Janice's idea of a low?sodium1 diet for him is to get these frozen dinners in plastic pouches2 called Low?Cal. Most of this precooked chicken and beef is full of chemicals so it doesn't go bad on the shelf. To work it all through his system he usually has a second beer. Janice is distracted these days, full of excitement about taking real?estate courses at the Penn State extension. "I'm not sure I totally understand it, though the woman at the office over on Pine Street ? hasn't that neighborhood gone downhill, since you and your father used to work at Verity3! ? she was very patient with my questions. The classes meet three hours a week for ten weeks, and there are two required and four electives to get this certificate, but I don't think you need the certificate to take the licensing4 exam, which for a salesperson5 ? that's what I'd be ? is given monthly and for a broker6, which maybe I'd try to be later, only quarterly. But the gist7 of it is I could begin with two this April and then take two more from July to September and if all goes well get my license8 in September and start selling, strictly9 on a commission basis at first, for this firm that Doris Eberhardt's new brother?in?law is one of the partners in. She says she's told him about me and he's interested. It's in your favor evidently to be middle?aged11, the clients assume you're experienced."
"Honey, why do you need to do this? You have the lot."
"I don't have the lot. Nelson has the lot."
"Does he? I dropped over there today and he wasn't there, just these kids he's hired. One fag, one wop, and a skirt."
"Harry12. Now who's sounding prejudiced?"
He doesn't push ahead with his story, he wants to save it for when they both can focus. After dinner Janice likes to watch Jeopardy13! even though she never knows any of the answers, and then the Phillies are playing the Mets on Channel 11. The little stone house with its fractional number on Franklin Drive draws darkling about them, just them, in the evening as the gradual Northern dusk (in Florida the sun just suddenly shuts down, and the moon takes over) seeps14 into the still?bare trees, quelling15 the birdsong, and a lemon tinge16 of sky in the west beyond the craggy chimneys of the big clinker?brick house deepens to an incendiary orange and then the crimson17 of last embers. Another few weeks, the trees will leaf in, and there won't be any sunset to see from the lozenge?pane18 windows of his den10, when he turns his eyes aside from watching the television screen.
In the third inning, with two men on, Schmidt hits a home run, his fourth of the young season and the five hundred fortysixth of his career. It puts the Phils ahead five to zero, and Rabbit starts switching channels, finding no basketball playoffs, only Matlock and The Wonder Years. Much as Janice irritates him when she's with him, when she isn't in the room with him, or when he can't hear her knocking around in the kitchen or upstairs above his head, he grows uneasy. He switches off the set and goes looking for her, full of his troubling news as once he was full of gold Krugerrands.
She is already in one of her nighties, upstairs, and those infuri-ating Florida sandals that go f lip?flop19 as she walks around when he is still trying to sleep in the morning. Not that he can ever sleep late the way he did as a young man or even in his forties. He wakes around six with a little start and ever since his heart attack there is a gnawing20 in his stomach whose cause he can't locate until he realizes it is the terror of being trapped inside his perishing body, like being in a prison cell with a madman who might decide to kill him at any moment. She is paddling back and forth21, flop?flop, carrying small stacks of folded cloth, laundry she has brought up the back stairs; one square stack he recognizes as folded handkerchiefs, another, less trim, as his jockey shorts with their slowly slacken-ing elastic22 waists, a third as her own underthings, which still excite him, not so much when they are on her as when empty and laun-dry?clean. He doesn't know how to begin. He throws his big body across the bed diagonally and lets the nubbles ofits bedspread rub his face. The reddish blankness behind his closed lids is restful after the incessant23 skidding24 sparks of the television set. "Harry, is anything the matter?" Janice's voice sounds alarmed. His fragility gives him a new hold over her.
He rolls over and can't help smiling at the lumpy figure she cuts in her nightie. She looks not so different from how Judy looks in hers and not very much larger. Her scant25 bangs don't quite hide her high forehead, its Florida tan dulling, and her tired eyes look focused elsewhere. He begins, "There's something going wrong over at the lot. When I was over there today I asked to see the books and this fag with AIDS Nelson has put in as bookkeeper instead of Mildred told me he couldn't show them to me unless you authorized26 it. You're the boss, according to him."
The tip of her little tongue creeps out and presses on her upper lip. "That was silly," she says.
"I thought so, but I kept my cool. Poor guy, he's just cover-ing up for Nelson."
"Covering up for Nelson why?"
"Well" ? Harry sighs heavily, and arranges himself on the bed like an odalisque, with a hippy twist to his body ? "you really want to hear this?"
"Of course." But she keeps moving around the room with her little stacks.
"I have a new theory. I think Nelson takes cocaine27, and that's why he's so shifty and jumpy, and kind of paranoid."
Janice moves carefully to the bureau, flop and then flop, carry-ing what Harry recognizes as her salmon28?colored running suit with the blue sleeves and stripes, which she never wears on the street around here, where the middle?aged are more careful about looking ridiculous. "Who told you this?" she asks.
He squirms on the bed, pulling up his legs and pushing off his suede29 shoes so as not to dirty the bedspread of white dotted Swiss.
"Nobody told me," he says. "I just put two and two together. Cocaine's everywhere and these yuppie baby boomers Nelson's age are just the ones who use it. It takes money. Lots of money, to maintain a real habit. Doesn't Pru keep complaining about all these bills they can't pay?"
Janice comes close to the bed and stands; he sees through her cotton nightie shadows of her nipples and her pubic hair. From his angle she looks strangely enormous, and in his diagonal posi-tion he undergoes one of those surges of lightheadedness as when he stands up too fast; it is not clear who is upright and who is not. Her body has kept the hard neatness it had when they were kids working at Kroll's but underneath30 her chin there are ugly folds that ramify into her neck. She was determined31 not to get fat like her mother but age catches you anyway. Janice says carefully, "Most young couples have bills they can't pay."
He sits up, to shake the lightness in his head, and because her body is there puts his arms around her hips32. On second thought he reaches under her nightie and cups his hands around her solid, slightly gritty buttocks. He says, looking up past her breasts to her face, "The worst of it is, honey, I think he's been bleeding the company. I think he's been stealing and Lyle has been helping33 him, that's why they let Mildred go."
Her buttocks under his hands tense; he feels them squeeze together and become more spherical34, with the tension of a basket-ball a few pounds under regulation pressure. A watery35 glimmer36 of arousal winks37 below his waist. Her blurred38 eyes look down upon him with somber39 concentration, the skin of her face sagging40 down-ward from the bone. He nuzzles one breast and closes his eyes again, smelling the faintly sweaty cotton, hiding from her intent down-ward eyes. Her voice asks, "What evidence do you have?"
This irritates him. She is dumb. "That's what I was saying. I asked to look at the accounts and bank statements today and they wouldn't let me, unless you authorized it. All you have to do is call up this Lyle."
He hears in her chest a curious stillness, and feels in her body a tension of restraint. Her nightie is transparent41 but she is opaque42. "If you did see these figures," she asks, "would you know enough to understand them?"
He flicks43 her nipple with his tongue through the cotton. The glimmer below has grown to a steady glow, a swelling44 warmth. "Maybe not altogether," he says. "But even the monthly statements we got in Florida didn't look quite right to me. I'd take Mildred with me, and if she's too far gone ? he said she's senile and over at Dengler's ? I think we should hire somebody, a professional accountant in Brewer45. You could call our lawyer for who he'd recommend. This may be something we have to bring the cops in on eventually." A nice April shower has started up outdoors, kindled46 by the slow sunset.
Her body has stiffened47 and jerked back an inch. "Harry! Your own son!"
"Well," he says, irritated again, "his own mother. Stealing from his own mother."
"We don't know anything for sure," Janice tells him. "It's only your theory."
"What else could Lyle have been hiding today? Now they'll have the wind up so we should start moving or they'll shred48 everything like Ollie North."
Now Janice is getting agitated49, backing out ofhis arms and rubbing the back of one hand with the other, standing50 in the center of the carpet. He sees that the sex isn't going to happen, the first time in weeks he's really had the urge. Damn that Nelson. She says, "I think I should talk to Nelson first."
"You should? Why not we?"
"According to Lyle, I'm the only one who counts."
This hurts. "You're too soft on Nelson. He can do anything he wants with you."
"Oh, Harry, it used to be so awful, that time I ran off with Charlie! Nelson was only twelve, he'd come over on his bicycle all the way into Eisenhower Avenue and he'd stand there for an hour across the street, looking up at our windows, and a couple of times I saw him and I hid, I hid behind the curtain and let him just stand there until he got exhausted51 and rode away." Staring over Harry's head, seeing her little boy across the street, so patient and puzzled and hopeful, her dark eyes fill with tears.
"Well, hell," Rabbit says, "nobody asked him to go over there spying on you. 1 was taking care of him."
"With that poor crazy girl and perfectly52 hideous53 black man you were. It's just dumb luck the house didn't bum54 down with Nelson in it too."
"I would have got him out. If I'd been there I would have got them all out."
"You don't know," she says, "you don't know what you would have done. And you don't know now what the real story is, it's all just your suspicions, somebody's been poisoning your mind against Nelson. I bet it was Thelma."
"Thelma? We never see her anymore, we ought to have the Harrisons over sometime."
"Pfaa!" She spits this refusal, he has to admire her fury, the animal way it fluffs out her hair. "Over my dead body."
"Just a thought." This is not a good topic. He reverts55: "I don't know what the real story is, but you do, huh? What has Nelson told you?"
She pinches her mouth shut so she seems to have no lips at all, like Ma Springer used to look. "Nothing really," she lies.
"Nothing really. Well O.K. then. You know more than I do. Good luck. It's you he's ripping off. It's your father's company he and his queer buddies56 are taking down the tube."
"Nelson wouldn't steal from the company."
"Honey, you don't understand the power of drugs. Read the papers. Read People, Richard Pryor tells all. Just the other day they pulled Yogi Berra's kid in. People who are into coke will kill their grandmother for a fix. It used to be heroin57 was the bottom of the barrel but crack makes heroin look mild."
"Nelson doesn't do crack. Much."
"Oh. Who says?"
She almost tells him, but gets frightened. "Nobody. I just know my own son. And from what Pru lets drop."
"Pru talks, does she? What does she say?"
"She's miserable58. And the children too. Little Roy acts very odd, you must have noticed. Judy has nightmares. Ifit weren't for the children, Pru confessed to me, she would have left Nelson long ago."
Harry feels evaded59. "Let's keep to the subject. Pru's got her problems, you've got yours. You better get your man?child out of Springer Motors fast."
"I'll talk to him, Harry. I don't want you to say a word."
"Why the fuck not? What's the fucking harm if I do?"
"You'll come on too strong. You'll drive him deeper into himself. He ? he takes you too seriously."
"But not you?"
"He's sure of me. He knows I love him."
"And I don't?" His eyes water at the thought. The shower outside has already lifted, leaving a trickle60 in the gutters61.
"You do, Harry, but there's something else too. You're another man. Men have this territorial62 thing. You think of the lot as yours. He thinks of it as his."
"It'll be his some day, if he's not in jail. I was looking at him down in Florida and there suddenly came into my mind the word criminal. Something about the shape ofhis head. I hate the way he's going bald. He'll look like Ronnie Harrison."
"Will you promise to let me talk to him and you do nothing?"
"You'll just let him weasel out." But in fact he has no desire to confront Nelson himself.
She knows this. She says, "No I won't, I promise." She stops rubbing the back of one hand with the fingers of the other and moves back toward him, flop flop, as he sits on the bed. She rests her fingers above his ears and by the short hairs there pulls him softly toward her. "I do like the way you want to defend me," she says.
He yields to her insistent63 tug64 and rests his face on her chest again. Her nightie has a damp spot on it where he diddled her nipple with his tongue. Her nipples are chewed?looking, less perfect, realer than Thelma's. Being little, Janice's tits have kept their tilt65 pretty much, that perky upward thrust through those Forties angora sweaters in the high?school halls. Through the cotton her body gives off a smell, a stirred?up smoky smell. "What's in it for me?" he asks, his mouth against the wet cloth.
"Oh, a present," she says.
"When do I get it?"
"Pretty soon."
"With the mouth?"
"We'll see." She pushes his face back from her smoky warm body and with her fingers poking66 under his jaws67 makes him look up at her. "But if you say another single word about Nelson, I'll stop, and you won't get any present."
His face feels hot and his heart is racing68 but in a steady sweet way, contained in his rib69 cage the way his hard?on is contained in his pants, sweetly packed with blood; he is pleased that the Vasotec may make him lightheaded but leaves him enough blood pressure for one of these unscheduled, once in a while. "O.K., not a word," Rabbit promises, becoming efficient. "I'll quick go to the bathroom and brush my teeth and stuff and you turn off the lights. And somebody ought to take the phone off the hook. Downstairs, so we don't hear the squawking."
收听单词发音 |
1
sodium
|
|
| n.（化）钠 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
pouches
|
|
| n.（放在衣袋里或连在腰带上的）小袋( pouch的名词复数 )；（袋鼠等的）育儿袋；邮袋；（某些动物贮存食物的）颊袋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
verity
|
|
| n.真实性 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
licensing
|
|
| v.批准，许可，颁发执照( license的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
salesperson
|
|
| n.售货员，营业员，店员 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
broker
|
|
| n.中间人，经纪人；v.作为中间人来安排 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
gist
|
|
| n.要旨；梗概 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
license
|
|
| n.执照，许可证，特许；v.许可，特许 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
strictly
|
|
| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
den
|
|
| n.兽穴；秘密地方；安静的小房间，私室 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
aged
|
|
| adj.年老的，陈年的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
harry
|
|
| vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
jeopardy
|
|
| n.危险；危难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
seeps
|
|
| n.（液体）渗( seep的名词复数 )；渗透；渗出；漏出v.（液体）渗( seep的第三人称单数 )；渗透；渗出；漏出 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
quelling
|
|
| v.（用武力）制止，结束，镇压( quell的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
tinge
|
|
| vt.(较淡)着色于，染色；使带有…气息；n.淡淡色彩，些微的气息 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
crimson
|
|
| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
pane
|
|
| n.窗格玻璃，长方块 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
flop
|
|
| n.失败(者)，扑通一声；vi.笨重地行动，沉重地落下 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
gnawing
|
|
| a.痛苦的，折磨人的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
elastic
|
|
| n.橡皮圈，松紧带；adj.有弹性的；灵活的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
incessant
|
|
| adj.不停的，连续的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
skidding
|
|
| n.曳出，集材v.（通常指车辆） 侧滑( skid的现在分词 )；打滑；滑行；（住在）贫民区 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
scant
|
|
| adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
authorized
|
|
| a.委任的，许可的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
cocaine
|
|
| n.可卡因，古柯碱（用作局部麻醉剂） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
salmon
|
|
| n.鲑，大马哈鱼，橙红色的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
suede
|
|
| n.表面粗糙的软皮革 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
underneath
|
|
| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
determined
|
|
| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
hips
|
|
| abbr.high impact polystyrene 高冲击强度聚苯乙烯，耐冲性聚苯乙烯n.臀部( hip的名词复数 )；[建筑学]屋脊；臀围（尺寸）；臀部…的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
helping
|
|
| n.食物的一份&adj.帮助人的，辅助的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
spherical
|
|
| adj.球形的；球面的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
watery
|
|
| adj.有水的，水汪汪的；湿的，湿润的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
glimmer
|
|
| v.发出闪烁的微光；n.微光，微弱的闪光 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
winks
|
|
| v.使眼色( wink的第三人称单数 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
blurred
|
|
| v.（使）变模糊( blur的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）难以区分；模模糊糊；迷离 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
somber
|
|
| adj.昏暗的，阴天的，阴森的，忧郁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
sagging
|
|
| 下垂[沉，陷]，松垂，垂度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
transparent
|
|
| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
opaque
|
|
| adj.不透光的；不反光的，不传导的；晦涩的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
flicks
|
|
| （尤指用手指或手快速地）轻击( flick的第三人称单数 )； （用…）轻挥； （快速地）按开关； 向…笑了一下（或瞥了一眼等） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
swelling
|
|
| n.肿胀 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
brewer
|
|
| n. 啤酒制造者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
kindled
|
|
| （使某物）燃烧，着火( kindle的过去式和过去分词 )； 激起（感情等）； 发亮，放光 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
stiffened
|
|
| 加强的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
shred
|
|
| v.撕成碎片，变成碎片；n.碎布条，细片，些少 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
agitated
|
|
| adj.被鼓动的，不安的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
exhausted
|
|
| adj.极其疲惫的，精疲力尽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
hideous
|
|
| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
bum
|
|
| n.臀部；流浪汉，乞丐；vt.乞求，乞讨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
reverts
|
|
| 恢复( revert的第三人称单数 )； 重提； 回到…上； 归还 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
buddies
|
|
| n.密友( buddy的名词复数 )；同伴；弟兄；（用于称呼男子，常带怒气）家伙v.（如密友、战友、伙伴、弟兄般）交往( buddy的第三人称单数 )；做朋友；亲近（…）；伴护艾滋病人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
heroin
|
|
| n.海洛因 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
miserable
|
|
| adj.悲惨的，痛苦的；可怜的，糟糕的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
evaded
|
|
| 逃避( evade的过去式和过去分词 )； 避开； 回避； 想不出 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
trickle
|
|
| vi.淌，滴，流出，慢慢移动，逐渐消散 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
gutters
|
|
| （路边）排水沟( gutter的名词复数 )； 阴沟； （屋顶的）天沟； 贫贱的境地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
territorial
|
|
| adj.领土的，领地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
insistent
|
|
| adj.迫切的，坚持的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
tug
|
|
| v.用力拖(或拉)；苦干；n.拖；苦干；拖船 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
tilt
|
|
| v.(使)倾侧；(使)倾斜；n.倾侧；倾斜 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
poking
|
|
| n. 刺，戳，袋 vt. 拨开，刺，戳 vi. 戳，刺，捅，搜索，伸出，行动散慢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
jaws
|
|
| n.口部；嘴 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
racing
|
|
| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
rib
|
|
| n.肋骨，肋状物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |