shiny by light from the apartment across the courtyard. Rain started falling. He left.
They would know he'd been by.
Profane, whose nights were now free, decided he could afford to frequent the Rusty130 Spoon and the Forked Yew131 without serious compromise. "Ben," Rachel yelled, "this is putting me down." Since the night he was fired from Anthroresearch Associates, it seemed he'd been trying every way he knew to put her down. "Why won't you let me get you a job? It is September, college kids are fleeing the city, the labor132 market was never better."
"Call it a vacation," said Profane. But how do you swing a vacation from two dependents?
Before anyone knew it there was Profane, full-fledged Crew member. Under the tutelage of Charisma133 and Fu, he learned how to use proper nouns; how not to get too drunk, keep a straight face, use marijuana.
"Rachel," running in a week later, "I smoked pot."
"Get out of here."
"Wha."
"You are turning into a phony," said Rachel.
"You're not interested in what it's like?"
"I have smoked pot. It is a stupid business, like masturbation. If you get kicks that way, fine. But not around me."
"It was only once. Only for the experience."
"Once I will say it, is all: that Crew does not live, it experiences. It does not create, it talks about people who do. Varese, Ionesco, de Kooning, Wittgenstein, I could puke. It satirizes134 itself and doesn't mean it. Time magazine takes it seriously and does mean it."
"It's fun."
"And you are becoming less of a man."
He was still high, too high to argue. Off he rollicked, in train with Charisma and Fu.
Rachel locked herself in the bathroom with a portable radio and bawled135 for a while. Somebody was singing the old standard about how you always hurt the one you love, the one you shouldn't hurt at all. Indeed, thought Rachel, but does Benny even love me? I love him. I think. There's no reason why I should. She kept crying.
So near one in the morning she was at the Spoon with her hair hanging straight, dressed in black, no makeup136 except for mascara in sad raccoon-rings round her eyes, looking like all those other women and girls: camp followers137.
"Benny," she said, "I'm sorry." And later:
"You don't have to try not to hurt me. Only come home, with me, to bed . . ." And much later, at her apartment, facing the wall, "You don't even have to be a man. Only pretend to love me."
None of which made Profane feel any better. But it didn't stop him going to the Spoon.
One night at the Forked Yew, he and Stencil got juiced. "Stencil is leaving the country," Stencil said. He apparently138 wanted to talk.
"I wish I was leaving the country."
Young Stencil, old Machiavel. Soon he had Profane talking about his women problems.
"I don't know what Paola wants. You know her better. Do you know what she wants?"
An embarrassing question for Stencil. He dodged139:
"Aren't you two - how shall one say."
"No," Profane said. "No, no."
But Stencil was there again, next evening. "Truth of it is," he admitted, "Stencil can't handle her. But you can."
"Don't talk," said Profane. "Drink."
Hours later they were both out of their heads. "You wouldn't consider coming along with them," Stencil wondered.
"I have been there once. Why should I want to go back."
"But didn't Valletta - somehow - get to you? Make you feel anything?"
"I went down to the Gut140 and got drunk like everybody else. I was too drunk to feel anything."
Which eased Stencil. He was scared to death of Valletta. He'd feel better with Profane, anybody else, along on this jaunt141 (a) to take care of Paola, (b) so he wouldn't be alone.
Shame, said his conscience. Old Sidney went in there with the cards stacked against him. Alone.
And look what he got, thought Stencil, a little wry142, a little shaky.
On the offensive: "Where do you belong, Profane?"
"Wherever I am."
"Deracinated. Which of them is not. Which of this Crew couldn't pick up tomorrow and go off to Malta, go off to the moon. Ask them why and they'll answer why not."
"I could not care less about Valletta." But hadn't there been something after all about the bombed-out buildings, buff-colored rubble143, excitement of Kingsway? What had Paola called the island: a cradle of life.
"I have always wanted to be buried at sea," said Profane.
Had Stencil seen the coupling in that associative train he would have gathered heart of grace, surely. But Paola and he had never spoken of Profane. Who, after all, was Profane?
Until now. They decided to rollick off to a party on Jefferson Street.
Next day was Saturday. Early morning found Stencil rushing around to his contacts, informing them all of a third tentative passage.
The third passage, meanwhile, was horribly hung over. His Girl was having more than second thoughts.
"Why do you go to the Spoon, Benny."
"Why not?"
She edged up on one elbow. "That's the first time you've said that."
"You break your cherry on something every day."
Without thinking: "What about love? When are you going to end your virgin status there, Ben?"
In reply Profane fell out of bed, crawled to the bathroom and hung over the toilet, thinking about barfing. Rachel clasped hands in front of one breast, like a concert soprano. "My man." Profane decided instead to make noises at himself in the mirror.
She came up behind him, hair all down and straggly for the night, and set her cheek against his back as Paola had on the Newport News ferry last winter. Profane inspected his teeth.
"Get off my back," he said.
Still holding on: "So. Only smoked pot once and already he's hooked. Is that your monkey talking?"
"It's me talking. Off."
She moved away. "How off is off, Ben." Things were quiet then. Soft, penitent144, "If I am hooked on anything it's you, Rachel O." Watching her shifty in the mirror.
"On women," she said, "on what you think love is: take, take. Not on me."
He started brushing his teeth fiercely. In the mirror as she watched there bloomed a great flower of leprous-colored foam145, out of his mouth and down both sides of his chin.
"You want to go," she yelled, "go then."
He said something but around the toothbrush and through the foam neither could understand the words.
"You are scared of love and all that means is somebody else," she said. "As long as you don't have to give anything, be held to anything, sure: you can talk about love. Anything you have to talk about isn't real. It's only a way of putting yourself up. And anybody who tries to get through to you - me - down."
Profane made gurgling noises in the sink: drinking out of the tap, flushing out his mouth. "Look," coming up for air, "what did I tell you? Didn't I warn you?"
"People can change. Couldn't you make the effort?" She was damned if she'd cry.
"I don't change. Schlemihls don't change."
"Oh that makes me sick. Can't you stop feeling sorry for yourself? You've taken your own flabby, clumsy soul and amplified146 it into a Universal Principle."
"What about you and that MG."
"What does that have to do with any -"
"You know what I always thought? That you were an accessory. That you, flesh, you'd fall apart sooner than the car. That the car would go on, in a junkyard even it would look like it always had, and it would have to be a thousand years before that thing could rust129 so you wouldn't recognize it. But old Rachel, she'd be long gone. A part, a cheesy part, like a radio, heater, windshield-wiper blade."
She looked upset. He pushed it.
"I only started to think about being a schlemihl, about a world of things that had to be watched out for, after I saw you alone with the MG. I didn't even stop to think it might be perverted147, what I was watching. All I was was scared."
"Showing how much you know about girls."
He started scratching his head, sending wide flakes148 of dandruff showering about the bathroom.
"Slab149 was my first. None of those tweed jockstraps at Schlozhauer's got any more than bare hand. Don't you know, poor Ben, that a young girl has to take out her virginity on something, a pet parakeet, a car - though most of the time on herself."
"No," he said his hair all in clumps150, fingernails gone yellow with dead scalp. "There's more. Don't try to get out of it that way."
"You're not a schlemihl. You're nobody special. Everybody is some kind of a schlemihl. Only come out of that scungille shell and you'd see."
He stood, pear-shaped, bags under the eyes, all forlorn. "What do you want? How much are you out to get? Isn't this -" he waved at her an inanimate schmuck - "enough?"
"It can't be. Not for me, nor Paola."
"Where does she -"
"Anywhere you go there'll always be a woman for Benny. Let it be a comfort. Always a hole to let yourself come in without fear of losing any of that precious schlemihlhood." She stomped151 around the room. "All right. We're all hookers. Our price is fixed152 and single for everything: straight, French, round-the-world. Can you pay it, honey? Bare brain, bare heart?"
"If you think me and Paola -"
"You and anybody. Until that thing doesn't work any more. A whole line of them, some better than me, but all just as stupid. We can all be conned because we've all got one of these," touching153 her crotch, "and when it talks we listen."
She was on the bed. "Come on baby," she said, too close to crying, "this one's for free. For love. Climb on. Good stuff, no charge."
Absurdly he thought of Hiroshima the electronics technician, reciting a mnemonic guide for resistor color-coding.
Bad boys rape our young girls behind victory garden walls (or "but Violet gives willingly"). Good stuff, no charge.
Could any of their resistances be measured in ohms? Someday, please God, there would be an all-electronic woman. Maybe her name would be Violet. Any problems with her, you could look it up in the maintenance manual. Module concept: fingers' weight, heart's temperature, mouth's size out of tolerance154? Remove and replace, was all.
He climbed on anyway.
That night at the Spoon, things were louder than usual, despite Mafia's being in stir and a few of the Crew out on bail155 and their best behavior. Saturday night toward the end of the dog days; after all.
Near closing time, Stencil approached Profane, who'd been drinking all night but for some reason was still sober.
"Stencil heard you and Rachel are having difficulties."
"Don't start."
"Paola told him."
"Rachel told her. Fine. Buy me a beer."
"Paola loves you, Profane."
"You think that impresses me? What is your act, ace1?" Young Stencil sighed. Along came a bartender's rinkydink, yelling "Time, gentlemen, please." Anything properly English like that went over well with the Whole Sick Crew.
"Time for what," Stencil mused156. "More words, more beer. Another party, another girl. In short, no time for anything of importance. Profane. Stencil has a problem. A woman."
"Indeed," said Profane. "That's unusual. I never heard of anything like that before."
"Come. Walk."
"I can't help you."
"Be an ear. It's all he needs."
Outside, walking up Hudson Street: "Stencil doesn't want to go to Malta. He is quite simply afraid. Since 1945, you see, he's been on a private manhunt. Or womanhunt, no one is sure."
"Why?" said Profane.
"Why not?" said Stencil. "His giving you any clear reason would mean he'd already found her. Why does one decide to pick up one girl in a bar over another. If one knew why, she would never be a problem. Why do wars start: if one knew why there would be eternal peace. So in this search the motive is part of the quarry157.
"Stencil's father mentioned her in his journals: this was near the turn of the century. Stencil became curious in 1945. Was it boredom158, was it that old Sidney had never said anything of use to his son; or was it something buried in the son that needed a mystery, any sense of pursuit to keep active a borderline metabolism159? Perhaps he feeds on mystery.
"But he stayed off Malta. He had pieces of thread: clues. Young Stencil has been in all her cities, chased her down till faulty memories or vanished buildings defeated him. All her cities but Valletta. His father died in Valletta. He tried to tell himself meeting V. and dying were separate and unconnected for Sidney.
"Not so. Because: all along the first thread, from a young, crude Mata Hari act in Egypt - as always, in no one's employ but her own - while Fashoda tossed sparks in search of a fuse; until 1913 when she knew she'd done all she could and so took time out for love - all that while, something monstrous160 had been building. Not the War, nor the socialist161 tide which brought us Soviet162 Russia. Those were symptoms, that's all."
They'd turned into 14th Street and were walking east. More bums came roving by the closer they got to Third Avenue. Some nights 14th Street can be the widest street with the tallest wind in the earth.
"Not even as if she were any cause, any agent. She was only there. But being there was enough, even as a symptom. Of course Stencil could have chosen the War, or Russia to investigate. But he doesn't have that much time.
"He is a hunter."
"You are expecting to find this chick in Malta?" Profane said. "Or how your father died? Or something? Wha."
"How does Stencil know," Stencil yelled. "How does he know what he'll do once he finds her. Does he want to find her? They're all stupid questions. He must go to Malta. Preferably with somebody along. You."
"That again."
"He is afraid. Because if she went there to wait out one war, a war she'd not started but whose etiology was also her own, a war which came least as a surprise to her, then perhaps too she was there during the first. There to meet old Sidney at its end. Paris for love, Malta for war. If so then now, of all times . . ."
"You think there'll be a war."
"Perhaps. You've been reading the newspapers." Profane's newspaper reading was in fact confined to glancing at the front page of the New York Times. If there was no banner headline on that paper then the world was in good enough shape. "The Middle East, cradle of civilization, may yet be its grave.
"If he must go to Malta, it can't be only with Paola. He can't trust her. He needs someone to - occupy her, to serve as buffer163 zone, if you will."
"That could be anybody. You said the Crew was at home anywhere. Why not Raoul, Slab, Melvin."
"It's you she loves. Why not you."
"Why not."
"You are not of the Crew, Profane. You have stayed out of that machine. All August."
"No. No, there was Rachel."
"You stayed out of it." And a sly smile. Profane looked away.
So they went up Third Avenue, drowned in the Street's great wind: all flapping and Irish pennants164. Stencil yarned165. Told Profane of a whorehouse in Nice with mirrors on the ceiling where he thought, once, he'd found his V. Told of his mystical experience before a plaster death-cast of Chopin's hand in the Celda Museo in Mallorca.
"There was no difference," he caroled, causing two strolling bums to laugh along with him: "that was all. Chopin had a plaster hand!" Profane shrugged. The bums tagged along.
"She stole an airplane: an old Spad, the kind young Godolphin crashed in. God, what a flight it must have been: from Le Havre over the Bay of Biscay to somewhere in the back country of Spain. The officer on duty only remembered a fierce - what did he call her - 'hussar,' who came rushing by in a red field-cape, glaring out of a glass eye in the shape of a clock: 'as if I'd been fixed by the evil eye of time itself.'
"Disguise is one of her attributes. In Mallorca she spent at least a year as an old fisherman who evenings, would smoke dried seaweed in a pipe and tell the children stories of gun-running in the Red Sea."
"Rimbaud," suggested one of the bums.
"Did she know Rimbaud as a child? Drift up-country at age three or four through that district and its trees festooned gray and scarlet166 with crucified English corpses167? Act as lucky mascot168 to the Mahdists? Live in Cairo and take Sir Alastair Wren169 for a lover when she came of age?
"Who knows. Stencil would rather depend on the imperfect vision of humans for his history. Somehow government reports, bar graphs, mass movements are too treacherous170."
"Stencil," Profane announced, "you are juiced."
True. Autumn, coming on, was cold enough to've sobered Profane. But Stencil appeared drunk on something else.
V. in Spain, V. on Crete: V. crippled in Corfu, a partisan171 in Asia Minor172. Giving tango lessons in Rotterdam she had commanded the rain to stop; it had. Dressed in tights adorned173 with two Chinese dragons she handed swords, balloons and colored handkerchiefs to Ugo Medichevole, a minor magician, for one lustless summer in the Roman Campagna. And, learning quickly, found time to perform a certain magic of her own; for one morning Medichevole was found out in a field, discussing the shadows of clouds with a sheep. His hair had become white, his mental age roughly five. V. had fled.
It went on like this, all the way up into the 70's, this progress-of-four; Stencil caught up in a compulsive yarning174, the others listening with interest. It wasn't that Third Avenue was any kind of drunk's confessional. Did Stencil like his father suffer some private leeriness about Valletta - foresee some submersion, against his will, in a history too old for him, or at least of a different order from what he'd known? Probably not; only that he was on the verge175 of a major farewell. If it hadn't been Profane and the two bums it would have been somebody: cop, barkeep, girl. Stencil that way had left pieces of himself - and V. - all over the western world.
V. by this time was a remarkably176 scattered177 concept.
"Stencil's going to Malta like a nervous groom73 to matrimony. It is a marriage of convenience, arranged by Fortune, father and mother to everyone. Perhaps Fortune even cares about the success of these things: wants one to look after it in its old age." Which struck Profane as outright178 foolish. Somehow they had wandered over by Park Avenue. The two bums, sensing unfamiliar179 territory, veered180 away toward the west and the Park. Toward what assignation? Stencil said: "Should one bring a peace-offering?"
"Wha. Box of candy, flowers, ha, ha."
"Stencil knows just the thing," said Stencil. They were before Eigenvalue's office building. Intention or accident?
"Stay here in the street," Stencil said. "He won't be but a minute." And vanished into the lobby of the building. Simultaneously a prowl car appeared a few blocks uptown, turned and headed downtown on Park Avenue. Profane started walking. Car passed him and didn't stop. Profane got to the corner and turned west. By the time he'd walked all around the block, Stencil was at a top floor window, yelling down.
"Come on up. You have to help."
"I have to - You are out of your head."
Impatient: "Come up. Before the police get back."
Profane stood outside for a minute, counting floors. Nine. Shrugged, went inside the lobby and took the self-service elevator up.
"Can you pick a lock," Stencil asked. Profane laughed.
"Fine. You will have to go in a window, then."
Stencil rummaged181 in the broom closet and came up with a length of line.
"Me," said Profane. They started up to the roof.
"This is important." Stencil was pleading. "Suppose you were enemies with someone. But had to see him, her. Wouldn't you try to make it as painless as you could?"
They reached a point on the roof directly above Eigenvalue's office.
Profane looked down into the street. "You," with exaggerated gestures, "are going to put me, over that wall, with no fire escape there, to open, that window, right?" Stencil nodded. So. Back to the boatswain's chair for Profane. Though this time no Pig to save, no good will to cash in on. There'd be no reward from Stencil because there's no honor among second- (or ninth-) story men. Because Stencil was more a bum than he.
They looped the line round Profane's middle. He being so shapeless, it was difficult to locate any center of gravity. Stencil gave the line a few turns round a TV antenna. Profane climbed over the edge and they began to lower away.
"How is it," Stencil said after a while.
"Except for those three cops down there, who are looking at me sort of fishy -"
The line jerked.
"Ha, ha," said Profane. "Made you look." Not that his mood tonight was suicidal. But with the inanimate line, antenna, building and street nine floors below, what common sense could he have?
The center of gravity calculation, it turned out, was way off. As Profane inched down toward Eigenvalue's window, his body's attitude slowly tilted from nearly vertical182 to face down and parallel with the street. Hanging thus in the air, it occurred to him to practice an Australian crawl.
"Dear God," muttered Stencil. He tugged183 at the line, impatient. Soon Profane, a dim figure looking like a quadruply-amputated octopus184, stopped flailing185 around. Then he hung still in the air, pondering.
"Hey," he called after a while.
Stencil said what.
"Pull me back up. Hurry." Wheezing186, feeling his middle age acutely, Stencil began hauling in line. It took him ten minutes. Profane appeared and hung his nose over the edge of the roof.
"What's wrong."
"You forgot to tell me what it was I was supposed to do when I got in the window." Stencil only looked at him. "Oh. Oh you mean I open the door for you -"
"- and you lock it when you go out," they recited together.
Profane flipped187 a salute. "Carry on." Stencil began lowering again. Down at the window, Profane called up:
"Stencil, hey. The window won't open."
Stencil took a few half-hitches round the antenna.
"Break it," he gritted188. All at once another police car, sirens screaming, lights flashing round and round, came tearing down Park. Stencil ducked behind the roof's low wall. The car kept going. Stencil waited till it was way downtown, out of earshot. And a minute or so more. Then arose cautiously and looked after Profane.
Profane was horizontal again. He'd covered his head with his suede189 jacket and showed no signs of moving.
"What are you doing," said Stencil.
"Hiding," said Profane. "How about a little torque." Stencil turned the rope: Profane's head slowly began to rotate away from the building. When he came around to where he was facing straight out, like a gargoyle190, Profane kicked in the window, a crash horrible and deafening191 in that night.
"Now the other way."
He got the window open, climbed inside and unlocked for Stencil. Wasting no time, Stencil proceeded through a train of rooms to the museum, forced open the case, slipped that set of false teeth wrought192 from all precious metals into a coat pocket. From another room he heard more glass breaking.
"What the hell."
Profane looked around. "One pane193 broken is crude," he explained, "because that looks like a burglary. So I am breaking a few more, is all, so it won't be too suspicious."
Back on the street, scot-free, they followed the bums' way into Central Park. It was two in the morning.
In the wilds of that skinny rectangle they found a rock near a stream. Stencil sat down and produced the teeth.
"The booty," he announced.
"It's yours. What do I need with more teeth." Especially these, more dead than the half-alive hardware in his mouth now.
"Decent of you, Profane. Helping194 Stencil like that."
"Yeah," Profane agreed.
Part of a moon was out. The teeth, lying on the sloping rock, beamed at their reflection in the water.
All manner of life moved in the dying shrubbery around them.
"Is your name Neil?" inquired a male voice.
"Yes."
"I saw your note. In the men's room of the Port Authority terminal, third stall in the . . ."
Oho, thought Profane. That had cop written all over it.
"With the picture of your sexual organ. Actual size."
"There is one thing," said Neil, "that I like better than having homosexual intercourse. And that is knocking the shit out of a wise cop."
There was then a soft clobbering195 sound followed by the plainclothesman's crash into the underbrush.
"What day is it," somebody asked. "Say, what day is it?"
Out there something had happened, probably atmospheric196. But the moon shone brighter. The number of objects and shadows in the park seemed to multiply: warm white, warm black.
A band of juvenile34 delinquents197 marched by, singing.
"Look at the moon," one of them called.
A used contraceptive came floating along the stream. A girl, built like a garbage-truck driver and holding in one hand a sodden198 brassiere which trailed behind her, trudged199 after the rubber, head down.
Somewhere else a traveling clock chimed seven. "It is Tuesday," said an old man's voice, half-asleep. It was Saturday.
But about the night-park, near-deserted and cold, was somehow a sense of population and warmth, and high noon. The stream made a curious half cracking, half ringing sound: like the glass of a chandelier, in a wintry drawing room when all the heat is turned off suddenly and forever. The moon shivered, impossibly bright.
"How quiet," said Stencil.
"Quiet. It's like the shuttle at 5 p.m."
"No. Nothing at all is happening in here."
"So what year is it."
"It is 1913," said Stencil.
"Why not," said Profane.
收听单词发音 |
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ace
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| n.A牌；发球得分；佼佼者；adj.杰出的 | |
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profane
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| adj.亵神的，亵渎的；vt.亵渎，玷污 | |
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guardianship
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| n. 监护, 保护, 守护 | |
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unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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stencil
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| v.用模版印刷；n.模版；复写纸，蜡纸 | |
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vocation
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| n.职业，行业 | |
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shroud
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| n.裹尸布，寿衣；罩，幕；vt.覆盖，隐藏 | |
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animate
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| v.赋于生命，鼓励；adj.有生命的，有生气的 | |
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rib
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| n.肋骨，肋状物 | |
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whined
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| v.哀号( whine的过去式和过去分词 )；哀诉，诉怨 | |
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malfunction
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| vi.发生功能故障，发生故障，显示机能失常 | |
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arrogant
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的 | |
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con
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| n.反对的观点，反对者，反对票，肺病；vt.精读，学习，默记；adv.反对地，从反面；adj.欺诈的 | |
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uproar
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| n.骚动，喧嚣，鼎沸 | |
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cylinders
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| n.圆筒( cylinder的名词复数 )；圆柱；汽缸；（尤指用作容器的）圆筒状物 | |
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hooting
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| （使）作汽笛声响，作汽车喇叭声( hoot的现在分词 )； 倒好儿； 倒彩 | |
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shrugged
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| vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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shuffled
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| v.洗（纸牌）( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 )；拖着脚步走；粗心地做；摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
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severance
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| n.离职金；切断 | |
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buddy
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| n.（美口）密友，伙伴 | |
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cynical
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| adj.(对人性或动机)怀疑的，不信世道向善的 | |
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solvent
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| n.溶剂；adj.有偿付能力的 | |
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bugging
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| [法] 窃听 | |
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bum
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| n.臀部；流浪汉，乞丐；vt.乞求，乞讨 | |
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bums
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| n. 游荡者，流浪汉，懒鬼，闹饮，屁股 adj. 没有价值的，不灵光的，不合理的 vt. 令人失望，乞讨 vi. 混日子，以乞讨为生 | |
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inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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meekly
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| adv.温顺地，逆来顺受地 | |
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hush
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| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
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pompous
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| adj.傲慢的，自大的；夸大的；豪华的 | |
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explicit
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| adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的 | |
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intercourse
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| n.性交；交流，交往，交际 | |
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dame
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| n.女士 | |
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sanctuary
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| n.圣所，圣堂，寺庙；禁猎区，保护区 | |
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juvenile
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| n.青少年，少年读物；adj.青少年的，幼稚的 | |
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brokers
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| n.（股票、外币等）经纪人( broker的名词复数 )；中间人；代理商；（订合同的）中人v.做掮客（或中人等）( broker的第三人称单数 )；作为权力经纪人进行谈判；以中间人等身份安排… | |
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furrows
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| n.犁沟( furrow的名词复数 )；（脸上的）皱纹v.犁田，开沟( furrow的第三人称单数 ) | |
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fluorescent
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| adj.荧光的，发出荧光的 | |
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kit
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| n.用具包，成套工具；随身携带物 | |
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rape
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| n.抢夺，掠夺，强奸；vt.掠夺，抢夺，强奸 | |
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snarled
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| v.（指狗）吠，嗥叫， （人）咆哮( snarl的过去式和过去分词 )；咆哮着说，厉声地说 | |
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ornamented
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| adj.花式字体的v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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stimulate
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| vt.刺激，使兴奋；激励，使…振奋 | |
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43
stimulated
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| a.刺激的 | |
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44
expended
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| v.花费( expend的过去式和过去分词 )；使用（钱等）做某事；用光；耗尽 | |
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45
memorable
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| adj.值得回忆的，难忘的，特别的，显著的 | |
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46
inventory
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| n.详细目录，存货清单 | |
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47
components
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| （机器、设备等的）构成要素，零件，成分； 成分( component的名词复数 )； [物理化学]组分； [数学]分量； （混合物的）组成部分 | |
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48
discreet
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| adj.(言行)谨慎的；慎重的；有判断力的 | |
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49
outlet
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| n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄 | |
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50
ashore
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| adv.在(向)岸上，上岸 | |
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51
salute
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| vi.行礼，致意，问候，放礼炮；vt.向…致意，迎接，赞扬；n.招呼，敬礼，礼炮 | |
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52
grooves
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| n.沟( groove的名词复数 )；槽；老一套；（某种）音乐节奏v.沟( groove的第三人称单数 )；槽；老一套；（某种）音乐节奏 | |
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53
pints
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| n.品脱( pint的名词复数 )；一品脱啤酒 | |
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54
torpedo
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| n.水雷，地雷；v.用鱼雷破坏 | |
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55
boxer
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| n.制箱者，拳击手 | |
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56
agile
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| adj.敏捷的，灵活的 | |
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57
calf
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| n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮 | |
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58
galley
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| n.（飞机或船上的）厨房单层甲板大帆船；军舰舰长用的大划艇； | |
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59
marital
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| adj.婚姻的，夫妻的 | |
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60
simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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61
naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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62
crunch
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| n.关键时刻；艰难局面；v.发出碎裂声 | |
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63
tinkle
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| vi.叮当作响；n.叮当声 | |
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64
larceny
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| n.盗窃（罪） | |
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65
morale
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| n.道德准则，士气，斗志 | |
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66
enlisted
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| adj.应募入伍的v.（使）入伍， （使）参军( enlist的过去式和过去分词 )；获得（帮助或支持） | |
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67
habitual
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| adj.习惯性的；通常的，惯常的 | |
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68
offenders
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| n.冒犯者( offender的名词复数 )；犯规者；罪犯；妨害…的人（或事物） | |
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69
troupe
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| n.剧团，戏班；杂技团；马戏团 | |
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70
compartment
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| n.卧车包房，隔间；分隔的空间 | |
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71
foul
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| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
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72
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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73
groom
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| vt.给（马、狗等）梳毛，照料，使...整洁 | |
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74
infested
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|
| adj.为患的，大批滋生的（常与with搭配）v.害虫、野兽大批出没于( infest的过去式和过去分词 )；遍布于 | |
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75
crabs
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|
| n.蟹( crab的名词复数 )；阴虱寄生病；蟹肉v.捕蟹( crab的第三人称单数 ) | |
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76
strings
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| n.弦 | |
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77
stewardesses
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| （飞机上的）女服务员，空中小姐( stewardess的名词复数 ) | |
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78
restriction
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| n.限制，约束 | |
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79
unnatural
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| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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80
complexions
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| 肤色( complexion的名词复数 )； 面色； 局面； 性质 | |
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81
swapped
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| 交换（工作）( swap的过去式和过去分词 )； 用…替换，把…换成，掉换（过来） | |
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82
civilian
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| adj.平民的，民用的，民众的 | |
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83
idyllic
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| adj.质朴宜人的，田园风光的 | |
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84
hordes
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| n.移动着的一大群( horde的名词复数 )；部落 | |
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85
incessant
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| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
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86
reticent
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| adj.沉默寡言的；言不如意的 | |
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87
ineffable
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| adj.无法表达的，不可言喻的 | |
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88
supernal
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| adj.天堂的，天上的；崇高的 | |
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89
whooping
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| 发嗬嗬声的，发咳声的 | |
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90
winced
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| 赶紧避开，畏缩( wince的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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91
descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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92
convoy
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| vt.护送，护卫，护航；n.护送；护送队 | |
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93
piers
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| n.水上平台( pier的名词复数 )；（常设有娱乐场所的）突堤；柱子；墙墩 | |
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94
mammoth
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|
| n.长毛象；adj.长毛象似的，巨大的 | |
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95
moored
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| adj. 系泊的 动词moor的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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96
trumpet
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| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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97
bugle
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| n.军号，号角，喇叭；v.吹号，吹号召集 | |
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98
frantic
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| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
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99
exasperated
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| adj.恼怒的 | |
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100
crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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101
drenched
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| adj.湿透的；充满的v.使湿透( drench的过去式和过去分词 )；在某人（某物）上大量使用（某液体） | |
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102
exhausted
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|
| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
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103
mutual
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|
| adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的 | |
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104
fealty
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| n.忠贞，忠节 | |
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105
pal
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|
| n.朋友，伙伴，同志；vi.结为友 | |
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106
reconciliation
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| n.和解，和谐，一致 | |
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107
afflicted
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| 使受痛苦，折磨( afflict的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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108
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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109
radar
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| n.雷达，无线电探测器 | |
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110
antenna
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| n.触角，触须；天线 | |
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111
sterile
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| adj.不毛的，不孕的，无菌的，枯燥的，贫瘠的 | |
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112
tottering
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|
| adj.蹒跚的，动摇的v.走得或动得不稳( totter的现在分词 )；踉跄；蹒跚；摇摇欲坠 | |
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113
solicitously
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| adv.热心地，热切地 | |
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114
wards
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| 区( ward的名词复数 )； 病房； 受监护的未成年者； 被人照顾或控制的状态 | |
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115
vomiting
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| 吐 | |
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116
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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117
sneaking
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| a.秘密的，不公开的 | |
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118
latched
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| v.理解( latch的过去式和过去分词 )；纠缠；用碰锁锁上（门等）；附着（在某物上） | |
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119
noose
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| n.绳套，绞索（刑）；v.用套索捉；使落入圈套；处以绞刑 | |
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120
snare
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| n.陷阱，诱惑，圈套；（去除息肉或者肿瘤的）勒除器；响弦，小军鼓；vt.以陷阱捕获，诱惑 | |
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121
inverted
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| adj.反向的，倒转的v.使倒置，使反转( invert的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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122
maternal
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| adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的 | |
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123
embark
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| vi.乘船，着手，从事，上飞机 | |
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124
lure
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| n.吸引人的东西，诱惑物；vt.引诱，吸引 | |
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125
flake
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| v.使成薄片；雪片般落下；n.薄片 | |
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126
sculptor
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| n.雕刻家，雕刻家 | |
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127
orphan
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| n.孤儿；adj.无父母的 | |
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128
brace
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| n. 支柱,曲柄,大括号; v. 绷紧,顶住,(为困难或坏事)做准备 | |
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129
rust
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| n.锈；v.生锈；(脑子)衰退 | |
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130
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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131
yew
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| n.紫杉属树木 | |
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132
labor
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| n.劳动，努力，工作，劳工；分娩；vi.劳动，努力，苦干；vt.详细分析；麻烦 | |
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133
charisma
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| n.(大众爱戴的)领袖气质，魅力 | |
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134
satirizes
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| v.讽刺，讥讽( satirize的第三人称单数 ) | |
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135
bawled
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| v.大叫，大喊( bawl的过去式和过去分词 )；放声大哭；大声叫出；叫卖（货物） | |
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136
makeup
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| n.组织；性格；化装品 | |
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137
followers
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| 追随者( follower的名词复数 )； 用户； 契据的附面； 从动件 | |
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138
apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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139
dodged
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| v.闪躲( dodge的过去式和过去分词 )；回避 | |
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140
gut
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| n.[pl.]胆量；内脏；adj.本能的；vt.取出内脏 | |
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141
jaunt
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| v.短程旅游；n.游览 | |
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142
wry
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| adj.讽刺的；扭曲的 | |
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143
rubble
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| n.（一堆）碎石，瓦砾 | |
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144
penitent
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| adj.后悔的；n.后悔者；忏悔者 | |
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145
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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146
amplified
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| 放大，扩大( amplify的过去式和过去分词 )； 增强； 详述 | |
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147
perverted
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| adj.不正当的v.滥用( pervert的过去式和过去分词 )；腐蚀；败坏；使堕落 | |
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148
flakes
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| 小薄片( flake的名词复数 )； （尤指）碎片； 雪花； 古怪的人 | |
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149
slab
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| n.平板，厚的切片；v.切成厚板，以平板盖上 | |
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150
clumps
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| n.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的名词复数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声v.（树、灌木、植物等的）丛、簇( clump的第三人称单数 )；（土、泥等）团；块；笨重的脚步声 | |
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151
stomped
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| v.跺脚，践踏，重踏( stomp的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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152
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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153
touching
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| adj.动人的，使人感伤的 | |
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154
tolerance
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| n.宽容；容忍，忍受；耐药力；公差 | |
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155
bail
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| v.舀（水），保释；n.保证金，保释，保释人 | |
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156
mused
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| v.沉思，冥想( muse的过去式和过去分词 )；沉思自语说（某事） | |
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157
quarry
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| n.采石场；v.采石；费力地找 | |
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158
boredom
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| n.厌烦，厌倦，乏味，无聊 | |
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159
metabolism
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| n.新陈代谢 | |
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160
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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161
socialist
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| n.社会主义者；adj.社会主义的 | |
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162
Soviet
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|
| adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃 | |
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163
buffer
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| n.起缓冲作用的人(或物)，缓冲器；vt.缓冲 | |
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164
pennants
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| n.校旗( pennant的名词复数 )；锦标旗；长三角旗；信号旗 | |
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165
yarned
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| vi.讲故事（yarn的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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166
scarlet
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| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
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167
corpses
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| n.死尸，尸体( corpse的名词复数 ) | |
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168
mascot
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| n.福神，吉祥的东西 | |
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169
wren
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| n.鹪鹩；英国皇家海军女子服务队成员 | |
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170
treacherous
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| adj.不可靠的，有暗藏的危险的；adj.背叛的，背信弃义的 | |
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171
partisan
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| adj.党派性的；游击队的；n.游击队员；党徒 | |
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172
minor
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| adj.较小(少)的，较次要的；n.辅修学科；vi.辅修 | |
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173
adorned
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| [计]被修饰的 | |
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174
yarning
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| vi.讲故事（yarn的现在分词形式） | |
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175
verge
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| n.边，边缘；v.接近，濒临 | |
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176
remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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177
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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178
outright
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| adv.坦率地；彻底地；立即；adj.无疑的；彻底的 | |
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179
unfamiliar
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| adj.陌生的，不熟悉的 | |
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180
veered
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| v.（尤指交通工具）改变方向或路线( veer的过去式和过去分词 )；（指谈话内容、人的行为或观点）突然改变；（指风） （在北半球按顺时针方向、在南半球按逆时针方向）逐渐转向；风向顺时针转 | |
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181
rummaged
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| 翻找，搜寻( rummage的过去式和过去分词 )； 已经海关检查 | |
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182
vertical
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| adj.垂直的，顶点的，纵向的；n.垂直物，垂直的位置 | |
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183
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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184
octopus
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| n.章鱼 | |
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185
flailing
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| v.鞭打( flail的现在分词 )；用连枷脱粒；（臂或腿）无法控制地乱动；扫雷坦克 | |
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186
wheezing
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| v.喘息，发出呼哧呼哧的喘息声( wheeze的现在分词 )；哮鸣 | |
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187
flipped
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| 轻弹( flip的过去式和过去分词 )； 按（开关）； 快速翻转； 急挥 | |
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188
gritted
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| v.以沙砾覆盖（某物），撒沙砾于( grit的过去式和过去分词 )；咬紧牙关 | |
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189
suede
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| n.表面粗糙的软皮革 | |
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190
gargoyle
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| n.笕嘴 | |
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191
deafening
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| adj. 振耳欲聋的, 极喧闹的 动词deafen的现在分词形式 | |
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192
wrought
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| v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的 | |
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193
pane
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| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
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194
helping
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| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
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195
clobbering
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| v.狠揍， （不停）猛打( clobber的现在分词 )；彻底击败 | |
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196
atmospheric
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| adj.大气的，空气的；大气层的；大气所引起的 | |
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197
delinquents
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| n.（尤指青少年）有过失的人，违法的人( delinquent的名词复数 ) | |
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198
sodden
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| adj.浑身湿透的；v.使浸透；使呆头呆脑 | |
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199
trudged
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| vt.& vi.跋涉，吃力地走（trudge的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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