FAIRFAX CARTER sat up very straight in the great carved walnut1 bed, and plaintively2 inspected the breakfast tray which the red-cheeked Norman maiden3 had just deposited beside her. Those eternal little hard rolls—the black bowl of coffee beneath whose steaming fragrance4 lurked5 the treacherous6 chicory—the jug7 of hot thin milk—the small brown jar of pale honey—she bestowed9 a rebellious10 scowl11 on the entire collection. She felt suddenly, frantically13 homesick for a bubbling percolator, for thick yellow cream and feathery biscuits, for chilled crimson14 berries with powdered mounds15 of sugar. Marie Léontine, briskly oblivious16, was coaxing17 the very small fire in the very large chimney into dancing animation18.
“V’la!” she announced triumphantly19, with all the hearty21 deference22 that is the common gift of the French servant. “Beau matin, p’tite dame23!”
“Oui,” conceded the “small lady” grudgingly24. She shivered apprehensively25 as Marie Léontine shoved the copper26 water jug closer to the flames,109 and trotted27 smiling from the room. Ugh! How in the world could any nation hope to keep clean and warm with three sticks of wood and four teaspoonfuls of water? She remembered another country—a bright and blessed country—where water rushed hot and joyous28 from glittering faucets29 into great shining tubs—where warmed and fleecy towels hung waiting to fold you hospitably30 close. She shivered again, forlornly, scanning the stretch of distance across the bare floor to the hook where the meagre towel hung limp and forbidding. “La douce France!” Ha! She pulled the tray toward her, still scowling31.
Even when she scowled32, Fair Carter was more distracting looking than any one young woman has a right to be. She was very small—absurdly small sitting bolt upright in the great dark bed—but she had enough charms to equip any six ladies of ordinary size and aspirations33. There was the ruffled34 glory of her hair, warmer than gold, brighter than bronze, and her rain-coloured eyes—and the small, warm mouth, and the elfin tilt35 to her brows. There was that look about her, eager and reckless and adventurous36, that made your heart contract, when you remembered what life did to the eager and reckless and adventurous. It had made a great many hearts contract. It had made one despairing young adorer from Richmond110 say: “Fair always looks as though she were carrying a flag—and listening to drums.” And it had wrung37 tribute from her father, who had been all her family and all her world, and who had adored her even more than the young man from Richmond. “She’s the bravest of all the fighting Carters, is my Fair. And never quite so brave as when she’s frightened. Panic arms her with really desperate valour!”
The bravest of the fighting Carters swallowed the dregs of the coffee bowl, pushed the tray from her, and bestowed a sudden and enchanting38 smile on one of the dark carved figures on the bedposts. There were four of them, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but she liked Mark the best. He had a very stern face and a little lion.
“Morning,” she saluted39 him affably, and if St. Mark’s head had not been made of walnut he would have lost it. She had kept the most potent40 of her charms in reserve, like a true daughter of Eve. Fair’s extravagant41 prettiness might steel the sceptical, leading them to argue that so ornamental42 a head must necessarily be empty, and that no one could look that way long without becoming unbearably43 vain, spoiled, and capricious. But if she spoke44 just once—if she said any three indifferent words at random—the veriest sceptic was undone45 for ever. Because Fair had a Voice.111 Not the coloratura kind—perhaps Patti could do more justice to Caro Nome—but a voice which Galli-Curci and the nightingale and the running brook46 and church bells and Sarah Bernhardt might well envy. She could sing a little—small, candle-lit songs about love, and absurdly stirring things that had marched down through the centuries, and haunting bits of lullabies—she had a trick of chanting them under her breath, as though it were to herself that she was singing. But when she spoke—ah, then any coloratura that ever lived might well shed tears of bitter envy. For the voice that Fair Carter used for such homely47 purposes as wishing lucky mortals good day and good night and God-speed was compact of magic. It was wine and velvet48 and moonlight and laughter and mystery—and for all its enchantment49, it was as clear and honest as a nice little boy’s. It did remarkable50 things to the English language. Fair would have widened her eyes in cool disdain51 at the idea of indulging in such far-advertised Southern tricks as “you all” and “Ah raickon” and “honey lamb,” but she managed to linger over vowels52 and elude53 consonants54 in a way that did not even remotely suggest the frozen North. It reduced English to such a satisfactory state of submission55 that she only experimented half heartedly with any other language. A Chinaman would112 have understood her when she said “Please”—a Polynesian would have thrilled responsive to her “Thank you.”
Therefore she had gone serenely56 on her way during those two terrible and thrilling years in France, those three terrible and bitter years in Germany, ignoring entirely57 the fact that the Teutons had a language of their own, and acquiring just enough of the Gallic tongue to enable her to indulge in the gay and hybrid58 banter59 of her beloved doughboys—a swift patter consisting largely of “Ah oui,” “?a ne fait rien” and “pas compris!” It had served her purpose admirably for a good five years, but it had proved a broken reed during the past five weeks. The De Lautrecs were capable of speaking almost any kind of French—Monsieur le Vicomte leaned toward a nice mixture of Bossuet and Anatole France, Madame his ancient and regal mother to Marivaux with sprightly60 touches of Voltaire, Laure and Diane, to René Bazin when they were being supervised and Gyp when they weren’t—Philippe le Gai to a racy and thrilling idiom, at once virile61 and graceful62, as old as the Chanson de Roland, as new as Sacha Guitry’s latest comedy. But after several courteous63 and tense attempts to exchange amenities64 with Laure’s “Little American” they had abandoned the tongue of their fathers and devoted65 their earnest attention113 to mastering the English language. It was easy enough for Philippe and Laure, of course; they already knew a great deal more about English literature than Fair had dreamed existed, though they tripped over the spoken word, but the other members of the family laboured sternly and industriously66, while their small guest surveyed their efforts with indulgent amusement. It seemed quite natural and reasonable to Fairfax Carter they they should continue to do so indefinitely—they wanted to talk to her, didn’t they? Well, then! They were getting on quite well, too, she reflected benevolently67, still smiling at St. Mark, who stared back at her so unresponsively that she suddenly ceased to smile.
“I suppose you don’t understand English, either?” she demanded severely68. “’Bout time a little old thing like you started to learn it, I should think!”
Her eye wandered to the travelling clock ticking competently away on the desk, and rested there for an electrified69 second.
“Mercy!” she murmured, appalled71, and was out of the bed and across the room with all the swift grace of a kitten. Half-past nine, and the De Chartreuil boys were to ride over for a game of “croquo-golf” at ten! Her toes curled rebelliously72 at the contact of the cold flags, but she114 ignored them stoically, pouncing73 on the copper jug and whirling across the room like a small, bright tempest. What a divine day, chanted her heart, suddenly exultant74, as she splashed the water recklessly and tumbled into her clothes. It was wonderful to feel almost well again—to feel weariness slipping from her like a worn-out garment. The sun came flooding in through the deep windows, gilding75 the faded hangings—gilding the vivid head—she could hear horses’ hoofs76 beneath her window, and she flung it wide, leaning far out.
“Bonjour, Monsieur Raoul—bonjour, Monsieur André! Oh, Laure, are you down already?”
“Already? This hour, small lazy one! Quick now, or we leave thee!”
“No, no,” wailed77 Fair. “I’ll be there—I’m almost there now, truly. Save the red mallet78 for me, angel darling—it’s the only one I can hit with. Don’t let her go, Monsieur André!”
“Never and never, Mademoiselle. We are your slaves.”
She knotted her shoe-laces with frantic12 fingers, snatched up the brown tam from the table, and raced down the corridor between the swaying tapestries79 like a small wild thing. But half way down she halted abruptly80. Behind one of the great doors someone was singing, gay and ringing115 and reckless, a gallant81 thing, that set her heart flying.
“Monsieur Charette à dit a ces Messieurs
Monsieur Charette à dit——”
Philippe le Gai was singing the old Vendée marching song that he had translated for her the day before.
For a moment she wavered and then, thrusting her hands deep in her pockets, she took a long breath. “Morning, Monsieur Philippe!” she challenged clearly.
The song broke off, and Fair could see him, for all the closed doors—could see his shining black head and the dark young face with its recklessly friendly smile, and its curiously82 unfriendly eyes, gray and quiet. She could see—— The blithe83 voice rang out again.
“And a most good morning to Mistress Fairy Carter! Where is she going, with those quick feet?”
“She’s going to play croquo-golf with Laure and Diane and the De Chartreuils. It’s such a heavenly beautiful day. You—you aren’t coming?”
“But never of this life!” laughed the voice. “How old you think we in here are, hein? Seven? Eight? We have twenty-nine years and thirty-nine gray hairs—we don’t play with foolish children.116 Only fairies can do that! You be careful of the ball going by old Daudin’s farm, see; there’s a sacred traitor84 of a ditch just over the hill—hit him hard and good, that ball, and maybe you clear it. Maybe you don’t, too! It is one animal of a ditch!” The light, strong laughter swept through the door, and Fair swayed to it as though it were a hand that pulled her. Then she turned away with a brave lift to her head.
“Thanks a lot—I’ll be careful. See you this afternoon, then.”
But the light feet finished their journey down the gray corridor and the worn flight of stone steps in an ominously86 sedate87 fashion. No, it was no use; it was no use at all. She felt suddenly discouraged and baffled, she who a few minutes before had been a candle, brave and warm and shining—only to have a careless breath blow out the light, leaving nothing but a cold little white stick with a dead black wick for a heart. It was horribly unfair, and someone should most certainly pay for it; someone who was sitting blithe and callous88 and safe behind those heavy doors—heavy doors of oak, and heavier ones of cool indifference89. She drew a quivering breath, and straightened, as though she had heard far off a bugle90 sing. Oh, how dared he, how dared he be indifferent? He, who idled all his life away, paying no tribute to the117 world save laughter, a useless, black-haired, arrogant91 young good-for-nothing? How dared he be indifferent to beauty and riches and grace and wit and kindness, when they lingered at his side, tremulous and expectant? It was worse than cruel to be indifferent to the personification of all these attributes—it was crass92, intolerable stupidity. She made a sudden violent gesture, pushing something far from her. That dream was ended; she was through. She would tell them to-night that her visit was over—that to-morrow she must be on her way to Paris—and America.
But at the thought of America her feet faltered93 to a halt, as though she were reluctant to go one step nearer to that enchanted94 country, empty now and strange, since Dad had gone. How could she go back to that great house with its white pillars and echoing halls?—how could she face its cold and silent beauty without his arms about her? No, no, she couldn’t—she was afraid—she was afraid of loneliness. While she had had her work, while she had had those thousands of brown young faces lifted to her in comradeship and worship and mirth, she had fought off the nightmare of his going. No one had known but Laure—Laure who had loved “the little American” from the first day that she had come laughing and tiptoeing down the long room with contraband95 chocolates for118 Laure’s bitter, dying poilus—Laure who had held her in her tired young arms all the terrible night after the cable came—Laure who had wept when a tearless and frozen Fair had set off for Germany with her division—Laure who had come all the way to Coblenz to bring her back to Normandy when she had literally96 dropped in her tracks two years later. Dear Laure, who had healed and tended this small alien, she would be loath97 to leave her go.
Fair’s lip quivered; she felt suddenly too small and solitary98 to face a world that could play such hideous99 tricks. It was bad enough and thrice incredible to have rendered Laure’s brother impervious100 to her every enchantment, but it was sheer wanton cruelty to have made him utterly101 unworthy of any lady’s straying fancy—and alas102, alas, how fancy strayed! The bravest of all the fighting Carters was badly frightened; the whole thing savoured of black magic. She, who had flouted103 and flaunted104 every masculine heart that had been laid at her feet since she had put on slippers105, to have fallen, victim to a laugh and a careless word! Why, she barely knew him, he held so lightly aloof106, courteous and smiling and indifferent; it was hatefully obvious that he preferred his own society to any that they could offer. He wouldn’t play—he wouldn’t work—he wouldn’t even eat with them. Of course he had been in the hospital for119 ages, but he had been out of it for ages, too, and it was criminal folly107 to continue to pamper108 any one as he was pampered109. A man—a real man—would die of shame before he would permit his sisters to give music lessons while he locked himself in his room and laughed. Never was he with them, save for the brief hour after déjeuner when they drank their cups of black coffee under the golden beech110 trees—and for that heavenly space after dinner in the great salon111, full of firelight and candlelight and falling rose-leaves and music, with Madame de Lautrec stitching bright flowers into her tapestry112 frame and Monsieur le Vicomte smiling his courteous and tragic113 smile into the leaping fire in the carved chimney, and the fresh young voices rising and falling about the piano over which Laure bent114 her golden head—Diane’s silver music lifting clearly, Laure’s soft contralto murmuring like far waters, and Philippe singing as his troubadour ancestor might have sung, fearless and true and shining—Fair caught her breath at the memory of that ringing splendour, and then looked stern. It was ridiculous to worship any one as the De Lautrecs worshipped their tall Philippe and it was obviously highly demoralizing for him—highly. Laure was the worst; it was as though she couldn’t bear to have him out of her sight for a minute; if he rose to go—oh, if he even120 stirred, she was at his side in a flash, her hand slipped into his, all her white tranquillity115 shaken into some mysterious terror at the thought that he might escape her again.
“No, no!” she would cry passionately116 when Fair rallied her with flying laughter. “You do not know what you say, my Fair. I have no courage left; none, none, I tell you. He is my life—and for four years every morning, every night I made myself say: ‘You will not see him again, you will not hear him again, you will not touch him again. But you will be brave, you hear? You will be brave because it is for France.’ Now France has no more need of my courage—and that is very well, because I have no more to give her. It is all gone. I will never be brave again.”
She was the only one that Philippe would suffer to come near him in all the long hours that he spent behind those dark barred doors; often, as Fair sped by on light feet, she could hear the murmur70 of their voices, low and absorbed—shutting her out, thought Fair forlornly, more than any lock on any door. What did they find to talk about, hour after hour, blind and deaf to the world that lay about them, golden under the October sun? What spell did Laure use to bind117 him, what magic to dispel118 all the endless witchery that Fair had spread before him, first carelessly,121 then startled into wide-eyed consciousness and finally, during these last flying days, driven to despairing prodigality119? She bit her lip, blinking back the treacherous tears fiercely. Some day—some day he should pay for this indifference, and pay with interest. The loitering feet paused again while their owner visualized120, through the mist of unwelcome tears, a contrite121 Philippe dragging himself to grovel122 abjectly123 at her feet, begging for one small word of mercy and of hope. The vivid countenance124 suddenly assumed an expression of exquisite125 contentment.
“No, Philippe,” she would tell him, lightly but inflexibly126, “no, my poor boy, it would be sheer cruelty to mislead you. Never, under any circumstances could I——”
“Enfin!” rang out a richly indignant voice. “Do you walk in your sleep, my good goose? We wait and we wait until we are one half frozen, and you arrive like the snail127 he was your little brother and——”
“Oh, Laure, I am sorry! Box my ears—no, hard—you tell her to box them hard, Monsieur André!”
“I, Mademoiselle? But never—I think we are well repaid for our vigil, hey, Raoul? Here is that very red mallet with which you will beat us all. We take Bravo with us, Diane?”
“Who holds the leash129; you, André? Last time he get loose, he bite three sheep—three, before we catch him. You hear, monster?”
Fair and Bravo exchanged guilty glances.
“Well, but Diane, he pulled so; truly he did. He went so fast, right over those hedges, and the leash cut through my mittens130, and——”
Laure and Diane yielded to outrageous131 laughter.
“Raoul, you should see them! Right over those sticking hedges they go, Bravo ahead, big like three wolves, and Fair ’way behind at the other end of the leash, so small like the little Red Riding Hood132, and so fast like she was flying! Oh, bon Dieu! I thought we die laughing!”
“Very, very funny,” commented Fair bitterly. “Specially for me. How are we going to-day?”
“How if we go across the little meadow to the Gates and home by the C?ur d’Or? Too far, Raoul?”
“We will be back for lunch? à la bonheur—we go. Ah, well hit, Mademoiselle. Straight like arrows, too!”
Fair raced after the red ball, her scarf flying behind her like a banner, wings at her heels, stars in her eyes, tragedy forgotten.
Three more strokes like that would get her to123 the meadow—oh, wonderful to be alive, to be swift and light and sure, to feel the wind lifting your hair, and the sun warming your heart in a world that was once more safe and kind. Dear world—dear France, dear France, so kind to this small American—she absolved133 it lavishly134 from its sins of cold water and bitter coffee; where else in all the world could you find a game of the inspiring simplicity135 of croquo-golf—a game whose sole equipment was a ball and a mallet—whose sole object was to cover as much space in as few strokes as possible? Where else could you find such comrades to play it with, grave and eager as children, ardent-eyed and laughing-lipped? She smote136 the ball again, her voice flying with it.
“Oh, Laure, as I live and breathe, it’s cleared the ditch!
‘Monsieur Charette hath said to all his peers,
Monsieur Charette hath said to all his peers,
Come, good sirs!
The exultant chant wavered for a moment as the proud possessor of the ball cleared the ditch, too, and took up her triumphant20 lilt, crescendo138:
124
“‘Take up thy gun, my good Gregory!
Our comrades have gone down
To fight for Paris Town!’”
André de Chartreuil swung up beside her, breathless and laughing. Luck was with him; all the English that he had mastered as liaison141 officer raced to the tip of his tongue.
“But what a child! How old are you, Mlle. Fairfax Carter?”
“Too old,” mourned Fairfax, shaking her bright head till the curls danced in the sun. “Much, much too old—old enough to know better.” She pounced142 on the half-buried ball with a small shriek143 of excitement. “Ah ha, my little treasure, a mere144 turn of the wrist and—bet I make the gate in four strokes.”
“Bet you do not,” replied André obligingly.
“Done; all the mushrooms that you find in Daudin’s meadow to—to what?”
“To the very great privilege of kissing the tips of your fingers.” Young De Chartreuil’s voice was carefully light.
“Monsieur André!” Fair, her mallet poised146 for the blow, paused long enough to bestow8 a distracting glance through her lashes147, oddly at variance148 with her maternal149 tone. “You aren’t going to begin that kind of thing, are you?” Her laughter rang out, gay and lovely and mocking.
Young De Chartreuil smiled back at her—a not very convincing smile. She was the most enchanting creature that he had ever met, but125 her lack of discretion150 froze the marrow151 in his bones.
“Mademoiselle, one so charming is privileged to forget that one may also be kind,” he remarked formally.
Fair stopped laughing. “Oh, nonsense!” she returned abruptly, forgetting that one may also be polite. She hit viciously at the ball, scowling after it more like a cross little boy than a lady of Romance. “There—see what you made me do!” The astonished André met her accusing gaze blankly.
“I, Mademoiselle?”
“Yes, sir, you.” The tone was unrelenting. “I’m a great deal kinder than I have any business being,” she added darkly. “I certainly am. Sooner or later every single one of you turn on me like—like—vipers, and tell me that it’s not possible that I could have been so everlastingly152 kind and patient and wonderful if I hadn’t meant something by it. Goodness knows what you’d all like me to do,” she murmured gloomily. “Make faces and bark like a dog every time one of you comes near me, I s’pose. Where’s that ball? I wish I were dead.”
This time André’s smile was clearly unforced.
“Oh, no one in the world is droll153 like you!” he stated with conviction. “But no one. No, do126 not bark like a little dog—I will be good, I swear.” He shrugged154 his shoulders philosophically155. “After all, if God had made you tender hearted you would spend your days weeping for the ones you broke. So this way it is best, is it not so?”
Fair beamed on him graciously. “Well, of course!” she assented156 with conviction. “And I’m certainly thankful that you see it. If you’d had about seventy-eight thousand soldiers spending their every waking minute telling you that they’d fade away and die if you weren’t kind to them, you’d see that the novelty of it would wear off a little. Wear off a good deal.” She gave the ball a rather perfunctory hit. After all, Fairfax Carter on the subject of Fairfax Carter was more absorbing than any game ever invented. She drew a deep breath and started off headlong on her favourite topic. “It’s perfectly157 horrible being a girl—and it’s a million times worse if you’re a—well, if you aren’t exactly revolting looking and are what the dime158 novels call an heiress.”
“It must, indeed, be hard,” agreed young De Chartreuil consolingly.
Fair glanced at him suspiciously from the corner of her eye.
“You needn’t laugh, my dear boy—it most certainly is. I don’t believe men care one little snip159 for your soul or—or your intellect.”
127 “Oh, but surely!” protested De Chartreuil politely.
“No, sir,” maintained the complete cynic, giving another abstracted hit at the ball. “Not a single, solitary one. Oh, bother—look where it went then! How many strokes have you had? Four? Four? I’ve had five, and look at the horrible thing now. What was I talking about? Oh, proposals! I don’t believe in international marriages, do you, Monsieur André?”
Monsieur André made a light and deprecating gesture. “I, Mademoiselle? But I have had so few!”
“I do think foreigners are horribly frivolous160!” murmured Fair to the universe at large. “I’ve not had so many myself, but I can still think they’re a bad idea. You couldn’t possibly help thinking that they were pretty cold and calculating.”
“Could you not?” inquired one who had come very near being a cold calculator in a freezing voice. “I, for one, try to look more charitably on the pretty ladies who covet161 our poor coronets.”
Fair brushed this thrust aside with the obliviousness162 that made her strength and her weakness once the engine of her attention was racing163 along her one-track mind to the goal of her selection. Humour, satire164, impertinence, or indignation were128 signals powerless to impede165 her progress when she was on her way; she rushed by them heedlessly, recklessly indifferent to anything short of a head-on collision.
“Oh, I wasn’t thinking of the girls—who in the world wants a little old coronet! Of course they’re nice if you’re used to them,” she added hastily. “But it was the men that I was thinking of; you simply couldn’t be sure, not ever. You work, don’t you?”
“Alas, yes, Mademoiselle!” De Chartreuil abandoned resentment166 and stood leaning on his mallet, laughing down at this incorrigible167 and enchanting small barbarian168.
“Monsieur André, why do you suppose that Monsieur de Lautrec doesn’t work?”
“Philippe?” His voice was strange.
“Yes, Philippe—you didn’t suppose that I meant the Vicomte, did you? This place keeps him busy from morning to night. Philippe, of course.” Her voice was impatient, but there was a desperate eagerness behind it that checked the quick words on De Chartreuil’s tongue.
“Mademoiselle, for four years he worked day and night; he gave the blood of his heart, the blood of his soul in work—would you grudge169 him a little rest?”
“But, good heavens, he’s had years to rest,”129 cried Fair despairingly. “He’s not going to rest until he dies, is he? You’re not resting—Monsieur Raoul’s not resting—no one in the world has a right to rest when there’s so much to do—no one!”
“For long, long after the war he did not leave the hospital, Mademoiselle.”
“Well, wasn’t he resting there?” demanded his inquisitor fiercely.
“No,” replied the boy gravely. “No, he was not resting there, I think.”
“What—what was the matter with him in the hospital?” asked Fair, making her lips into a very straight line so that they wouldn’t quiver.
“It was—what you call shell-shock.”
“Shell-shock? That’s horrible—oh, don’t I know! Those hospitals—like a nightmare—worse than a nightmare——” She swept it far from her with a resolute170 gesture. “It’s no good thinking about it; you have to forget! And Heaven knows that he’s over it now; Heaven knows that now he isn’t suffering from any breakdown171. I’ve never seen him look even serious for two minutes at a time—I don’t believe that he has the faintest idea of what seriousness means. It’s all very well to have a sense of humour; I have a perfectly wonderful sense of humour myself when I’m not thinking of something more important—but it’s ridiculous to think that that’s all there is to it!” She130 hit the ball a reckless blow that sent it flying far across the tawny172 meadow, and turned to young De Chartreuil a lovely little countenance on fire with righteous indignation and angry distress173. “A real man would know that life ought to be more than just laughing half the day—and singing half the night—and looking the way the heroes in the moving pictures ought to look—and chatter-boxing away in his room for hours and hours and hours!” Bitter resentment at this unpalatable memory sent the colour flying higher in her cheeks, and she swung off after the red ball at a furious scamper174. “And by Glory, I’m going to tell him so!” she announced tempestuously175 over her shoulder to the astounded176 André. He sprang forward, galvanized into instant action.
“Mademoiselle—Mademoiselle, wait, I beg you. You jest, of course, but——”
“Indeed I do not jest, of course,” retorted Fair hotly. “I don’t jest one little bit. Why in the world shouldn’t I tell him?”
“There are, I should think, one thousand reasons why,” he replied sharply. “Must I give you the thousand and first, and assure you that always, always, all the days that you live, it would be to you a very deep regret?”
“It certainly would not,” replied his unimpressed audience flatly. Any one who attempted131 to frighten Fair out of any undertaking177 whatever was making a vital strategic error, but André de Chartreuil was too young and too thoroughly178 outraged179 to indulge in strategy.
“Mademoiselle, but this is madness——”
“Monsieur, but this is impertinence.” Fair’s chin was tilted180 at an angle that implied that battle, murder, and sudden death would be child’s play to her from then on. This—this little whipper-snapper of a French infant who had basely pretended to be at her feet, suddenly rising up and dictating181 a course of conduct to her—to her! Well, it simply proved what she had always maintained. You couldn’t trust a foreigner—you couldn’t, not ever.
“For what you call impertinence, forgive me.” The tone was far from repentant182, and Fair waited stiffly for further developments. “My poor English renders me clumsy—grant me, I pray, patience.”
Very poor English, thought Fair sternly; it might mean anything. Grant him patience indeed! She had precious little patience to spare for any one this morning, as he would discover to his cost.
“Philippe, he is like no one else!” Young De Chartreuil made a gesture of impotent despair, his careful English suddenly turned traitor. “You do not see it, but he is like no one else, I tell you.132 I who was his sous-officier—his how you call it, his under-officer—ah, no matter—he was my captain for three years, and I know, you hear me, I know.”
“Heaven knows I hear you,” Fair assured him with ominous85 calm. “I should think that they could hear you in Paris!”
“Well, then, I tell you that we, his men, we who followed him, we would have given the blood out of our hearts for him to shine his boots with—we knew him, we. You know why they call him Philippe le Gai?”
“I know that there’s some story about an old troubadour called Philippe le Gai——”
“About a very great soldier who was also a very great singer, Mademoiselle, long years ago in Provence. Philippe is of his race; one of those who meet Death itself with a song. That other Philippe died eight hundred years ago, and they say that he died singing. And we—we who followed this Philippe and gave to him our souls—we know that he could face worse than death—and still sing.”
“There isn’t the slightest necessity of making a curtain speech to me about courage,” replied the last of the fighting Carters, and the velvet voice rang as cold and hard as drawn183 steel. “I know quite a good deal about it, thank you. I may not133 have had any old ancestor that went rampaging around singing songs about how gay and brave and wonderful he was, but I had three great-uncles and a grandfather who were killed in the Civil War and a brother who was killed in the Spanish War, and—and a father——” Her voice failed her, but she swallowed hard and pushed on relentlessly185: “And a father who died for his country just as much as any of them, because he went right on working for it when he knew that it would kill him—and who didn’t even let me know that he was dying, because I couldn’t help him, and he thought that I might help America, and I was the only one of the Carters left to fight for America. And I kept on fighting, even though it just about killed me, too; I went into Germany with my men, because I knew that he wouldn’t think the war was over until we got what we fought for—until we really got it—and I’d be there yet if it hadn’t been for those idiotic186 doctors. Nervous breakdown! For gracious sakes, I’d like to hear what they’d say if one of their old colonels started to have a nervous breakdown. This isn’t any kind of a world to sit and twirl your thumbs and pet your nerves in—and I can’t see that singing about it makes it much nobler—or laughing, either.”
“There are many things, perhaps, that you cannot see,” commented young De Chartreuil, and134 at the tone in his voice there was one thing that Fair did see, and that was red.
“Well, I can see this,” she cried in a voice shaken with sheer fury, “I can see that it’s possible to be just as much of a slacker after the war as during it.”
“Mademoiselle!”
“In America men work,” stormed Fair. “They——”
“In America you save your generosity187 for your own faults, it seems.” He raised a commanding hand, and Fair stood voiceless, literally transfixed with rage. “No, wait, I beg you; I have not yet finished. Perhaps in your great country you forget that work is the means—that it is not the end; no, no, believe me, it is not the end. It is also not very wise to condemn189 utterly that which may differ only in kind, not in degree. To you courage may be a dark and stern thing—a duty—but to some—to one at least, Mademoiselle—it is a shining and gay and splendid gift; it is a joy.”
“Are you through with your lessons for the day?” asked Fair icily. “Because if you are, I’m going!” She whirled the red mallet about her head like a battle-axe, and sent it spinning far from her after the neglected ball. “Good-bye—I’m off. Tell the others I twisted my ankle—got a headache—tell them any old lie you think of——”
135 “But, Mademoiselle, you cannot——”
Fairfax Carter halted for a moment in her tumultuous progress, the wind whipping her leaf-brown skirts about her and sending the bright curls flying about the reckless, stubborn little face.
“Can’t I?” she called back defiantly190. “Can’t I? Well, wait and see! I’m going to tell your precious Philippe de Lautrec just exactly what I think of a hero who spends his life resting on his laurels191 while his sisters work their fingers to the bone—and you and Foch and the Archangel Gabriel can’t stop me, so I’d advise you to stick to croquo-golf. Good-bye!”
She was gone in a brilliant whirl of flying skirts and scarf and hair. Young De Chartreuil watched her disappearing down the long hill that led past Daudin’s farm to the far gate of the chateau192 with an expression in which dismay was tempered by a grim satisfaction. After a moment he shrugged his shoulders briefly193, retrieved194 the scarlet195 ball and mallet, and set off slowly toward the sounds of distant laughter that marked the other players. Well, let her go; she was richly in need of a lesson, that lovely little demon196! And to think that for a moment he had dreamed—ah, name of Heaven, what an escape!——
Fair, in the meantime, raced lightly on her chosen way. She was in a towering rage at De136 Chartreuil for his presumptuous197 insolence198, and in an even more towering rage at herself for the effect that it had had on her. Even immature199 reflection revealed the unmistakable fact that she had behaved a good deal more like a fish-wife than the traditional great lady. About the only things that she had failed to do were boxing his ears and screaming at the top of her lungs. And she had felt terribly—oh, but terribly—like doing both of them. No, it was all very well to have a temper, but it was a bad strategic error to lose it. Possession is nine points of the law, especially with tempers. Fortunately, the hateful De Chartreuil child had been even worse than she. He had looked at one time as though it would have been pure ecstasy200 to throttle201 the life out of her—the time that she had got in that neat thrust about peace-time slackers. Well, she was on her way to tell one of them exactly what she thought of him as fast as her stubby brown boots would carry her. She wrenched202 impatiently at the iron latch203 on the great north gate—it yielded with an unexpectedness that nearly threw her off her feet, and she heard it clang to behind her as she raced up the long alley204 of lime trees that led to the stone terrace. If she were lucky, she might find the object of her righteous wrath205 basking206 there in the sunlight, without so much as a book in his graceless hands,137 dreaming away the hours, his dark face turned to the golden fields of his inheritance. She had found him there before—and, yes, fate was with her—there he was now in his great chair with his back to the lime trees, lounging deep. For a moment she hesitated, her heart thundering in her ears, and then she swung recklessly across the sun-warmed flags, hands deep in her pockets, her chin tilted at an outrageous angle.
“Oh, there you are!” she hailed in her magic voice, but there was something behind the words that turned them from a salutation to a challenge.
Philippe le Gai sat quite still for a moment, and then, without rising, he flung her a radiant smile over his shoulder.
“And there are you!” he said. “All finished, the croquo-golf?”
“No—just finished for me. It’s a stupid game, don’t you think?”
“Me? I think no game stupid that once I have started—no, not one. Then I must play it through to the end, or count myself defeated!”
Fair’s eyes darkened ominously.
“But you don’t start many games, do you?” she asked.
“No,” acquiesced207 the young man in the chair. “As you say, not many.”
138 Fair set her teeth. Did he think that if he continued to sprawl208 all his splendid length there, unmoving, that she would pass on? Was this his method of once more conveying to her the information that her presence was an intrusion? Oh, for a man—for some slim, freckled209, young American—to take this insolent210 foreigner by his coat collar and jerk him to his unworthy feet! Perhaps it might be better to have two of them—he was disgustingly tall. She swung round the corner of the chair, flames dancing in her eyes.
“Are you—very busy?” she inquired in a dangerously polite little voice.
Philippe le Gai showed all of his white teeth in another flashing smile.
“But no!” he replied accurately211, and made a swift motion as though to rise, only to check himself more swiftly. “Be seated, I pray you!”
The look of consuming rage that Fair flashed on him as she seated herself in the small iron chair opposite him would have shrivelled a normally sensitive soul to gray ashes. Her impervious host, however, merely leaned deeper into his bright cushions, the smile still edging his lips.
“Laure still plays?”
“Yes,” replied Fair. She spoke with considerable difficulty; the royal condescension212 of that “Be seated” had left her feeling slightly dizzy.
139 “I have here a paper which will need her sharp wits—she will not be long, perhaps?”
“I don’t know,” replied Fair sombrely. Just how, she wondered, did you lead up to telling a comparative stranger that you despised him? It was harder than she had thought it would be, out there in the meadow—it was the proud turn of the black head, and the sure strength of the long brown hands, and the sheer beauty of the flashing smile that made it hard. No one had a right to look like that—and to be despicable. It wasn’t fair.
“I think that those poor Gods in Heaven must envy us our earth to-day!” said the object of her scorn, turning his face to the deep blue of the autumn sky. “So warm, so cold, so sweet—like some mad Bacchante, bare of throat and arm for all her warm fur skins, with grapes of purple weighing down her curls, and wine of gold tripping up her light heels.... Once, you know, when I was the smallest of little boys, Monsieur my grandfather call me to come down from my sleep to drink the health of my very new sister—of young Laure. There was a great banquet, a table brave with fruit and flowers and lace and candles, and they put me onto that table, and give me a little burning golden brandy to drink in a great cool glass of crystal—and straight to my head it flew—ah, Dieu, the lucky, curly head! I remember still, you140 see—I remember how the world must feel to-day. The world and I, we have been fortunate.”
Fair’s mouth was a rose-red line of stern distaste. It might be all very French to take a perfectly good autumn day and turn it into an intoxicated213 heathen, but in her opinion, which was far from humble214, it was simply outrageous. And those detestable people, giving brandy to that darling little boy—well, all little boys were more or less darling. It was their truly lamentable215 degeneration at about the age of twenty-nine that was occupying her at present. She leaned forward swiftly, her hands very cold and her eyes very hot.
“Monsieur Philippe, don’t you ever, ever get tired of just sitting around doing nothing?”
Perhaps the passion in the clear voice touched him—for a moment Philippe le Gai belied216 his name. Then he made a slight gesture with the hand that held the papers, a gesture of dismissal to such folly as sober thought.
“Tired, Mistress Fairy? How should I be tired, doing nothing? And how are you so sure that I do nothing while I sit around—how are you so sure of that, I wonder?”
“Because I can see you,” replied Fair with despairing emphasis.
“Can you then, Wise Eyes? Can you see so141 well? Then you must see that it is not nothing that I do.”
“Oh, isn’t it?” she whispered breathlessly, her heart in her voice. “Isn’t it?”
“But never! While I sit around, I am being very, very busy, me, being alive—and being amused—and being, believe me, most eternally and most exultantly217 grateful. You call that doing nothing?”
“Of course I call that doing nothing,” replied Fair fiercely.
“Now that is strange—because, you know, I am so busy doing it that I can find time to do nothing else. To sit with the sun and beauty and silence all about, that is better than heaven, I think. Always I have loved Beauty better than life and once I thought that I had lost her for ever—and, see, she is mine again! In other fields—fields churned to madness, horrors of white clay and red blood, with the proud trees stripped to dirty black stumps—in other fields I remembered these, and I swore to that god of battles that if he would send me back to this golden grace—to this greenness and kind quiet—I would ask nothing more. And where those stenches made the poor soul sicker than the body, I could sometimes hold my breath, and smell apple-blossoms in the spring moonlight, and yellow roses in the summer sunlight, and142 spiced wood burning in the great chimneys, and cider blowing across the autumn winds. Now—now I need not hold the breath to smell the good ripe fruit, now I need not close my eyes to see my fields of gold, with the little warm gray sheep against the hills. Now I have come home to my fields, and I keep faith with the god of battles—I ask for nothing more. Look before you, Wise Eyes; what do you see?”
“The alley of lime trees and the north gate and the meadow,” said Fair, fighting to harden the voice that wanted only to break.
“Look farther——”
“I can see the thatch218 on Daudin’s roof and the road to the village and the little steeple on the church.”
“Nothing more?”
“There’s nothing more to see.”
“You do not see a little boy climbing that iron gate and racing home up that long alley, singing—racing quick, quick because it begins to grow dark?”
“Of course I don’t see him,” replied Fair defiantly, but she leaned forward, straining her eyes.
“Look farther—look far away; you cannot see the other little boys, many, many, all hurrying while they sing to get home before it is dark? No? Ah, poor Wise Eyes! Perhaps it is because it is years143 that those little boys hurry down, instead of just an alley of lime trees—they are hurrying home clean across the centuries. Since that first Philippe came singing up from the south, they have loved these gray stones best of all the earth—best, I think, of heaven. And that last little boy, he did not love it least, believe me. Perhaps he is singing louder than them all, because though they have made it, those others, he has saved it.”
“He didn’t save it any more than a good many million other people,” commented Fair ruthlessly.
Philippe le Gai threw back his black head with a ringing peal219 of laughter. “Truly as you say, not more. But that is another reason why he sings, believe me.”
“But what did you do before you started in to save it?” pursued the remorseless inquisitor, and suddenly she sickened at her task. The radiance flagged in the dark face before her; for a moment Philippe le Gai looked mortally tired.
“Me? I was an artist—and an engineer.” He sat staring ahead of him, tense and straight; and then he relaxed easily, the smile playing again. “Not so good an artist, and not so bad an engineer. I was oh, most young, and oh, most vain, and gray-headed old gentlemen from far away came to beg a little advice as to what to do with their sick mines.”
144 “Mines?” Fair’s face was alight. “That was what Dad used to do before he went in for cotton. It was copper, you know. D’you know about copper?”
“Every kind of mine that ever was I knew about,” he assured her lightly. “But now I have forgotten.”
“How could you?” she cried. “How could you, when they need you so? Don’t you think that that little boy would be ashamed if he could see you sitting on this terrace—just sitting and sitting like a great enormous lazy black cat? Don’t you?”
“Why, no,” replied Philippe le Gai. “No, I do not think that he would be ashamed.”
Fair wrung her hands together; she felt defeat closing about her.
“Those fields that you talked about—don’t you want to make them green and golden again, too?”
“They are very tired, those fields,” said the man. “Shall we not let them rest?”
“Oh!” cried Fair, and the valiant220 voice struggled and broke. “Oh, how can you—oh, oh, how can you?”
“Fair——”
He was on his feet at last—the swift move sent the paper flying, and it came fluttering145 irresponsibly across the sunlit space between them, dancing to a halt almost at her feet. It had blown open, and her incredulous eyes were riveted221 on the letterhead—the little thick black letters spelling out the name of Dad’s attorney, Henry C. Forrester, Wall Street—she stared down blankly:
Dear Sir—
In further reply to your request for full details as to the fortune left Miss Carter by her father——
A wave of scarlet swept over her from heel to brow; she felt as though she were drowning, she felt as though she were being buried alive, she felt as though a bolt of lightning had passed clean through her body, leaving her quite dead and still.
“So that’s what you are?” she said. “You—you! I might have known.”
“What I am?” His voice was touched with a little wonder. “No, but I do not understand; what is it that I am?”
“There’s no word for you,” she told him between her clicking teeth. She was shaking violently, uncontrollably, like someone in a chill. “Crawling to my lawyers—you—you—a common adventurer——”
“You are mad,” he said.
“It’s here,” cried Fair. “Look. It’s here in black and white—are you going to deny it?”
146 “Give me that letter,” said Philippe le Gai.
“I wouldn’t touch it in a thousand years,” she flung at him. “Not in a hundred hundred thousand. It’s filthy—it can lie there till it rots.”
“Pick it up,” he told her.
“How dare you?” she whispered. “How dare you?”
“It is not so very greatly daring,” he assured her. “Pick it up, I tell you.”
Fair stared at him voicelessly where he stood, tall and splendid and terrible in the sunlight. No, no, this was nightmare—this was not real. It was not she who bent to the bidding of this relentless184 monster—it was some other Fairfax caught in a hideous dream. The paper rattled222 in her fingers like goblin castanets.
“Now bring it to me.”
She crossed the little space of sun-warmed bricks, her eyes fixed188 and brilliant as a sleep-walker.
“Closer,” bade the still voice. “Closer yet. Yes. Now put it in my hand. That way—yes. It was not yours, you see; did you forget that?”
Fair made no answer. She stood frozen, watching the brown fingers folding the bit of white paper into a neat oblong.
“I would not, I think, say any word to Laure of this,” said the voice. “And I would not, I147 think, stay here longer. I would forget all this, and go.”
“I am going this afternoon,” she told him through her stiff lips. “And I am going to tell Laure—everything.”
“Do not,” he said. “Do not, believe me.” He stood staring down at the paper, and then he spoke again.
“I am, as you say, an adventurer,” said Philippe le Gai, in that terrible and gentle voice. “And adventure is, as you say, common. For which I thank my gods. You have nothing more to say to me?”
“Nothing.”
“Then that is all, I think, Miss Carter.”
Obviously, the audience was over, the courtier was dismissed. Oh, for one word—one little, little word—to blast him where he stood, gentle and insolent and relentless. She could not find that word, and she would die before she would give him any other. The brown boots stumbled in their haste on the terrace steps; at the foot she turned once more to face him, flinging him a last look of terror and defiance223 and despair—and deeper than all, wonder. But Philippe le Gai’s face was turned once more to his golden fields.
Far away, at the end of the long alley, she could see the players coming back; she could hear them,148 too, laughing and calling to each other—Bravo was barking frenziedly, heedless of Diane’s small, peremptory224 shouts—there, he was off, with Raoul and Diane in pursuit, headed straight for the distant stables. She clung to the stone railing for a moment, limp and sick, and then she flung back her head, spurred her flagging feet, and set off down the arching lime trees, running. Running because she was desperately225 tired and desperately frightened; because it was toward battle that she ran, and she must get there swiftly. Laure hailed from the far end.
“I’ve not come to do penance,” said the deserter. She stood very straight with her hands clasped tightly behind her. “I’ve come to say good-bye.”
“Good-bye?” echoed Laure. “Here, André, take this mallet, this ball. What folly is this, Fair?”
“It’s not folly; the folly’s been in staying. I’ve learned quite a lot of things in the last few minutes, Laure. Monsieur de Lautrec has some papers that he wants to show you.”
“Papers? Well, but what is all this mystery? Come, now, Fair, you are not well, I know. The doctor he said you should not be excited.”
149 “I am not in the least excited,” replied Fair, her eyes two glittering danger signals. “Are you in this plot, too, Monsieur André?”
“Plot? No, decidedly, this is fever! Let me feel your hands, mon enfant——”
“Don’t touch me, please,” said Fair, clearly and distinctly.
“No.” She took a step farther away from Laure who stood looking down at her, clear and quiet, with that incredulous lift to her brows. “Don’t pretend any more, please; it makes me rather sick. I know about everything, you see.”
“That is very exactly what I do not do, ma petite. No, André, do not go—you, too, will wait and see. What is this nonsense, Fair?”
“You needn’t keep it up any longer, I tell you,” returned Fair fiercely. “I’ve found out what you and Monsieur de Lautrec have been doing. I thought that you loved me, Laure—you did it pretty well—and all the time you were nothing but fortune hunters, were you?”
“You told Philippe—that?” asked Laure. Every atom of colour had drained out of her face, but she did not lift her voice. “No, wait, André. I am not yet through. It would be a good hunter150 who could find your fortune, Fairfax. You have none to hunt for.”
“I have two million dollars,” said Fair.
“You have not half a million centimes. It was all in cotton, that great fortune; it is gone. Your lawyers had cabled to you while you were ill in Germany, but the doctors they said you must not hear that bad news then; they asked me to tell you, gently, when you were much better. So I have waited, and Philippe, he has cabled three—no, four times, to see whether skill and thought and work might not save that so mighty228 fortune. To-day he thought perhaps that we might have heard——”
“Oh,” said Fair in a small, childish voice. “Oh.” She put her hand to her head; it hurt dreadfully. “Well, then, I can go to work——” She made a vague gesture, as though if she stretched out her hand work would be there for her to cling to—and Laure smiled, a fine, cruel little smile. Something snapped in Fair’s head. “That sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it, Laure? But you see, I’m not over six feet tall, I’m not stronger than steel—I’m not busy twelve hours a day sitting around in the sun being an ex-hero—so I’m going to work.”
“Did you, perhaps, tell my brother that you thought that of him, too?” asked Laure.
“I told him that, and I told him more,” said Fair.
151 Laure came toward her, something so terrible in her white face that for a moment Fair thought that she was going to kill her.
“Little fool!” she said very softly. “Little, wicked, wicked fool, Philippe cannot work—Philippe is blind.”
“No!” cried Fair. She clapped her hands over her ears, to shut out those dreadful words, her face a twisted mask of terror. “No, no, no!”
“And I tell you yes, yes, yes,” repeated the tall girl before her, closing her long fingers over the small wrists, wrenching229 the clinging hands down relentlessly. “Blind like a stone, I tell you—blind.”
“He couldn’t be—he couldn’t be—I’d have seen——”
“What have you ever seen that did not touch yourself?” asked Philippe’s sister. “He is blind, but not so blind as you. When you came to us, never, never did we think that you would not see, though we could not talk of it—not yet. But Philippe—Philippe he said: ‘No, no—let her alone. She has need of peace and mirth and sunshine, those doctors said—darkness it must not touch her. We will be careful, and perhaps she will not know.’ You have well repaid that care, have you not, Fairfax?”
“But his eyes—his eyes——”
“His eyes—because they are still there, you152 think they see? They saw too much, those eyes; they see no more. What made the light behind them—that nerve behind them—it is paralyzed. You who know so much about the war, you do not know that shock could do that? That there are men blind because their eyes turned rebel, and they would see no more horror—deaf because they would not hear more horror—dumb because they could not tell their horror. Philippe—Philippe he loved beauty—and after a long while his eyes they went mad—and he is blind. Work—work, you little fool! All day, all night, he works, he works. To learn to read—to learn to write—to learn to live, to live, you hear——”
“Please let me go, Laure,” whispered Fair. “Please, Laure—please, Laure.”
“I will tell Marie Léontine to help you with your packing,” said Laure. “And I am glad indeed to let you go. Come, André.”
Fair watched them cutting across the garden to the east entrance—not the terrace, not the terrace. She couldn’t run any more—she felt as though she could never run again—but perhaps if she started now and went very carefully, holding to the lime trees, she could get there before he left. She must, she must get there before he left.... Not until she was at the steps did she dare to raise her eyes. He was still there.
153 “Laure?” he called. “Laure?”
“It’s Fair,” she said. “I came back.”
She saw him grind the paper between his hands—and then he turned toward her, smiling a little.
“You had forgotten something?”
“Yes.” She was quite near now, but her voice was so low that it barely reached him. “I came back to tell you—to tell you——”
The smile deepened on the dark young face. “Ah, tiens! There was something, then, that you forgot to tell me? Never should I have said it!”
“Please,” she entreated230, in that shadow of a voice. “Please. I know now about—about—Laure told me!”
“About why I lie like that cat in the sun? Good! Now you tell Laure——” He broke off sharply. “She was not kind, our Laure? You are weeping? Do not weep; those little jewels of tears, so small, so shining, so empty, empty—you women love them best of all your jewels, I think. But me, I do not think that they become you best!”
“I don’t cry often,” Fair told him. “Not often, really. You can ask Dad—no, no—not Dad. It’s because I’m tired, probably. I came back because I wanted to tell you——” She swallowed despairingly, the tears salt on her lips.
“Why, because you were a good child,” he154 helped her gaily231. “And wanted to tell me that you were sorry.”
“No—no. Because I wanted to tell you that I was glad.”
“Glad?” He was on his feet, with that cry.
“How could I be sorry for you, Philippe? Oh, I can’t be sorry for myself—not even now—not now, when I see myself. I wanted so to be proud of you—you don’t know—you don’t—you don’t——”
“And why did you so want to be proud of me, may I ask?”
“Because I love you,” said Fair clearly.
Philippe le Gai caught at the cushioned chair. “You are mad,” he said.
“Yes.” The voice tripped in its haste. “Yes, but you see I had to tell you. You mustn’t mind; I’m going this afternoon—Marie Léontine’s waiting now. Don’t mind, please, Philippe; I didn’t know, myself, truly—not till Laure told me about—about you, and I knew that I didn’t care at all how horrible and vile145 I had been, because I was so glad that you—that you——”
“Hush!” He stood quite still, and then he raised his hand to his eyes. “I should send you far from me, Fairfax.”
“Yes,” said Fair, “I’m not any good, you see. All I had to give you was my money and my—my155 prettiness. I can’t give you either of them, Philippe.”
“When I heard you laugh, that first night when you came,” he told her, “I remembered—I remembered that laughter was not just a sound to cover up despair—I remembered how to laugh that night.”
She stared at him, voiceless.
“When you spoke to me—when you spoke to me, my Music—I was glad then that I could not see, because I wished to listen only, always.”
“Philippe,” she prayed. “Don’t, don’t send me away, Philippe.”
“We are mad,” he said. “Come closer.”
And once more she went toward him across that sunlit space, to where he stood, tall and splendid and terrible. “Closer still,” he said. “Closer still—still closer. Why do you weep, my Laughter?”
“Hold me—hold me—don’t let me go.”
“Blindness,” he said. “It is just a little word, a little, dark, ugly word to frighten foolish children. Are you beautiful, my Loveliness? Never, never could you be beautiful as I dream you!” He touched her lips with his brown fingers.
“Smile!” he said. And she smiled.
“What is blindness to me who can touch your lips to laughter?” he asked her, bending his black head until his lips swept her lashes. “What is156 blindness to me, who can touch your eyes to tears?”
The sunlight fell across the bright hair of the last of the fighting Carters—he could feel it warm against his lips and suddenly he laughed aloud.
“What is blindness to me?” cried Philippe le Gai to the golden sun. “What is blindness to me, who hold my light against my heart?”
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
walnut
|
|
| n.胡桃，胡桃木，胡桃色，茶色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
plaintively
|
|
| adv.悲哀地，哀怨地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
maiden
|
|
| n.少女，处女；adj.未婚的，纯洁的，无经验的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
fragrance
|
|
| n.芬芳，香味，香气 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
lurked
|
|
| vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
treacherous
|
|
| adj.不可靠的，有暗藏的危险的；adj.背叛的，背信弃义的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
jug
|
|
| n.(有柄，小口，可盛水等的)大壶，罐，盂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
bestow
|
|
| v.把…赠与，把…授予；花费 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
bestowed
|
|
| 赠给，授予( bestow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
rebellious
|
|
| adj.造反的，反抗的，难控制的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
scowl
|
|
| vi.(at)生气地皱眉，沉下脸，怒视；n.怒容 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
frantic
|
|
| adj.狂乱的，错乱的，激昂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
frantically
|
|
| ad.发狂地, 发疯地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
crimson
|
|
| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
mounds
|
|
| 土堆，土丘( mound的名词复数 )； 一大堆 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
oblivious
|
|
| adj.易忘的，遗忘的，忘却的，健忘的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
coaxing
|
|
| v.哄，用好话劝说( coax的现在分词 )；巧言骗取；哄劝，劝诱；“锻炼”效应 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
animation
|
|
| n.活泼，兴奋，卡通片／动画片的制作 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
triumphantly
|
|
| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
triumphant
|
|
| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
hearty
|
|
| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
deference
|
|
| n.尊重，顺从；敬意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
dame
|
|
| n.女士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
grudgingly
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
apprehensively
|
|
| adv.担心地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
copper
|
|
| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
trotted
|
|
| 小跑，急走( trot的过去分词 )； 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
joyous
|
|
| adj.充满快乐的；令人高兴的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
faucets
|
|
| n.水龙头( faucet的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
hospitably
|
|
| 亲切地，招待周到地，善于款待地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
scowling
|
|
| 怒视，生气地皱眉( scowl的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
scowled
|
|
| 怒视，生气地皱眉( scowl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
aspirations
|
|
| 强烈的愿望( aspiration的名词复数 )； 志向； 发送气音； 发 h 音 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
ruffled
|
|
| adj. 有褶饰边的, 起皱的 动词ruffle的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
tilt
|
|
| v.(使)倾侧；(使)倾斜；n.倾侧；倾斜 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
adventurous
|
|
| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
wrung
|
|
| 绞( wring的过去式和过去分词 )； 握紧（尤指别人的手）； 把（湿衣服）拧干； 绞掉（水） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
enchanting
|
|
| a.讨人喜欢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
saluted
|
|
| v.欢迎，致敬( salute的过去式和过去分词 )；赞扬，赞颂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
potent
|
|
| adj.强有力的，有权势的；有效力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
extravagant
|
|
| adj.奢侈的；过分的；(言行等)放肆的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
ornamental
|
|
| adj.装饰的；作装饰用的；n.装饰品；观赏植物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
unbearably
|
|
| adv.不能忍受地，无法容忍地；慌 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
spoke
|
|
| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
undone
|
|
| a.未做完的，未完成的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
brook
|
|
| n.小河，溪；v.忍受，容让 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
homely
|
|
| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
velvet
|
|
| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
enchantment
|
|
| n.迷惑，妖术，魅力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
remarkable
|
|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
disdain
|
|
| n.鄙视，轻视；v.轻视，鄙视，不屑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
vowels
|
|
| n.元音，元音字母( vowel的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
elude
|
|
| v.躲避，困惑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
consonants
|
|
| n.辅音，子音( consonant的名词复数 )；辅音字母 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
submission
|
|
| n.服从，投降；温顺，谦虚；提出 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
serenely
|
|
| adv.安详地，宁静地，平静地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
hybrid
|
|
| n.(动，植）杂种，混合物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
banter
|
|
| n.嘲弄，戏谑；v.取笑，逗弄，开玩笑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
sprightly
|
|
| adj.愉快的，活泼的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
virile
|
|
| adj.男性的；有男性生殖力的；有男子气概的；强有力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
graceful
|
|
| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
courteous
|
|
| adj.彬彬有礼的，客气的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
amenities
|
|
| n.令人愉快的事物；礼仪；礼节；便利设施；礼仪( amenity的名词复数 )；便利设施；（环境等的）舒适；（性情等的）愉快 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
devoted
|
|
| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
industriously
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
benevolently
|
|
| adv.仁慈地，行善地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
severely
|
|
| adv.严格地；严厉地；非常恶劣地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
electrified
|
|
| v.使电气化( electrify的过去式和过去分词 )；使兴奋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
murmur
|
|
| n.低语，低声的怨言；v.低语，低声而言 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
appalled
|
|
| v.使惊骇，使充满恐惧( appall的过去式和过去分词)adj.惊骇的；丧胆的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
rebelliously
|
|
| adv.造反地，难以控制地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
pouncing
|
|
| v.突然袭击( pounce的现在分词 )；猛扑；一眼看出；抓住机会（进行抨击） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
exultant
|
|
| adj.欢腾的，狂欢的，大喜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
gilding
|
|
| n.贴金箔，镀金 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
hoofs
|
|
| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
wailed
|
|
| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
mallet
|
|
| n.槌棒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
tapestries
|
|
| n.挂毯( tapestry的名词复数 )；绣帷，织锦v.用挂毯（或绣帷）装饰( tapestry的第三人称单数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
abruptly
|
|
| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
gallant
|
|
| adj.英勇的，豪侠的；(向女人)献殷勤的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
curiously
|
|
| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
blithe
|
|
| adj.快乐的，无忧无虑的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
traitor
|
|
| n.叛徒，卖国贼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
ominous
|
|
| adj.不祥的，不吉的，预兆的，预示的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
ominously
|
|
| adv.恶兆地，不吉利地；预示地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
sedate
|
|
| adj.沉着的，镇静的，安静的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
callous
|
|
| adj.无情的，冷淡的，硬结的，起老茧的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
indifference
|
|
| n.不感兴趣，不关心，冷淡，不在乎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
bugle
|
|
| n.军号，号角，喇叭；v.吹号，吹号召集 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
arrogant
|
|
| adj.傲慢的，自大的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
crass
|
|
| adj.愚钝的，粗糙的；彻底的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
faltered
|
|
| （嗓音）颤抖( falter的过去式和过去分词 )； 支吾其词； 蹒跚； 摇晃 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
enchanted
|
|
| adj. 被施魔法的，陶醉的，入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
contraband
|
|
| n.违禁品，走私品 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
literally
|
|
| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
loath
|
|
| adj.不愿意的；勉强的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
solitary
|
|
| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
hideous
|
|
| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
impervious
|
|
| adj.不能渗透的，不能穿过的，不易伤害的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
utterly
|
|
| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
alas
|
|
| int.唉(表示悲伤、忧愁、恐惧等) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
flouted
|
|
| v.藐视，轻视( flout的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
flaunted
|
|
| v.炫耀，夸耀( flaunt的过去式和过去分词 )；有什么能耐就施展出来 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
slippers
|
|
| n. 拖鞋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
aloof
|
|
| adj.远离的；冷淡的，漠不关心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
folly
|
|
| n.愚笨，愚蠢，蠢事，蠢行，傻话 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
pamper
|
|
| v.纵容，过分关怀 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
pampered
|
|
| adj.饮食过量的，饮食奢侈的v.纵容，宠，娇养( pamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
beech
|
|
| n.山毛榉；adj.山毛榉的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
salon
|
|
| n.[法]沙龙；客厅；营业性的高级服务室 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
tapestry
|
|
| n.挂毯，丰富多采的画面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
tragic
|
|
| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
bent
|
|
| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
tranquillity
|
|
| n. 平静, 安静 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
passionately
|
|
| ad.热烈地，激烈地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
bind
|
|
| vt.捆，包扎；装订；约束；使凝固；vi.变硬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
dispel
|
|
| vt.驱走，驱散，消除 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
prodigality
|
|
| n.浪费，挥霍 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
visualized
|
|
| 直观的，直视的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
contrite
|
|
| adj.悔悟了的，后悔的，痛悔的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
grovel
|
|
| vi.卑躬屈膝，奴颜婢膝 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
abjectly
|
|
| 凄惨地； 绝望地； 糟透地； 悲惨地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
countenance
|
|
| n.脸色，面容；面部表情；vt.支持，赞同 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
exquisite
|
|
| adj.精美的；敏锐的；剧烈的，感觉强烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
inflexibly
|
|
| adv.不屈曲地，不屈地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
snail
|
|
| n.蜗牛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
dubiously
|
|
| adv.可疑地，怀疑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
leash
|
|
| n.牵狗的皮带，束缚；v.用皮带系住 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
mittens
|
|
| 不分指手套 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
outrageous
|
|
| adj.无理的，令人不能容忍的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
hood
|
|
| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
absolved
|
|
| 宣告…无罪，赦免…的罪行，宽恕…的罪行( absolve的过去式和过去分词 )； 不受责难，免除责任 [义务] ,开脱（罪责） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
lavishly
|
|
| adv.慷慨地，大方地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
135
simplicity
|
|
| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
136
smote
|
|
| v.猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去式 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
137
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
138
crescendo
|
|
| n.(音乐)渐强，高潮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
139
virgin
|
|
| n.处女，未婚女子；adj.未经使用的；未经开发的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
140
gourd
|
|
| n.葫芦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
141
liaison
|
|
| n.联系，（未婚男女间的）暖昧关系，私通 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
142
pounced
|
|
| v.突然袭击( pounce的过去式和过去分词 )；猛扑；一眼看出；抓住机会（进行抨击） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
143
shriek
|
|
| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
144
mere
|
|
| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
145
vile
|
|
| adj.卑鄙的，可耻的，邪恶的；坏透的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
146
poised
|
|
| a.摆好姿势不动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
147
lashes
|
|
| n.鞭挞( lash的名词复数 )；鞭子；突然猛烈的一击；急速挥动v.鞭打( lash的第三人称单数 )；煽动；紧系；怒斥 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
148
variance
|
|
| n.矛盾，不同 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
149
maternal
|
|
| adj.母亲的，母亲般的，母系的，母方的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
150
discretion
|
|
| n.谨慎；随意处理 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
151
marrow
|
|
| n.骨髓；精华；活力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
152
everlastingly
|
|
| 永久地，持久地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
153
droll
|
|
| adj.古怪的，好笑的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
154
shrugged
|
|
| vt.耸肩（shrug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
155
philosophically
|
|
| adv.哲学上；富有哲理性地；贤明地；冷静地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
156
assented
|
|
| 同意，赞成( assent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
157
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
158
dime
|
|
| n.（指美国、加拿大的钱币）一角 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
159
snip
|
|
| n.便宜货，廉价货，剪，剪断 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
160
frivolous
|
|
| adj.轻薄的；轻率的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
161
covet
|
|
| vt.垂涎；贪图(尤指属于他人的东西) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
162
obliviousness
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
163
racing
|
|
| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
164
satire
|
|
| n.讽刺，讽刺文学，讽刺作品 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
165
impede
|
|
| v.妨碍，阻碍，阻止 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
166
resentment
|
|
| n.怨愤，忿恨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
167
incorrigible
|
|
| adj.难以纠正的，屡教不改的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
168
barbarian
|
|
| n.野蛮人；adj.野蛮(人)的；未开化的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
169
grudge
|
|
| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
170
resolute
|
|
| adj.坚决的，果敢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
171
breakdown
|
|
| n.垮，衰竭；损坏，故障，倒塌 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
172
tawny
|
|
| adj.茶色的，黄褐色的；n.黄褐色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
173
distress
|
|
| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
174
scamper
|
|
| v.奔跑，快跑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
175
tempestuously
|
|
| adv.剧烈地，暴风雨似地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
176
astounded
|
|
| v.使震惊(astound的过去式和过去分词)；愕然；愕；惊讶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
177
undertaking
|
|
| n.保证，许诺，事业 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
178
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
179
outraged
|
|
| a.震惊的，义愤填膺的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
180
tilted
|
|
| v. 倾斜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
181
dictating
|
|
| v.大声讲或读( dictate的现在分词 )；口授；支配；摆布 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
182
repentant
|
|
| adj.对…感到悔恨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
183
drawn
|
|
| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
184
relentless
|
|
| adj.残酷的，不留情的，无怜悯心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
185
relentlessly
|
|
| adv.不屈不挠地；残酷地；不间断 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
186
idiotic
|
|
| adj.白痴的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
187
generosity
|
|
| n.大度，慷慨，慷慨的行为 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
188
fixed
|
|
| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
189
condemn
|
|
| vt.谴责，指责；宣判(罪犯)，判刑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
190
defiantly
|
|
| adv.挑战地，大胆对抗地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
191
laurels
|
|
| n.桂冠，荣誉 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
192
chateau
|
|
| n.城堡，别墅 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
193
briefly
|
|
| adv.简单地，简短地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
194
retrieved
|
|
| v.取回( retrieve的过去式和过去分词 )；恢复；寻回；检索（储存的信息） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
195
scarlet
|
|
| n.深红色，绯红色，红衣；adj.绯红色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
196
demon
|
|
| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
197
presumptuous
|
|
| adj.胆大妄为的，放肆的，冒昧的，冒失的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
198
insolence
|
|
| n.傲慢；无礼；厚颜；傲慢的态度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
199
immature
|
|
| adj.未成熟的，发育未全的，未充分发展的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
200
ecstasy
|
|
| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
201
throttle
|
|
| n.节流阀，节气阀，喉咙；v.扼喉咙，使窒息，压 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
202
wrenched
|
|
| v.（猛力地）扭( wrench的过去式和过去分词 )；扭伤；使感到痛苦；使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
203
latch
|
|
| n.门闩，窗闩；弹簧锁 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
204
alley
|
|
| n.小巷，胡同；小径，小路 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
205
wrath
|
|
| n.愤怒，愤慨，暴怒 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
206
basking
|
|
| v.晒太阳，取暖( bask的现在分词 )；对…感到乐趣；因他人的功绩而出名；仰仗…的余泽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
207
acquiesced
|
|
| v.默认，默许( acquiesce的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
208
sprawl
|
|
| vi.躺卧，扩张，蔓延；vt.使蔓延；n.躺卧，蔓延 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
209
freckled
|
|
| adj.雀斑；斑点；晒斑；（使）生雀斑v.雀斑，斑点( freckle的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
210
insolent
|
|
| adj.傲慢的，无理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
211
accurately
|
|
| adv.准确地，精确地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
212
condescension
|
|
| n.自以为高人一等，贬低(别人) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
213
intoxicated
|
|
| 喝醉的，极其兴奋的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
214
humble
|
|
| adj.谦卑的，恭顺的；地位低下的；v.降低，贬低 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
215
lamentable
|
|
| adj.令人惋惜的，悔恨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
216
belied
|
|
| v.掩饰( belie的过去式和过去分词 )；证明（或显示）…为虚假；辜负；就…扯谎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
217
exultantly
|
|
| adv.狂欢地，欢欣鼓舞地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
218
thatch
|
|
| vt.用茅草覆盖…的顶部；n.茅草(屋) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
219
peal
|
|
| n.钟声；v.鸣响 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
220
valiant
|
|
| adj.勇敢的，英勇的；n.勇士，勇敢的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
221
riveted
|
|
| 铆接( rivet的过去式和过去分词 )； 把…固定住； 吸引； 引起某人的注意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
222
rattled
|
|
| 慌乱的，恼火的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
223
defiance
|
|
| n.挑战，挑衅，蔑视，违抗 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
224
peremptory
|
|
| adj.紧急的，专横的，断然的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
225
desperately
|
|
| adv.极度渴望地，绝望地，孤注一掷地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
226
penance
|
|
| n.（赎罪的）惩罪 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
227
delirium
|
|
| n. 神智昏迷,说胡话;极度兴奋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
228
mighty
|
|
| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
229
wrenching
|
|
| n.修截苗根，苗木铲根（铲根时苗木不起土或部分起土）v.（猛力地）扭( wrench的现在分词 )；扭伤；使感到痛苦；使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
230
entreated
|
|
| 恳求，乞求( entreat的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
231
gaily
|
|
| adv.欢乐地，高兴地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |