And Graham wondered if this surrounding of herself by many people was not deliberate on Paula’s part. As for himself, he definitely abandoned work on his book, and joined in the before-breakfast swims of the hardier5 younger folk, in the morning rides over the ranch6, and in whatever fun was afoot indoors and out.
Late hours and early were kept; and one night, Dick, who adhered to his routine and never appeared to his guests before midday, made a night of it at poker7 in the stag-room. Graham had sat in, and felt well repaid when, at dawn, the players received an unexpected visit from Paula—herself past one of her white nights, she said, although no sign of it showed on her fresh skin and color. Graham had to struggle to keep his eyes from straying too frequently to her as she mixed golden fizzes to rejuvenate8 the wan-eyed, jaded9 players. Then she made them start the round of “jacks” that closed the game, and sent them off for a cold swim before breakfast and the day’s work or frolic.
Never was Paula alone. Graham could only join in the groups that were always about her. Although the young people ragged10 and tangoed incessantly11, she rarely danced, and then it was with the young men. Once, however, she favored him with an old-fashioned waltz. “Your ancestors in an antediluvian12 dance,” she mocked the young people, as she stepped out; for she and Graham had the floor to themselves.
Once down the length of the room, the two were in full accord. Paula, with the sympathy Graham recognized that made her the exceptional accompanist or rider, subdued13 herself to the masterful art of the man, until the two were as parts of a sentient14 machine that operated without jar or friction15. After several minutes, finding their perfect mutual16 step and pace, and Graham feeling the absolute giving of Paula to the dance, they essayed rhythmical17 pauses and dips, their feet never leaving the floor, yet affecting the onlookers18 in the way Dick voiced it when he cried out: “They float! They float!” The music was the “Waltz of Salomé,” and with its slow-fading end they postured19 slower and slower to a perfect close.
There was no need to speak. In silence, without a glance at each other, they returned to the company where Dick was proclaiming:
“Well, younglings, codlings, and other fry, that’s the way we old folks used to dance. I’m not saying anything against the new dances, mind you. They’re all right and dandy fine. But just the same it wouldn’t injure you much to learn to waltz properly. The way you waltz, when you do attempt it, is a scream. We old folks do know a thing or two that is worth while.”
“I’ll tell you. I don’t mind the young generation smelling of gasoline the way it does—”
Cries and protests drowned Dick out for a moment.
“I know I smell of it myself,” he went on. “But you’ve all failed to learn the good old modes of locomotion21. There isn’t a girl of you that Paula can’t walk into the ground. There isn’t a fellow of you that Graham and I can’t walk into a receiving hospital.—Oh, I know you can all crank engines and shift gears to the queen’s taste. But there isn’t one of you that can properly ride a horse—a real horse, in the only way, I mean. As for driving a smart pair of roadsters, it’s a screech22. And how many of you husky lads, hell-scooting on the bay in your speed-boats, can take the wheel of an old-time sloop23 or schooner24, without an auxiliary25, and get out of your own way in her?”
“But we get there just the same,” the same girl retorted.
“And I don’t deny it,” Dick answered. “But you are not always pretty. I’ll tell you a pretty sight that no one of you can ever present— Paula, there, with the reins26 of four slashing27 horses in her hands, her foot on the brake, swinging tally-ho along a mountain road.”
On a warm morning, in the cool arcade28 of the great patio29, a chance group of four or five, among whom was Paula, formed about Graham, who had been reading alone. After a time he returned to his magazine with such absorption that he forgot those about him until an awareness30 of silence penetrated31 to his consciousness. He looked up. All the others save Paula had strayed off. He could hear their distant laughter from across the patio. But Paula! He surprised the look on her face, in her eyes. It was a look bent32 on him, concerning him. Doubt, speculation33, almost fear, were in her eyes; and yet, in that swift instant, he had time to note that it was a look deep and searching—almost, his quick fancy prompted, the look of one peering into the just-opened book of fate. Her eyes fluttered and fell, and the color increased in her cheeks in an unmistakable blush. Twice her lips moved to the verge34 of speech; yet, caught so arrantly35 in the act, she was unable to phrase any passing thought. Graham saved the painful situation by saying casually36:
“Do you know, I’ve just been reading De Vries’ eulogy37 of Luther Burbank’s work, and it seems to me that Dick is to the domestic animal world what Burbank is to the domestic vegetable world. You are life-makers here—thumbing the stuff into new forms of utility and beauty.”
Paula, by this time herself again, laughed and accepted the compliment.
“I fear me,” Graham continued with easy seriousness, “as I watch your achievements, that I can only look back on a misspent life. Why didn’t I get in and make things? I’m horribly envious38 of both of you.”
“We are responsible for a dreadful lot of creatures being born,” she said. “It makes one breathless to think of the responsibility.”
“The ranch certainly spells fecundity,” Graham smiled. “I never before was so impressed with the flowering and fruiting of life. Everything here prospers39 and multiplies—”
“Oh!” Paula cried, breaking in with a sudden thought. “Some day I’ll show you my goldfish. I breed them, too—yea, and commercially. I supply the San Francisco dealers40 with their rarest strains, and I even ship to New York. And, best of all, I actually make money—profits, I mean. Dick’s books show it, and he is the most rigid41 of bookkeepers. There isn’t a tack-hammer on the place that isn’t inventoried42; nor a horse-shoe nail unaccounted for. That’s why he has such a staff of bookkeepers. Why, do you know, calculating every last least item of expense, including average loss of time for colic and lameness43, out of fearfully endless columns of figures he has worked the cost of an hour’s labor44 for a draught45 horse to the third decimal place.”
“Well, Dick makes his bookkeepers keep track of my goldfish in the same way. I’m charged every hour of any of the ranch or house labor I use on the fish—postage stamps and stationery47, too, if you please. I have to pay interest on the plant. He even charges me for the water, just as if he were a city water company and I a householder. And still I net ten per cent., and have netted as high as thirty. But Dick laughs and says when I’ve deducted48 the wages of superintendence—my superintendence, he means—that I’ll find I am poorly paid or else am operating at a loss; that with my net I couldn’t hire so capable a superintendent49.
“Just the same, that’s why Dick succeeds in his undertakings50. Unless it’s sheer experiment, he never does anything without knowing precisely51, to the last microscopic52 detail, what it is he is doing.”
“He is very sure,” Graham observed.
“I never knew a man to be so sure of himself,” Paula replied warmly; “and I never knew a man with half the warrant. I know him. He is a genius—but only in the most paradoxical sense. He is a genius because he is so balanced and normal that he hasn’t the slightest particle of genius in him. Such men are rarer and greater than geniuses. I like to think of Abraham Lincoln as such a type.”
“I must admit I don’t quite get you,” Graham said.
“Oh, I don’t dare to say that Dick is as good, as cosmically good, as Lincoln,” she hurried on. “Dick is good, but it is not that. It is in their excessive balance, normality, lack of flare53, that they are of the same type. Now I am a genius. For, see, I do things without knowing how I do them. I just do them. I get effects in my music that way. Take my diving. To save my life I couldn’t tell how I swan-dive, or jump, or do the turn and a half.
“Dick, on the other hand, can’t do anything unless he clearly knows in advance how he is going to do it. He does everything with balance and foresight54. He’s a general, all-around wonder, without ever having been a particular wonder at any one thing.—Oh, I know him. He’s never been a champion or a record-breaker in any line of athletics55. Nor has he been mediocre56 in any line. And so with everything else, mentally, intellectually. He is an evenly forged chain. He has no massive links, no weak links.”
“I’m afraid I’m like you,” Graham said, “that commoner and lesser57 creature, a genius. For I, too, on occasion, flare and do the most unintentional things. And I am not above falling on my knees before mystery.”
“And Dick hates mystery—or it would seem he does. Not content with knowing how—he is eternally seeking the why of the how. Mystery is a challenge to him. It excites him like a red rag does a bull. At once he is for ripping the husks and the heart from mystery, so that he will know the how and the why, when it will be no longer mystery but a generalization58 and a scientifically demonstrable fact.”
Much of the growing situation was veiled to the three figures of it. Graham did not know of Paula’s desperate efforts to cling close to her husband, who, himself desperately59 busy with his thousand plans and projects, was seeing less and less of his company. He always appeared at lunch, but it was a rare afternoon when he could go out with his guests. Paula did know, from the multiplicity of long, code telegrams from Mexico, that things were in a parlous60 state with the Harvest Group. Also, she saw the agents and emissaries of foreign investors61 in Mexico, always in haste and often inopportune, arriving at the ranch to confer with Dick. Beyond his complaint that they ate the heart out of his time, he gave her no clew to the matters discussed.
“My! I wish you weren’t so busy,” she sighed in his arms, on his knees, one fortunate morning, when, at eleven o’clock, she had caught him alone.
It was true, she had interrupted the dictation of a letter into the phonograph; and the sigh had been evoked62 by the warning cough of Bonbright, whom she saw entering with more telegrams in his hand.
“Won’t you let me drive you this afternoon, behind Duddy and Fuddy, just you and me, and cut the crowd?” she begged.
He shook his head and smiled.
“You’ll meet at lunch a weird63 combination,” he explained. “Nobody else needs to know, but I’ll tell you.” He lowered his voice, while Bonbright discreetly64 occupied himself at the filing cabinets. “They’re Tampico oil folk. Samuels himself, President of the Nacisco; and Wishaar, the big inside man of the Pearson-Brooks crowd—the chap that engineered the purchase of the East Coast railroad and the Tiuana Central when they tried to put the Nacisco out of business; and Matthewson—he’s the hi-yu-skookum big chief this side the Atlantic of the Palmerston interests—you know, the English crowd that fought the Nacisco and the Pearson-Brooks bunch so hard; and, oh, there’ll be several others. It shows you that things are rickety down Mexico way when such a bunch stops scrapping65 and gets together.
“You see, they are oil, and I’m important in my way down there, and they want me to swing the mining interests in with the oil. Truly, big things are in the air, and we’ve got to hang together and do something or get out of Mexico. And I’ll admit, after they gave me the turn-down in the trouble three years ago, that I’ve sulked in my tent and made them come to see me.”
He caressed66 her and called her his armful of dearest woman, although she detected his eye roving impatiently to the phonograph with its unfinished letter.
“And so,” he concluded, with a pressure of his arms about her that seemed to hint that her moment with him was over and she must go, “that means the afternoon. None will stop over. And they’ll be off and away before dinner.”
She slipped off his knees and out of his arms with unusual abruptness68, and stood straight up before him, her eyes flashing, her cheeks white, her face set with determination, as if about to say something of grave importance. But a bell tinkled69 softly, and he reached for the desk telephone.
Paula drooped70, and sighed inaudibly, and, as she went down the room and out the door, and as Bonbright stepped eagerly forward with the telegrams, she could hear the beginning of her husband’s conversation:
“No. It is impossible. He’s got to come through, or I’ll put him out of business. That gentleman’s agreement is all poppycock. If it were only that, of course he could break it. But I’ve got some mighty71 interesting correspondence that he’s forgotten about.... Yes, yes; it will clinch72 it in any court of law. I’ll have the file in your office by five this afternoon. And tell him, for me, that if he tries to put through this trick, I’ll break him. I’ll put a competing line on, and his steamboats will be in the receiver’s hands inside a year.... And... hello, are you there?... And just look up that point I suggested. I am rather convinced you’ll find the Interstate Commerce has got him on two counts....”
Nor did Graham, nor even Paula, imagine that Dick—the keen one, the deep one, who could see and sense things yet to occur and out of intangible nuances and glimmerings build shrewd speculations74 and hypotheses that subsequent events often proved correct—was already sensing what had not happened but what might happen. He had not heard Paula’s brief significant words at the hitching75 post; nor had he seen Graham catch her in that deep scrutiny76 of him under the arcade. Dick had heard nothing, seen little, but sensed much; and, even in advance of Paula, had he apprehended78 in vague ways what she afterward79 had come to apprehend77.
The most tangible73 thing he had to build on was the night, immersed in bridge, when he had not been unaware80 of the abrupt67 leaving of the piano after the singing of the “Gypsy Trail”; nor when, in careless smiling greeting of them when they came down the room to devil him over his losing, had he failed to receive a hint or feeling of something unusual in Paula’s roguish teasing face. On the moment, laughing retorts, giving as good as she sent, Dick’s own laughing eyes had swept over Graham beside her and likewise detected the unusual. The man was overstrung, had been Dick’s mental note at the time. But why should he be overstrung? Was there any connection between his overstrungness and the sudden desertion by Paula of the piano? And all the while these questions were slipping through his thoughts, he had laughed at their sallies, dealt, sorted his hand, and won the bid on no trumps81.
Yet to himself he had continued to discount as absurd and preposterous82 the possibility of his vague apprehension83 ever being realized. It was a chance guess, a silly speculation, based upon the most trivial data, he sagely84 concluded. It merely connoted the attractiveness of his wife and of his friend. But—and on occasional moments he could not will the thought from coming uppermost in his mind—why had they broken off from singing that evening? Why had he received the feeling that there was something unusual about it? Why had Graham been overstrung?
Nor did Bonbright, one morning, taking dictation of a telegram in the last hour before noon, know that Dick’s casual sauntering to the window, still dictating85, had been caused by the faint sound of hoofs86 on the driveway. It was not the first of recent mornings that Dick had so sauntered to the window, to glance out with apparent absentness at the rush of the morning riding party in the last dash home to the hitching rails. But he knew, on this morning, before the first figures came in sight whose those figures would be.
“Braxton is safe,” he went on with the dictation without change of tone, his eyes on the road where the riders must first come into view. “If things break he can get out across the mountains into Arizona. See Connors immediately. Braxton left Connors complete instructions. Connors to-morrow in Washington. Give me fullest details any move— signed.”
Up the driveway the Fawn87 and Altadena clattered88 neck and neck. Dick had not been disappointed in the figures he expected to see. From the rear, cries and laughter and the sound of many hoofs tokened that the rest of the party was close behind.
“And the next one, Mr. Bonbright, please put in the Harvest code,” Dick went on steadily89, while to himself he was commenting that Graham was a passable rider but not an excellent one, and that it would have to be seen to that he was given a heavier horse than Altadena. “It is to Jeremy Braxton. Send it both ways. There is a chance one or the other may get through...”
点击收听单词发音
1 limousine | |
n.豪华轿车 | |
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2 bevies | |
n.(尤指少女或妇女的)一群( bevy的名词复数 );(鸟类的)一群 | |
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3 inevitable | |
adj.不可避免的,必然发生的 | |
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4 clutter | |
n.零乱,杂乱;vt.弄乱,把…弄得杂乱 | |
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5 hardier | |
能吃苦耐劳的,坚强的( hardy的比较级 ); (植物等)耐寒的 | |
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6 ranch | |
n.大牧场,大农场 | |
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7 poker | |
n.扑克;vt.烙制 | |
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8 rejuvenate | |
v.(使)返老还童;(使)恢复活力 | |
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9 jaded | |
adj.精疲力竭的;厌倦的;(因过饱或过多而)腻烦的;迟钝的 | |
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10 ragged | |
adj.衣衫褴褛的,粗糙的,刺耳的 | |
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11 incessantly | |
ad.不停地 | |
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12 antediluvian | |
adj.史前的,陈旧的 | |
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13 subdued | |
adj. 屈服的,柔和的,减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
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14 sentient | |
adj.有知觉的,知悉的;adv.有感觉能力地 | |
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15 friction | |
n.摩擦,摩擦力 | |
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16 mutual | |
adj.相互的,彼此的;共同的,共有的 | |
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17 rhythmical | |
adj.有节奏的,有韵律的 | |
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18 onlookers | |
n.旁观者,观看者( onlooker的名词复数 ) | |
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19 postured | |
做出某种姿势( posture的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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20 queried | |
v.质疑,对…表示疑问( query的过去式和过去分词 );询问 | |
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21 locomotion | |
n.运动,移动 | |
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22 screech | |
n./v.尖叫;(发出)刺耳的声音 | |
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23 sloop | |
n.单桅帆船 | |
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24 schooner | |
n.纵帆船 | |
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25 auxiliary | |
adj.辅助的,备用的 | |
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26 reins | |
感情,激情; 缰( rein的名词复数 ); 控制手段; 掌管; (成人带着幼儿走路以防其走失时用的)保护带 | |
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27 slashing | |
adj.尖锐的;苛刻的;鲜明的;乱砍的v.挥砍( slash的现在分词 );鞭打;割破;削减 | |
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28 arcade | |
n.拱廊;(一侧或两侧有商店的)通道 | |
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29 patio | |
n.庭院,平台 | |
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30 awareness | |
n.意识,觉悟,懂事,明智 | |
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31 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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32 bent | |
n.爱好,癖好;adj.弯的;决心的,一心的 | |
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33 speculation | |
n.思索,沉思;猜测;投机 | |
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34 verge | |
n.边,边缘;v.接近,濒临 | |
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35 arrantly | |
adv.声名狼籍地,众目昭彰地 | |
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36 casually | |
adv.漠不关心地,无动于衷地,不负责任地 | |
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37 eulogy | |
n.颂词;颂扬 | |
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38 envious | |
adj.嫉妒的,羡慕的 | |
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39 prospers | |
v.成功,兴旺( prosper的第三人称单数 ) | |
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40 dealers | |
n.商人( dealer的名词复数 );贩毒者;毒品贩子;发牌者 | |
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41 rigid | |
adj.严格的,死板的;刚硬的,僵硬的 | |
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42 inventoried | |
vt.编制…的目录(inventory的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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43 lameness | |
n. 跛, 瘸, 残废 | |
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44 labor | |
n.劳动,努力,工作,劳工;分娩;vi.劳动,努力,苦干;vt.详细分析;麻烦 | |
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45 draught | |
n.拉,牵引,拖;一网(饮,吸,阵);顿服药量,通风;v.起草,设计 | |
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46 dwelling | |
n.住宅,住所,寓所 | |
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47 stationery | |
n.文具;(配套的)信笺信封 | |
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48 deducted | |
v.扣除,减去( deduct的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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49 superintendent | |
n.监督人,主管,总监;(英国)警务长 | |
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50 undertakings | |
企业( undertaking的名词复数 ); 保证; 殡仪业; 任务 | |
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51 precisely | |
adv.恰好,正好,精确地,细致地 | |
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52 microscopic | |
adj.微小的,细微的,极小的,显微的 | |
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53 flare | |
v.闪耀,闪烁;n.潮红;突发 | |
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54 foresight | |
n.先见之明,深谋远虑 | |
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55 athletics | |
n.运动,体育,田径运动 | |
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56 mediocre | |
adj.平常的,普通的 | |
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57 lesser | |
adj.次要的,较小的;adv.较小地,较少地 | |
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58 generalization | |
n.普遍性,一般性,概括 | |
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59 desperately | |
adv.极度渴望地,绝望地,孤注一掷地 | |
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60 parlous | |
adj.危险的,不确定的,难对付的 | |
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61 investors | |
n.投资者,出资者( investor的名词复数 ) | |
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62 evoked | |
[医]诱发的 | |
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63 weird | |
adj.古怪的,离奇的;怪诞的,神秘而可怕的 | |
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64 discreetly | |
ad.(言行)审慎地,慎重地 | |
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65 scrapping | |
刮,切除坯体余泥 | |
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66 caressed | |
爱抚或抚摸…( caress的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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67 abrupt | |
adj.突然的,意外的;唐突的,鲁莽的 | |
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68 abruptness | |
n. 突然,唐突 | |
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69 tinkled | |
(使)发出丁当声,(使)发铃铃声( tinkle的过去式和过去分词 ); 叮当响着发出,铃铃响着报出 | |
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70 drooped | |
弯曲或下垂,发蔫( droop的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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71 mighty | |
adj.强有力的;巨大的 | |
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72 clinch | |
v.敲弯,钉牢;确定;扭住对方 [参]clench | |
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73 tangible | |
adj.有形的,可触摸的,确凿的,实际的 | |
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74 speculations | |
n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 );思考;投机活动;推断 | |
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75 hitching | |
搭乘; (免费)搭乘他人之车( hitch的现在分词 ); 搭便车; 攀上; 跃上 | |
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76 scrutiny | |
n.详细检查,仔细观察 | |
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77 apprehend | |
vt.理解,领悟,逮捕,拘捕,忧虑 | |
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78 apprehended | |
逮捕,拘押( apprehend的过去式和过去分词 ); 理解 | |
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79 afterward | |
adv.后来;以后 | |
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80 unaware | |
a.不知道的,未意识到的 | |
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81 trumps | |
abbr.trumpets 喇叭;小号;喇叭形状的东西;喇叭筒v.(牌戏)出王牌赢(一牌或一墩)( trump的过去式 );吹号公告,吹号庆祝;吹喇叭;捏造 | |
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82 preposterous | |
adj.荒谬的,可笑的 | |
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83 apprehension | |
n.理解,领悟;逮捕,拘捕;忧虑 | |
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84 sagely | |
adv. 贤能地,贤明地 | |
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85 dictating | |
v.大声讲或读( dictate的现在分词 );口授;支配;摆布 | |
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86 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 ) | |
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87 fawn | |
n.未满周岁的小鹿;v.巴结,奉承 | |
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88 clattered | |
发出咔哒声(clatter的过去式与过去分词形式) | |
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89 steadily | |
adv.稳定地;不变地;持续地 | |
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