One night--it was late in the afternoon of the same year, about six months after the tragedy of the florin--Samuel Povey was wakened up by a hand on his shoulder and a voice that whispered: "Father!"
The thief and the liar1 was standing2 in his night-shirt by the bed. Samuel's sleepy eyes could just descry3 him in the thick gloom.
"What--what?" questioned the father, gradually coming to consciousness. "What are you doing there?"
"I didn't want to wake mother up," the boy whispered. "There's someone been throwing dirt or something at our windows, and has been for a long time."
"Eh, what?"
Samuel stared at the dim form of the thief and liar. The boy was tall, not in the least like a little boy; and yet, then, he seemed to his father as quite a little boy, a little 'thing' in a night- shirt, with childish gestures and childish inflections, and a childish, delicious, quaint4 anxiety not to disturb his mother, who had lately been deprived of sleep owing to an illness of Amy's which had demanded nursing. His father had not so perceived him for years. In that instant the conviction that Cyril was permanently5 unfit for human society finally expired in the father's mind. Time had already weakened it very considerably6. The decision that, be Cyril what he might, the summer holiday must be taken as usual, had dealt it a fearful blow. And yet, though Samuel and Constance had grown so accustomed to the companionship of a criminal that they frequently lost memory of his guilt7 for long periods, nevertheless the convention of his leprosy had more or less persisted with Samuel until that moment: when it vanished with strange suddenness, to Samuel's conscious relief.
There was a rain of pellets on the window.
"Hear that?" demanded Cyril, whispering dramatically. "And it's been like that on my window too."
Samuel arose. "Go back to your room!" he ordered in the same dramatic whisper; but not as father to son--rather as conspirator8 to conspirator.
Constance slept. They could hear her regular breathing.
Barefooted, the elderly gowned figure followed the younger, and one after the other they creaked down the two steps which separated Cyril's room from his parents'.
"Shut the door quietly!" said Samuel.
Cyril obeyed.
And then, having lighted Cyril's gas, Samuel drew the blind, unfastened the catch of the window, and began to open it with many precautions of silence. All the sashes in that house were difficult to manage. Cyril stood close to his father, shivering without knowing that he shivered, astonished only that his father had not told him to get back into bed at once. It was, beyond doubt, the proudest hour of Cyril's career. In addition to the mysterious circumstances of the night, there was in the situation that thrill which always communicates itself to a father and son when they are afoot together upon an enterprise unsuspected by the woman from whom their lives have no secrets.
Samuel put his head out of the window.
A man was standing there.
"That you, Samuel?" The voice came low.
"Yes," replied Samuel, cautiously. "It's not Cousin Daniel, is it?"
"I want ye," said Daniel Povey, curtly9.
Samuel paused. "I'll be down in a minute," he said.
Cyril at length received the command to get back into bed at once.
"Whatever's up, father?" he asked joyously10.
"I don't know. I must put some things on and go and see."
He shut down the window on all the breezes that were pouring into the room.
"Now quick, before I turn the gas out!" he admonished11, his hand on the gas-tap.
"You'll tell me in the morning, won't you, father?"
"Yes," said Mr. Povey, conquering his habitual12 impulse to say 'No.'
He crept back to the large bedroom to grope for clothes.
When, having descended13 to the parlour and lighted the gas there, he opened the side-door, expecting to let Cousin Daniel in, there was no sign of Cousin Daniel. Presently he saw a figure standing at the corner of the Square. He whistled--Samuel had a singular faculty14 of whistling, the envy of his son--and Daniel beckoned15 to him. He nearly extinguished the gas and then ran out, hatless. He was wearing most of his clothes, except his linen16 collar and necktie, and the collar of his coat was turned up.
Daniel advanced before him, without waiting, into the confectioner's shop opposite. Being part of the most modern building in the Square, Daniel's shop was provided with the new roll-down iron shutter17, by means of which you closed your establishment with a motion similar to the winding18 of a large clock, instead of putting up twenty separate shutters19 one by one as in the sixteenth century. The little portal in the vast sheet of armour20 was ajar, and Daniel had passed into the gloom beyond. At the same moment a policeman came along on his beat, cutting off Mr. Povey from Daniel.
"Good-night, officer! Brrr!" said Mr. Povey, gathering21 his dignity about him and holding himself as though it was part of his normal habit to take exercise bareheaded and collarless in St. Luke's Square on cold November nights. He behaved so because, if Daniel had desired the services of a policeman, Daniel would of course have spoken to this one.
"Goo' night, sir," said the policeman, after recognizing him.
"What time is it?" asked Samuel, bold.
"A quarter-past one, sir."
The policeman, leaving Samuel at the little open door, went forward across the lamplit Square, and Samuel entered his cousin's shop.
Daniel Povey was standing behind the door, and as Samuel came in he shut the door with a startling sudden movement. Save for the twinkle of gas, the shop was in darkness. It had the empty appearance which a well-managed confectioner's and baker's always has at night. The large brass23 scales near the flour-bins glinted; and the glass cake-stands, with scarce a tart22 among them, also caught the faint flare24 of the gas.
"What's the matter, Daniel? Anything wrong?" Samuel asked, feeling boyish as he usually did in the presence of Daniel.
The well-favoured white-haired man seized him with one hand by the shoulder in a grip that convicted Samuel of frailty25.
"Look here, Sam'l," said he in his low, pleasant voice, somewhat altered by excitement. "You know as my wife drinks?"
He stared defiantly26 at Samuel.
"N--no," said Samuel. "That is--no one's ever SAID---"
This was true. He did not know that Mrs. Daniel Povey, at the age of fifty, had definitely taken to drink. There had been rumours27 that she enjoyed a glass with too much gusto; but 'drinks' meant more than that.
"She drinks," Daniel Povey continued. "And has done this last two year!"
"I'm very sorry to hear it," said Samuel, tremendously shocked by this brutal28 rending29 of the cloak of decency30.
Always, everybody had feigned31 to Daniel, and Daniel had feigned to everybody, that his wife was as other wives. And now the man himself had torn to pieces in a moment the veil of thirty years' weaving.
"And if that was the worst!" Daniel murmured reflectively, loosening his grip.
Samuel was excessively disturbed. His cousin was hinting at matters which he himself, at any rate, had never hinted at even to Constance, so abhorrent32 were they; matters unutterable, which hung like clouds in the social atmosphere of the town, and of which at rare intervals33 one conveyed one's cognizance, not by words, but by something scarce perceptible in a glance, an accent. Not often is a town such as Bursley starred with such a woman as Mrs. Daniel Povey.
"But what's wrong?" Samuel asked, trying to be firm.
And, "What is wrong?" he asked himself. "What does all this mean, at after one o'clock in the morning?"
"Look here, Sam'l," Daniel recommenced, seizing his shoulder again. "I went to Liverpool corn market to-day, and missed the last train, so I came by mail from Crewe. And what do I find? I find Dick sitting on the stairs in the dark pretty high naked."
"Sitting on the stairs? Dick?"
"Ay! This is what I come home to!"
"But--"
"Hold on! He's been in bed a couple of days with a feverish34 cold, caught through lying in damp sheets as his mother had forgot to air. She brings him no supper to-night. He calls out. No answer. Then he gets up to go down-stairs and see what's happened, and he slips on th' stairs and breaks his knee, or puts it out or summat. Sat there hours, seemingly! Couldn't walk neither up nor down."
"And was your--wife--was Mrs.-?"
"Dead drunk in the parlour, Sam'l."
"But the servant?"
"Servant!" Daniel Povey laughed. "We can't keep our servants. They won't stay. YOU know that."
He did. Mrs. Daniel Povey's domestic methods and idiosyncrasies could at any rate be freely discussed, and they were.
"And what have you done?"
"Done? Why, I picked him up in my arms and carried him upstairs again. And a fine job I had too! Here! Come here!"
Daniel strode impulsively35 across the shop--the counterflap was up- -and opened a door at the back. Samuel followed. Never before had he penetrated36 so far into his cousin's secrets. On the left, within the doorway37, were the stairs, dark; on the right a shut door; and in front an open door giving on to a yard. At the extremity38 of the yard he discerned a building, vaguely39 lit, and naked figures strangely moving in it.
"What's that? Who's there?" he asked sharply.
"That's the bakehouse," Daniel replied, as if surprised at such a question. "It's one of their long nights."
Never, during the brief remainder of his life, did Samuel eat a mouthful of common bread without recalling that midnight apparition40. He had lived for half a century, and thoughtlessly eaten bread as though loaves grew ready-made on trees.
"Listen!" Daniel commanded him.
He cocked his ear, and caught a feeble, complaining wail41 from an upper floor.
"That's Dick! That is!" said Daniel Povey.
It sounded more like the distress42 of a child than of an adventurous43 young man of twenty-four or so.
"But is he in pain? Haven't you fetched the doctor?"
"Not yet," answered Daniel, with a vacant stare.
Samuel gazed at him closely for a second. And Daniel seemed to him very old and helpless and pathetic, a man unequal to the situation in which he found himself; and yet, despite the dignified44 snow of his age, wistfully boyish. Samuel thought swiftly: "This has been too much for him. He's almost out of his mind. That's the explanation. Some one's got to take charge, and I must." And all the courageous45 resolution of his character braced46 itself to the crisis. Being without a collar, being in slippers47, and his suspenders imperfectly fastened anyhow,--these things seemed to be a part of the crisis.
"I'll just run upstairs and have a look at him," said Samuel, in a matter-of-fact tone.
Daniel did not reply.
There was a glimmer48 at the top of the stairs. Samuel mounted, found the gas-jet, and turned it on full. A dingy49, dirty, untidy passage was revealed, the very antechamber of discomfort50. Guided by the moans, Samuel entered a bedroom, which was in a shameful51 condition of neglect, and lighted only by a nearly expired candle. Was it possible that a house-mistress could so lose her self- respect? Samuel thought of his own abode52, meticulously53 and impeccably 'kept,' and a hard bitterness against Mrs. Daniel surged up in his soul.
"Is that you, doctor?" said a voice from the bed; the moans ceased.
Samuel raised the candle.
Dick lay there, his face, on which was a beard of several days' growth, distorted by anguish54, sweating; his tousled brown hair was limp with sweat.
"Where the hell's the doctor?" the young man demanded brusquely. Evidently he had no curiosity about Samuel's presence; the one thing that struck him was that Samuel was not the doctor.
"He's coming, he's coming,' said Samuel, soothingly55.
"Well, if he isn't here soon I shall be damn well dead," said Dick, in feeble resentful anger. "I can tell you that."
Samuel deposited the candle and ran downstairs. "I say, Daniel," he said, roused and hot, "this is really ridiculous. Why on earth didn't you fetch the doctor while you were waiting for me? Where's the missis?"
Daniel Povey was slowly emptying grains of Indian corn out of his jacket-pocket into one of the big receptacles behind the counter on the baker's side of the shop. He had provisioned himself with Indian corn as ammunition56 for Samuel's bedroom window; he was now returning the surplus.
"Are ye going for Harrop?" he questioned hesitatingly.
"Why, of course!" Samuel exclaimed. "Where's the missis?"
"Happen you'd better go and have a look at her," said Daniel Povey. "She's in th' parlour."
He preceded Samuel to the shut door on the right. When he opened it the parlour appeared in full illumination.
"Here! Go in!" said Daniel.
Samuel went in, afraid. In a room as dishevelled and filthy57 as the bedroom, Mrs. Daniel Povey lay stretched awkwardly on a worn horse-hair sofa, her head thrown back, her face discoloured, her eyes bulging58, her mouth wet and yawning: a sight horribly offensive. Samuel was frightened; he was struck with fear and with disgust. The singing gas beat down ruthlessly on that dreadful figure. A wife and mother! The lady of a house! The centre of order! The fount of healing! The balm for worry, and the refuge of distress! She was vile59. Her scanty60 yellow-grey hair was dirty, her hollowed neck all grime, her hands abominable61, her black dress in decay. She was the dishonour62 of her sex, her situation, and her years. She was a fouler63 obscenity than the inexperienced Samuel had ever conceived. And by the door stood her husband, neat, spotless, almost stately, the man who for thirty years had marshalled all his immense pride to suffer this woman, the jolly man who had laughed through thick and thin! Samuel remembered when they were married. And he remembered when, years after their marriage, she was still as pretty, artificial, coquettish, and adamantine in her caprices as a young harlot with a fool at her feet. Time and the slow wrath64 of God had changed her.
He remained master of himself and approached her; then stopped.
"Ay, Sam'l, lad!" said the old man from the door. "I doubt I've killed her! I doubt I've killed her! I took and shook her. I got her by the neck. And before I knew where I was, I'd done it. She'll never drink brandy again. This is what it's come to!"
He moved away.
All Samuel's flesh tingled66 as a heavy wave of emotion rolled through his being. It was just as if some one had dealt him a blow unimaginably tremendous. His heart shivered, as a ship shivers at the mountainous crash of the waters. He was numbed67. He wanted to weep, to vomit68, to die, to sink away. But a voice was whispering to him: "You will have to go through with this. You are in charge of this." He thought of HIS wife and child, innocently asleep in the cleanly pureness of HIS home. And he felt the roughness of his coat-collar round his neck and the insecurity of his trousers. He passed out of the room, shutting the door. And across the yard he had a momentary69 glimpse of those nude70 nocturnal forms, unconsciously attitudinizing in the bakehouse. And down the stairs came the protests of Dick, driven by pain into a monotonous71 silly blasphemy72.
"I'll fetch Harrop," he said, melancholily, to his cousin.
The doctor's house was less than fifty yards off, and the doctor had a night-bell, which, though he was a much older man than his father had been at his age, he still answered promptly73. No need to bombard the doctor's premises74 with Indian corn! While Samuel was parleying with the doctor through a window, the question ran incessantly75 through his mind: "What about telling the police?"
But when, in advance of old Harrop, he returned to Daniel's shop, lo! the policeman previously76 encountered had returned upon his beat, and Daniel was talking to him in the little doorway. No other soul was about. Down King Street, along Wedgwood Street, up the Square, towards Brougham Street, nothing but gaslamps burning with their everlasting77 patience, and the blind facades78 of shops. Only in the second storey of the Bank Building at the top of the Square a light showed mysteriously through a blind. Somebody ill there!
The policeman was in a high state of nervous excitement. That had happened to him which had never happened to him before. Of the sixty policemen in Bursley, just he had been chosen by fate to fit the socket79 of destiny. He was startled.
"What's this, what's this, Mr. Povey?" he turned hastily to Samuel. "What's this as Mr. Councillor Povey is a-telling me?"
"You come in, sergeant," said Daniel.
"If I come in," said the policeman to Samuel, "you mun' go along Wedgwood Street, Mr. Povey, and bring my mate. He should be on Duck Bank, by rights."
It was astonishing, when once the stone had begun to roll, how quickly it ran. In half an hour Samuel had actually parted from Daniel at the police-office behind the Shambles80, and was hurrying to rouse his wife so that she could look after Dick Povey until he might be taken off to Pirehill Infirmary, as old Harrop had instantly, on seeing him, decreed.
"Ah!" he reflected in the turmoil81 of his soul: "God is not mocked!" That was his basic idea: God is not mocked! Daniel was a good fellow, honourable82, brilliant; a figure in the world. But what of his licentious83 tongue? What of his frequenting of bars? (How had he come to miss that train from Liverpool? How?) For many years he, Samuel, had seen in Daniel a living refutation of the authenticity84 of the old Hebrew menaces. But he had been wrong, after all! God is not mocked! And Samuel was aware of a revulsion in himself towards that strict codified85 godliness from which, in thought, he had perhaps been slipping away.
And with it all he felt, too, a certain officious self-importance, as he woke his wife and essayed to break the news to her in a manner tactfully calm. He had assisted at the most overwhelming event ever known in the history of the town.
1 liar | |
n.说谎的人 | |
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2 standing | |
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的 | |
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3 descry | |
v.远远看到;发现;责备 | |
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4 quaint | |
adj.古雅的,离奇有趣的,奇怪的 | |
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5 permanently | |
adv.永恒地,永久地,固定不变地 | |
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6 considerably | |
adv.极大地;相当大地;在很大程度上 | |
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7 guilt | |
n.犯罪;内疚;过失,罪责 | |
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8 conspirator | |
n.阴谋者,谋叛者 | |
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9 curtly | |
adv.简短地 | |
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10 joyously | |
ad.快乐地, 高兴地 | |
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11 admonished | |
v.劝告( admonish的过去式和过去分词 );训诫;(温和地)责备;轻责 | |
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12 habitual | |
adj.习惯性的;通常的,惯常的 | |
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13 descended | |
a.为...后裔的,出身于...的 | |
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14 faculty | |
n.才能;学院,系;(学院或系的)全体教学人员 | |
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15 beckoned | |
v.(用头或手的动作)示意,召唤( beckon的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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16 linen | |
n.亚麻布,亚麻线,亚麻制品;adj.亚麻布制的,亚麻的 | |
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17 shutter | |
n.百叶窗;(照相机)快门;关闭装置 | |
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18 winding | |
n.绕,缠,绕组,线圈 | |
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19 shutters | |
百叶窗( shutter的名词复数 ); (照相机的)快门 | |
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20 armour | |
(=armor)n.盔甲;装甲部队 | |
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21 gathering | |
n.集会,聚会,聚集 | |
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22 tart | |
adj.酸的;尖酸的,刻薄的;n.果馅饼;淫妇 | |
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23 brass | |
n.黄铜;黄铜器,铜管乐器 | |
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24 flare | |
v.闪耀,闪烁;n.潮红;突发 | |
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25 frailty | |
n.脆弱;意志薄弱 | |
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26 defiantly | |
adv.挑战地,大胆对抗地 | |
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27 rumours | |
n.传闻( rumour的名词复数 );风闻;谣言;谣传 | |
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28 brutal | |
adj.残忍的,野蛮的,不讲理的 | |
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29 rending | |
v.撕碎( rend的现在分词 );分裂;(因愤怒、痛苦等而)揪扯(衣服或头发等);(声音等)刺破 | |
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30 decency | |
n.体面,得体,合宜,正派,庄重 | |
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31 feigned | |
a.假装的,不真诚的 | |
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32 abhorrent | |
adj.可恶的,可恨的,讨厌的 | |
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33 intervals | |
n.[军事]间隔( interval的名词复数 );间隔时间;[数学]区间;(戏剧、电影或音乐会的)幕间休息 | |
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34 feverish | |
adj.发烧的,狂热的,兴奋的 | |
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35 impulsively | |
adv.冲动地 | |
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36 penetrated | |
adj. 击穿的,鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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37 doorway | |
n.门口,(喻)入门;门路,途径 | |
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38 extremity | |
n.末端,尽头;尽力;终极;极度 | |
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39 vaguely | |
adv.含糊地,暖昧地 | |
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40 apparition | |
n.幽灵,神奇的现象 | |
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41 wail | |
vt./vi.大声哀号,恸哭;呼啸,尖啸 | |
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42 distress | |
n.苦恼,痛苦,不舒适;不幸;vt.使悲痛 | |
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43 adventurous | |
adj.爱冒险的;惊心动魄的,惊险的,刺激的 | |
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44 dignified | |
a.可敬的,高贵的 | |
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45 courageous | |
adj.勇敢的,有胆量的 | |
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46 braced | |
adj.拉牢的v.支住( brace的过去式和过去分词 );撑牢;使自己站稳;振作起来 | |
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47 slippers | |
n. 拖鞋 | |
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48 glimmer | |
v.发出闪烁的微光;n.微光,微弱的闪光 | |
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49 dingy | |
adj.昏暗的,肮脏的 | |
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50 discomfort | |
n.不舒服,不安,难过,困难,不方便 | |
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51 shameful | |
adj.可耻的,不道德的 | |
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52 abode | |
n.住处,住所 | |
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53 meticulously | |
adv.过细地,异常细致地;无微不至;精心 | |
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54 anguish | |
n.(尤指心灵上的)极度痛苦,烦恼 | |
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55 soothingly | |
adv.抚慰地,安慰地;镇痛地 | |
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56 ammunition | |
n.军火,弹药 | |
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57 filthy | |
adj.卑劣的;恶劣的,肮脏的 | |
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58 bulging | |
膨胀; 凸出(部); 打气; 折皱 | |
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59 vile | |
adj.卑鄙的,可耻的,邪恶的;坏透的 | |
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60 scanty | |
adj.缺乏的,仅有的,节省的,狭小的,不够的 | |
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61 abominable | |
adj.可厌的,令人憎恶的 | |
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62 dishonour | |
n./vt.拒付(支票、汇票、票据等);vt.凌辱,使丢脸;n.不名誉,耻辱,不光彩 | |
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63 fouler | |
adj.恶劣的( foul的比较级 );邪恶的;难闻的;下流的 | |
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64 wrath | |
n.愤怒,愤慨,暴怒 | |
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65 stammered | |
v.结巴地说出( stammer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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66 tingled | |
v.有刺痛感( tingle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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67 numbed | |
v.使麻木,使麻痹( numb的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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68 vomit | |
v.呕吐,作呕;n.呕吐物,吐出物 | |
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69 momentary | |
adj.片刻的,瞬息的;短暂的 | |
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70 nude | |
adj.裸体的;n.裸体者,裸体艺术品 | |
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71 monotonous | |
adj.单调的,一成不变的,使人厌倦的 | |
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72 blasphemy | |
n.亵渎,渎神 | |
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73 promptly | |
adv.及时地,敏捷地 | |
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74 premises | |
n.建筑物,房屋 | |
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75 incessantly | |
ad.不停地 | |
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76 previously | |
adv.以前,先前(地) | |
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77 everlasting | |
adj.永恒的,持久的,无止境的 | |
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78 facades | |
n.(房屋的)正面( facade的名词复数 );假象,外观 | |
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79 socket | |
n.窝,穴,孔,插座,插口 | |
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80 shambles | |
n.混乱之处;废墟 | |
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81 turmoil | |
n.骚乱,混乱,动乱 | |
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82 honourable | |
adj.可敬的;荣誉的,光荣的 | |
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83 licentious | |
adj.放纵的,淫乱的 | |
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84 authenticity | |
n.真实性 | |
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85 codified | |
v.把(法律)编成法典( codify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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