Dr Hood paced the length of his string of apartments, bounded—as the boys’ geographies say—on the east by the North Sea and on the west by the serried12 ranks of his sociological and criminologist library. He was clad in an artist’s velvet13, but with none of an artist’s negligence14; his hair was heavily shot with grey, but growing thick and healthy; his face was lean, but sanguine15 and expectant. Everything about him and his room indicated something at once rigid16 and restless, like that great northern sea by which (on pure principles of hygiene) he had built his home.
Fate, being in a funny mood, pushed the door open and introduced into those long, strict, sea-flanked apartments one who was perhaps the most startling opposite of them and their master. In answer to a curt17 but civil summons, the door opened inwards and there shambled into the room a shapeless little figure, which seemed to find its own hat and umbrella as unmanageable as a mass of luggage. The umbrella was a black and prosaic18 bundle long past repair; the hat was a broad-curved black hat, clerical but not common in England; the man was the very embodiment of all that is homely19 and helpless.
The doctor regarded the new-comer with a restrained astonishment20, not unlike that he would have shown if some huge but obviously harmless sea-beast had crawled into his room. The new-comer regarded the doctor with that beaming but breathless geniality21 which characterizes a corpulent charwoman who has just managed to stuff herself into an omnibus. It is a rich confusion of social self-congratulation and bodily disarray22. His hat tumbled to the carpet, his heavy umbrella slipped between his knees with a thud; he reached after the one and ducked after the other, but with an unimpaired smile on his round face spoke23 simultaneously24 as follows:
“My name is Brown. Pray excuse me. I’ve come about that business of the MacNabs. I have heard, you often help people out of such troubles. Pray excuse me if I am wrong.”
By this time he had sprawlingly25 recovered the hat, and made an odd little bobbing bow over it, as if setting everything quite right.
“I hardly understand you,” replied the scientist, with a cold intensity26 of manner. “I fear you have mistaken the chambers. I am Dr Hood, and my work is almost entirely27 literary and educational. It is true that I have sometimes been consulted by the police in cases of peculiar28 difficulty and importance, but—”
“Oh, this is of the greatest importance,” broke in the little man called Brown. “Why, her mother won’t let them get engaged.” And he leaned back in his chair in radiant rationality.
The brows of Dr Hood were drawn29 down darkly, but the eyes under them were bright with something that might be anger or might be amusement. “And still,” he said, “I do not quite understand.”
“You see, they want to get married,” said the man with the clerical hat. “Maggie MacNab and young Todhunter want to get married. Now, what can be more important than that?”
The great Orion Hood’s scientific triumphs had deprived him of many things—some said of his health, others of his God; but they had not wholly despoiled30 him of his sense of the absurd. At the last plea of the ingenuous31 priest a chuckle32 broke out of him from inside, and he threw himself into an arm-chair in an ironical33 attitude of the consulting physician.
“Mr Brown,” he said gravely, “it is quite fourteen and a half years since I was personally asked to test a personal problem: then it was the case of an attempt to poison the French President at a Lord Mayor’s Banquet. It is now, I understand, a question of whether some friend of yours called Maggie is a suitable fiancee for some friend of hers called Todhunter. Well, Mr Brown, I am a sportsman. I will take it on. I will give the MacNab family my best advice, as good as I gave the French Republic and the King of England—no, better: fourteen years better. I have nothing else to do this afternoon. Tell me your story.”
The little clergyman called Brown thanked him with unquestionable warmth, but still with a queer kind of simplicity34. It was rather as if he were thanking a stranger in a smoking-room for some trouble in passing the matches, than as if he were (as he was) practically thanking the Curator of Kew Gardens for coming with him into a field to find a four-leaved clover. With scarcely a semi-colon after his hearty35 thanks, the little man began his recital36:
“I told you my name was Brown; well, that’s the fact, and I’m the priest of the little Catholic Church I dare say you’ve seen beyond those straggly streets, where the town ends towards the north. In the last and straggliest of those streets which runs along the sea like a sea-wall there is a very honest but rather sharp-tempered member of my flock, a widow called MacNab. She has one daughter, and she lets lodgings37, and between her and the daughter, and between her and the lodgers—well, I dare say there is a great deal to be said on both sides. At present she has only one lodger38, the young man called Todhunter; but he has given more trouble than all the rest, for he wants to marry the young woman of the house.”
“And the young woman of the house,” asked Dr Hood, with huge and silent amusement, “what does she want?”
“Why, she wants to marry him,” cried Father Brown, sitting up eagerly. “That is just the awful complication.”
“This young James Todhunter,” continued the cleric, “is a very decent man so far as I know; but then nobody knows very much. He is a bright, brownish little fellow, agile40 like a monkey, clean-shaven like an actor, and obliging like a born courtier. He seems to have quite a pocketful of money, but nobody knows what his trade is. Mrs MacNab, therefore (being of a pessimistic turn), is quite sure it is something dreadful, and probably connected with dynamite41. The dynamite must be of a shy and noiseless sort, for the poor fellow only shuts himself up for several hours of the day and studies something behind a locked door. He declares his privacy is temporary and justified42, and promises to explain before the wedding. That is all that anyone knows for certain, but Mrs MacNab will tell you a great deal more than even she is certain of. You know how the tales grow like grass on such a patch of ignorance as that. There are tales of two voices heard talking in the room; though, when the door is opened, Todhunter is always found alone. There are tales of a mysterious tall man in a silk hat, who once came out of the sea-mists and apparently43 out of the sea, stepping softly across the sandy fields and through the small back garden at twilight44, till he was heard talking to the lodger at his open window. The colloquy45 seemed to end in a quarrel. Todhunter dashed down his window with violence, and the man in the high hat melted into the sea-fog again. This story is told by the family with the fiercest mystification; but I really think Mrs MacNab prefers her own original tale: that the Other Man (or whatever it is) crawls out every night from the big box in the corner, which is kept locked all day. You see, therefore, how this sealed door of Todhunter’s is treated as the gate of all the fancies and monstrosities of the ‘Thousand and One Nights’. And yet there is the little fellow in his respectable black jacket, as punctual and innocent as a parlour clock. He pays his rent to the tick; he is practically a teetotaller; he is tirelessly kind with the younger children, and can keep them amused for a day on end; and, last and most urgent of all, he has made himself equally popular with the eldest46 daughter, who is ready to go to church with him tomorrow.”
A man warmly concerned with any large theories has always a relish47 for applying them to any triviality. The great specialist having condescended48 to the priest’s simplicity, condescended expansively. He settled himself with comfort in his arm-chair and began to talk in the tone of a somewhat absent-minded lecturer:
“Even in a minute instance, it is best to look first to the main tendencies of Nature. A particular flower may not be dead in early winter, but the flowers are dying; a particular pebble49 may never be wetted with the tide, but the tide is coming in. To the scientific eye all human history is a series of collective movements, destructions or migrations50, like the massacre51 of flies in winter or the return of birds in spring. Now the root fact in all history is Race. Race produces religion; Race produces legal and ethical52 wars. There is no stronger case than that of the wild, unworldly and perishing stock which we commonly call the Celts, of whom your friends the MacNabs are specimens53. Small, swarthy, and of this dreamy and drifting blood, they accept easily the superstitious54 explanation of any incidents, just as they still accept (you will excuse me for saying) that superstitious explanation of all incidents which you and your Church represent. It is not remarkable55 that such people, with the sea moaning behind them and the Church (excuse me again) droning in front of them, should put fantastic features into what are probably plain events. You, with your small parochial responsibilities, see only this particular Mrs MacNab, terrified with this particular tale of two voices and a tall man out of the sea. But the man with the scientific imagination sees, as it were, the whole clans56 of MacNab scattered57 over the whole world, in its ultimate average as uniform as a tribe of birds. He sees thousands of Mrs MacNabs, in thousands of houses, dropping their little drop of morbidity58 in the tea-cups of their friends; he sees—”
Before the scientist could conclude his sentence, another and more impatient summons sounded from without; someone with swishing skirts was marshalled hurriedly down the corridor, and the door opened on a young girl, decently dressed but disordered and red-hot with haste. She had sea-blown blonde hair, and would have been entirely beautiful if her cheek-bones had not been, in the Scotch60 manner, a little high in relief as well as in colour. Her apology was almost as abrupt61 as a command.
“I’m sorry to interrupt you, sir,” she said, “but I had to follow Father Brown at once; it’s nothing less than life or death.”
“James has been murdered, for all I can make out,” answered the girl, still breathing hard from her rush. “That man Glass has been with him again; I heard them talking through the door quite plain. Two separate voices: for James speaks low, with a burr, and the other voice was high and quavery.”
“That man Glass?” repeated the priest in some perplexity.
“I know his name is Glass,” answered the girl, in great impatience62. “I heard it through the door. They were quarrelling—about money, I think—for I heard James say again and again, ‘That’s right, Mr Glass,’ or ‘No, Mr Glass,’ and then, ‘Two or three, Mr Glass.’ But we’re talking too much; you must come at once, and there may be time yet.”
“But time for what?” asked Dr Hood, who had been studying the young lady with marked interest. “What is there about Mr Glass and his money troubles that should impel63 such urgency?”
“I tried to break down the door and couldn’t,” answered the girl shortly, “Then I ran to the back-yard, and managed to climb on to the window-sill that looks into the room. It was all dim, and seemed to be empty, but I swear I saw James lying huddled64 up in a corner, as if he were drugged or strangled.”
“This is very serious,” said Father Brown, gathering65 his errant hat and umbrella and standing66 up; “in point of fact I was just putting your case before this gentleman, and his view—”
“Has been largely altered,” said the scientist gravely. “I do not think this young lady is so Celtic as I had supposed. As I have nothing else to do, I will put on my hat and stroll down town with you.”
In a few minutes all three were approaching the dreary67 tail of the MacNabs’ street: the girl with the stern and breathless stride of the mountaineer, the criminologist with a lounging grace (which was not without a certain leopard-like swiftness), and the priest at an energetic trot68 entirely devoid69 of distinction. The aspect of this edge of the town was not entirely without justification70 for the doctor’s hints about desolate71 moods and environments. The scattered houses stood farther and farther apart in a broken string along the seashore; the afternoon was closing with a premature72 and partly lurid73 twilight; the sea was of an inky purple and murmuring ominously74. In the scrappy back garden of the MacNabs which ran down towards the sand, two black, barren-looking trees stood up like demon75 hands held up in astonishment, and as Mrs MacNab ran down the street to meet them with lean hands similarly spread, and her fierce face in shadow, she was a little like a demon herself. The doctor and the priest made scant76 reply to her shrill77 reiterations of her daughter’s story, with more disturbing details of her own, to the divided vows78 of vengeance79 against Mr Glass for murdering, and against Mr Todhunter for being murdered, or against the latter for having dared to want to marry her daughter, and for not having lived to do it. They passed through the narrow passage in the front of the house until they came to the lodger’s door at the back, and there Dr Hood, with the trick of an old detective, put his shoulder sharply to the panel and burst in the door.
It opened on a scene of silent catastrophe80. No one seeing it, even for a flash, could doubt that the room had been the theatre of some thrilling collision between two, or perhaps more, persons. Playing-cards lay littered across the table or fluttered about the floor as if a game had been interrupted. Two wine glasses stood ready for wine on a side-table, but a third lay smashed in a star of crystal upon the carpet. A few feet from it lay what looked like a long knife or short sword, straight, but with an ornamental81 and pictured handle, its dull blade just caught a grey glint from the dreary window behind, which showed the black trees against the leaden level of the sea. Towards the opposite corner of the room was rolled a gentleman’s silk top hat, as if it had just been knocked off his head; so much so, indeed, that one almost looked to see it still rolling. And in the corner behind it, thrown like a sack of potatoes, but corded like a railway trunk, lay Mr James Todhunter, with a scarf across his mouth, and six or seven ropes knotted round his elbows and ankles. His brown eyes were alive and shifted alertly.
Dr Orion Hood paused for one instant on the doormat and drank in the whole scene of voiceless violence. Then he stepped swiftly across the carpet, picked up the tall silk hat, and gravely put it upon the head of the yet pinioned82 Todhunter. It was so much too large for him that it almost slipped down on to his shoulders.
“Mr Glass’s hat,” said the doctor, returning with it and peering into the inside with a pocket lens. “How to explain the absence of Mr Glass and the presence of Mr Glass’s hat? For Mr Glass is not a careless man with his clothes. That hat is of a stylish84 shape and systematically85 brushed and burnished86, though not very new. An old dandy, I should think.”
“I say ‘old’ with intention, though not with certainty” continued the expositor; “my reason for it might seem a little far-fetched. The hair of human beings falls out in very varying degrees, but almost always falls out slightly, and with the lens I should see the tiny hairs in a hat recently worn. It has none, which leads me to guess that Mr Glass is bald. Now when this is taken with the high-pitched and querulous voice which Miss MacNab described so vividly88 (patience, my dear lady, patience), when we take the hairless head together with the tone common in senile anger, I should think we may deduce some advance in years. Nevertheless, he was probably vigorous, and he was almost certainly tall. I might rely in some degree on the story of his previous appearance at the window, as a tall man in a silk hat, but I think I have more exact indication. This wineglass has been smashed all over the place, but one of its splinters lies on the high bracket beside the mantelpiece. No such fragment could have fallen there if the vessel90 had been smashed in the hand of a comparatively short man like Mr Todhunter.”
“By the way,” said Father Brown, “might it not be as well to untie Mr Todhunter?”
“Our lesson from the drinking-vessels91 does not end here,” proceeded the specialist. “I may say at once that it is possible that the man Glass was bald or nervous through dissipation rather than age. Mr Todhunter, as has been remarked, is a quiet thrifty92 gentleman, essentially93 an abstainer94. These cards and wine-cups are no part of his normal habit; they have been produced for a particular companion. But, as it happens, we may go farther. Mr Todhunter may or may not possess this wine-service, but there is no appearance of his possessing any wine. What, then, were these vessels to contain? I would at once suggest some brandy or whisky, perhaps of a luxurious95 sort, from a flask96 in the pocket of Mr Glass. We have thus something like a picture of the man, or at least of the type: tall, elderly, fashionable, but somewhat frayed97, certainly fond of play and strong waters, perhaps rather too fond of them. Mr Glass is a gentleman not unknown on the fringes of society.”
“Look here,” cried the young woman, “if you don’t let me pass to untie him I’ll run outside and scream for the police.”
“I should not advise you, Miss MacNab,” said Dr Hood gravely, “to be in any hurry to fetch the police. Father Brown, I seriously ask you to compose your flock, for their sakes, not for mine. Well, we have seen something of the figure and quality of Mr Glass; what are the chief facts known of Mr Todhunter? They are substantially three: that he is economical, that he is more or less wealthy, and that he has a secret. Now, surely it is obvious that there are the three chief marks of the kind of man who is blackmailed99. And surely it is equally obvious that the faded finery, the profligate100 habits, and the shrill irritation101 of Mr Glass are the unmistakable marks of the kind of man who blackmails102 him. We have the two typical figures of a tragedy of hush103 money: on the one hand, the respectable man with a mystery; on the other, the West-end vulture with a scent104 for a mystery. These two men have met here today and have quarrelled, using blows and a bare weapon.”
“Are you going to take those ropes off?” asked the girl stubbornly.
Dr Hood replaced the silk hat carefully on the side table, and went across to the captive. He studied him intently, even moving him a little and half-turning him round by the shoulders, but he only answered:
“No; I think these ropes will do very well till your friends the police bring the handcuffs.”
Father Brown, who had been looking dully at the carpet, lifted his round face and said: “What do you mean?”
The man of science had picked up the peculiar dagger-sword from the carpet and was examining it intently as he answered:
“Because you find Mr Todhunter tied up,” he said, “you all jump to the conclusion that Mr Glass had tied him up; and then, I suppose, escaped. There are four objections to this: First, why should a gentleman so dressy as our friend Glass leave his hat behind him, if he left of his own free will? Second,” he continued, moving towards the window, “this is the only exit, and it is locked on the inside. Third, this blade here has a tiny touch of blood at the point, but there is no wound on Mr Todhunter. Mr Glass took that wound away with him, dead or alive. Add to all this primary probability. It is much more likely that the blackmailed person would try to kill his incubus105, rather than that the blackmailer106 would try to kill the goose that lays his golden egg. There, I think, we have a pretty complete story.”
“But the ropes?” inquired the priest, whose eyes had remained open with a rather vacant admiration107.
“Ah, the ropes,” said the expert with a singular intonation108. “Miss MacNab very much wanted to know why I did not set Mr Todhunter free from his ropes. Well, I will tell her. I did not do it because Mr Todhunter can set himself free from them at any minute he chooses.”
“What?” cried the audience on quite different notes of astonishment.
“I have looked at all the knots on Mr Todhunter,” reiterated109 Hood quietly. “I happen to know something about knots; they are quite a branch of criminal science. Every one of those knots he has made himself and could loosen himself; not one of them would have been made by an enemy really trying to pinion83 him. The whole of this affair of the ropes is a clever fake, to make us think him the victim of the struggle instead of the wretched Glass, whose corpse110 may be hidden in the garden or stuffed up the chimney.”
There was a rather depressed111 silence; the room was darkening, the sea-blighted boughs112 of the garden trees looked leaner and blacker than ever, yet they seemed to have come nearer to the window. One could almost fancy they were sea-monsters like krakens or cuttlefish113, writhing114 polypi who had crawled up from the sea to see the end of this tragedy, even as he, the villain115 and victim of it, the terrible man in the tall hat, had once crawled up from the sea. For the whole air was dense116 with the morbidity of blackmail98, which is the most morbid59 of human things, because it is a crime concealing117 a crime; a black plaster on a blacker wound.
The face of the little Catholic priest, which was commonly complacent118 and even comic, had suddenly become knotted with a curious frown. It was not the blank curiosity of his first innocence119. It was rather that creative curiosity which comes when a man has the beginnings of an idea. “Say it again, please,” he said in a simple, bothered manner; “do you mean that Todhunter can tie himself up all alone and untie himself all alone?”
“That is what I mean,” said the doctor.
“Jerusalem!” ejaculated Brown suddenly, “I wonder if it could possibly be that!”
He scuttled120 across the room rather like a rabbit, and peered with quite a new impulsiveness121 into the partially-covered face of the captive. Then he turned his own rather fatuous122 face to the company. “Yes, that’s it!” he cried in a certain excitement. “Can’t you see it in the man’s face? Why, look at his eyes!”
Both the Professor and the girl followed the direction of his glance. And though the broad black scarf completely masked the lower half of Todhunter’s visage, they did grow conscious of something struggling and intense about the upper part of it.
“His eyes do look queer,” cried the young woman, strongly moved. “You brutes123; I believe it’s hurting him!”
“Not that, I think,” said Dr Hood; “the eyes have certainly a singular expression. But I should interpret those transverse wrinkles as expressing rather such slight psychological abnormality—”
“Oh, bosh!” cried Father Brown: “can’t you see he’s laughing?”
“Laughing!” repeated the doctor, with a start; “but what on earth can he be laughing at?”
“Well,” replied the Reverend Brown apologetically, “not to put too fine a point on it, I think he is laughing at you. And indeed, I’m a little inclined to laugh at myself, now I know about it.”
“Now you know about what?” asked Hood, in some exasperation124.
“Now I know,” replied the priest, “the profession of Mr Todhunter.”
He shuffled125 about the room, looking at one object after another with what seemed to be a vacant stare, and then invariably bursting into an equally vacant laugh, a highly irritating process for those who had to watch it. He laughed very much over the hat, still more uproariously over the broken glass, but the blood on the sword point sent him into mortal convulsions of amusement. Then he turned to the fuming126 specialist.
“Dr Hood,” he cried enthusiastically, “you are a great poet! You have called an uncreated being out of the void. How much more godlike that is than if you had only ferreted out the mere127 facts! Indeed, the mere facts are rather commonplace and comic by comparison.”
“I have no notion what you are talking about,” said Dr Hood rather haughtily128; “my facts are all inevitable129, though necessarily incomplete. A place may be permitted to intuition, perhaps (or poetry if you prefer the term), but only because the corresponding details cannot as yet be ascertained130. In the absence of Mr Glass—”
“That’s it, that’s it,” said the little priest, nodding quite eagerly, “that’s the first idea to get fixed131; the absence of Mr Glass. He is so extremely absent. I suppose,” he added reflectively, “that there was never anybody so absent as Mr Glass.”
“Do you mean he is absent from the town?” demanded the doctor.
“I mean he is absent from everywhere,” answered Father Brown; “he is absent from the Nature of Things, so to speak.”
“Do you seriously mean,” said the specialist with a smile, “that there is no such person?”
Orion Hood broke into a contemptuous laugh. “Well,” he said, “before we go on to the hundred and one other evidences, let us take the first proof we found; the first fact we fell over when we fell into this room. If there is no Mr Glass, whose hat is this?”
“It is Mr Todhunter’s,” replied Father Brown.
“But it doesn’t fit him,” cried Hood impatiently. “He couldn’t possibly wear it!”
Father Brown shook his head with ineffable133 mildness. “I never said he could wear it,” he answered. “I said it was his hat. Or, if you insist on a shade of difference, a hat that is his.”
“My good sir,” cried the mild little man, with his first movement akin135 to impatience, “if you will walk down the street to the nearest hatter’s shop, you will see that there is, in common speech, a difference between a man’s hat and the hats that are his.”
“But a hatter,” protested Hood, “can get money out of his stock of new hats. What could Todhunter get out of this one old hat?”
“What?” cried Dr Hood.
“Rabbits, ribbons, sweetmeats, goldfish, rolls of coloured paper,” said the reverend gentleman with rapidity. “Didn’t you see it all when you found out the faked ropes? It’s just the same with the sword. Mr Todhunter hasn’t got a scratch on him, as you say; but he’s got a scratch in him, if you follow me.”
“Do you mean inside Mr Todhunter’s clothes?” inquired Mrs MacNab sternly.
“I do not mean inside Mr Todhunter’s clothes,” said Father Brown. “I mean inside Mr Todhunter.”
“Mr Todhunter,” explained Father Brown placidly138, “is learning to be a professional conjurer, as well as juggler139, ventriloquist, and expert in the rope trick. The conjuring140 explains the hat. It is without traces of hair, not because it is worn by the prematurely141 bald Mr Glass, but because it has never been worn by anybody. The juggling142 explains the three glasses, which Todhunter was teaching himself to throw up and catch in rotation143. But, being only at the stage of practice, he smashed one glass against the ceiling. And the juggling also explains the sword, which it was Mr Todhunter’s professional pride and duty to swallow. But, again, being at the stage of practice, he very slightly grazed the inside of his throat with the weapon. Hence he has a wound inside him, which I am sure (from the expression on his face) is not a serious one. He was also practising the trick of a release from ropes, like the Davenport Brothers, and he was just about to free himself when we all burst into the room. The cards, of course, are for card tricks, and they are scattered on the floor because he had just been practising one of those dodges144 of sending them flying through the air. He merely kept his trade secret, because he had to keep his tricks secret, like any other conjurer. But the mere fact of an idler in a top hat having once looked in at his back window, and been driven away by him with great indignation, was enough to set us all on a wrong track of romance, and make us imagine his whole life overshadowed by the silk-hatted spectre of Mr Glass.”
“But what about the two voices?” asked Maggie, staring.
“Have you never heard a ventriloquist?” asked Father Brown. “Don’t you know they speak first in their natural voice, and then answer themselves in just that shrill, squeaky, unnatural145 voice that you heard?”
There was a long silence, and Dr Hood regarded the little man who had spoken with a dark and attentive146 smile. “You are certainly a very ingenious person,” he said; “it could not have been done better in a book. But there is just one part of Mr Glass you have not succeeded in explaining away, and that is his name. Miss MacNab distinctly heard him so addressed by Mr Todhunter.”
The Rev89. Mr Brown broke into a rather childish giggle147. “Well, that,” he said, “that’s the silliest part of the whole silly story. When our juggling friend here threw up the three glasses in turn, he counted them aloud as he caught them, and also commented aloud when he failed to catch them. What he really said was: ‘One, two and three—missed a glass one, two—missed a glass.’ And so on.”
There was a second of stillness in the room, and then everyone with one accord burst out laughing. As they did so the figure in the corner complacently148 uncoiled all the ropes and let them fall with a flourish. Then, advancing into the middle of the room with a bow, he produced from his pocket a big bill printed in blue and red, which announced that ZALADIN, the World’s Greatest Conjurer, Contortionist, Ventriloquist and Human Kangaroo would be ready with an entirely new series of Tricks at the Empire Pavilion, Scarborough, on Monday next at eight o’clock precisely149.
该作者的其它小说
《The Napoleon of Notting Hill》
该作者的其它小说
《The Napoleon of Notting Hill》
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hood
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| n.头巾，兜帽，覆盖；v.罩上，以头巾覆盖 | |
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eminent
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| adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的 | |
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disorders
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| n.混乱( disorder的名词复数 )；凌乱；骚乱；（身心、机能）失调 | |
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disorder
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| n.紊乱，混乱；骚动，骚乱；疾病，失调 | |
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chambers
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| n.房间( chamber的名词复数 )；（议会的）议院；卧室；会议厅 | |
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excellence
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| n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德 | |
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physiologists
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| n.生理学者( physiologist的名词复数 )；生理学( physiology的名词复数 )；生理机能 | |
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laden
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| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
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lyrics
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| n.歌词 | |
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ballads
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| 民歌，民谣，特别指叙述故事的歌( ballad的名词复数 )； 讴 | |
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frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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serried
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| adj.拥挤的；密集的 | |
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velvet
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| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
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negligence
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| n.疏忽，玩忽，粗心大意 | |
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sanguine
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| adj.充满希望的，乐观的，血红色的 | |
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16
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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17
curt
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| adj.简短的，草率的 | |
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18
prosaic
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| adj.单调的，无趣的 | |
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19
homely
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| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
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20
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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21
geniality
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| n.和蔼，诚恳；愉快 | |
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22
disarray
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| n.混乱，紊乱，凌乱 | |
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23
spoke
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| 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 | |
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24
simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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25
sprawlingly
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| 蔓生的，不规则地伸展的 | |
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26
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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27
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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28
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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29
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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30
despoiled
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| v.掠夺，抢劫( despoil的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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31
ingenuous
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| adj.纯朴的，单纯的；天真的；坦率的 | |
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32
chuckle
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|
| vi.／n.轻声笑，咯咯笑 | |
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33
ironical
|
|
| adj.讽刺的，冷嘲的 | |
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34
simplicity
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|
| n.简单，简易；朴素；直率，单纯 | |
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35
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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36
recital
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|
| n.朗诵，独奏会，独唱会 | |
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37
lodgings
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| n. 出租的房舍, 寄宿舍 | |
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38
lodger
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|
| n.寄宿人，房客 | |
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39
hideous
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|
| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
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40
agile
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| adj.敏捷的，灵活的 | |
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41
dynamite
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|
| n./vt.(用)炸药(爆破) | |
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42
justified
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| a.正当的，有理的 | |
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43
apparently
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|
| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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44
twilight
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|
| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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45
colloquy
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|
| n.谈话，自由讨论 | |
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46
eldest
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|
| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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47
relish
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|
| n.滋味，享受，爱好，调味品；vt.加调味料，享受，品味；vi.有滋味 | |
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48
condescended
|
|
| 屈尊，俯就( condescend的过去式和过去分词 )； 故意表示和蔼可亲 | |
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49
pebble
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|
| n.卵石，小圆石 | |
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50
migrations
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|
| n.迁移，移居( migration的名词复数 ) | |
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51
massacre
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|
| n.残杀，大屠杀；v.残杀，集体屠杀 | |
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52
ethical
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|
| adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的 | |
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53
specimens
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|
| n.样品( specimen的名词复数 )；范例；（化验的）抽样；某种类型的人 | |
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54
superstitious
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|
| adj.迷信的 | |
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55
remarkable
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|
| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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56
clans
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|
| 宗族( clan的名词复数 )； 氏族； 庞大的家族； 宗派 | |
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57
scattered
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|
| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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58
morbidity
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|
| n.病态；不健全；发病；发病率 | |
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59
morbid
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|
| adj.病的；致病的；病态的；可怕的 | |
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60
scotch
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|
| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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61
abrupt
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|
| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
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62
impatience
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|
| n.不耐烦，急躁 | |
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63
impel
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| v.推动；激励，迫使 | |
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64
huddled
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| 挤在一起（huddle的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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65
gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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66
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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67
dreary
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|
| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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68
trot
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|
| n.疾走，慢跑；n.老太婆；现成译本；(复数）trots:腹泻（与the 连用）；v.小跑，快步走，赶紧 | |
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69
devoid
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|
| adj.全无的，缺乏的 | |
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70
justification
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|
| n.正当的理由；辩解的理由 | |
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71
desolate
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|
| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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72
premature
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|
| adj.比预期时间早的；不成熟的，仓促的 | |
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73
lurid
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|
| adj.可怕的；血红的；苍白的 | |
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74
ominously
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|
| adv.恶兆地，不吉利地；预示地 | |
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75
demon
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|
| n.魔鬼，恶魔 | |
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76
scant
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|
| adj.不充分的，不足的；v.减缩，限制，忽略 | |
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77
shrill
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|
| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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78
vows
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|
| 誓言( vow的名词复数 )； 郑重宣布，许愿 | |
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79
vengeance
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|
| n.报复，报仇，复仇 | |
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80
catastrophe
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|
| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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81
ornamental
|
|
| adj.装饰的；作装饰用的；n.装饰品；观赏植物 | |
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82
pinioned
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|
| v.抓住[捆住]（双臂）( pinion的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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83
pinion
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|
| v.束缚；n.小齿轮 | |
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84
stylish
|
|
| adj.流行的，时髦的；漂亮的，气派的 | |
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85
systematically
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|
| adv.有系统地 | |
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86
burnished
|
|
| adj.抛光的，光亮的v.擦亮（金属等），磨光( burnish的过去式和过去分词 )；被擦亮，磨光 | |
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87
untie
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|
| vt.解开，松开；解放 | |
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88
vividly
|
|
| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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89
rev
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|
| v.发动机旋转，加快速度 | |
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90
vessel
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|
| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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91
vessels
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|
| n.血管( vessel的名词复数 )；船；容器；（具有特殊品质或接受特殊品质的）人 | |
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92
thrifty
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|
| adj.节俭的；兴旺的；健壮的 | |
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93
essentially
|
|
| adv.本质上，实质上，基本上 | |
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94
abstainer
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|
| 节制者，戒酒者，弃权者 | |
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95
luxurious
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|
| adj.精美而昂贵的；豪华的 | |
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96
flask
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|
| n.瓶，火药筒，砂箱 | |
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97
frayed
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|
| adj.磨损的v.（使布、绳等）磨损，磨破( fray的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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98
blackmail
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|
| n.讹诈，敲诈，勒索，胁迫，恫吓 | |
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99
blackmailed
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|
| 胁迫，尤指以透露他人不体面行为相威胁以勒索钱财( blackmail的过去式 ) | |
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100
profligate
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|
| adj.行为不检的；n.放荡的人，浪子，肆意挥霍者 | |
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101
irritation
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|
| n.激怒，恼怒，生气 | |
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102
blackmails
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| 胁迫，尤指以透露他人不体面行为相威胁以勒索钱财( blackmail的第三人称单数 ) | |
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103
hush
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| int.嘘，别出声；n.沉默，静寂；v.使安静 | |
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104
scent
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|
| n.气味，香味，香水，线索，嗅觉；v.嗅，发觉 | |
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105
incubus
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| n.负担；恶梦 | |
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106
blackmailer
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| 敲诈者，勒索者 | |
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107
admiration
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|
| n.钦佩，赞美，羡慕 | |
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108
intonation
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| n.语调，声调；发声 | |
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109
reiterated
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| 反复地说，重申( reiterate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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110
corpse
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| n.尸体，死尸 | |
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111
depressed
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|
| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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112
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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113
cuttlefish
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|
| n.乌贼，墨鱼 | |
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114
writhing
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| （因极度痛苦而）扭动或翻滚( writhe的现在分词 ) | |
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115
villain
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| n.反派演员，反面人物；恶棍；问题的起因 | |
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116
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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117
concealing
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，遮住( conceal的现在分词 ) | |
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118
complacent
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| adj.自满的；自鸣得意的 | |
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119
innocence
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| n.无罪；天真；无害 | |
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120
scuttled
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| v.使船沉没( scuttle的过去式和过去分词 )；快跑，急走 | |
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121
impulsiveness
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| n.冲动 | |
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122
fatuous
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| adj.愚昧的；昏庸的 | |
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123
brutes
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| 兽( brute的名词复数 )； 畜生； 残酷无情的人； 兽性 | |
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124
exasperation
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|
| n.愤慨 | |
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125
shuffled
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|
| v.洗（纸牌）( shuffle的过去式和过去分词 )；拖着脚步走；粗心地做；摆脱尘世的烦恼 | |
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126
fuming
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|
| 愤怒( fume的现在分词 )； 大怒； 发怒； 冒烟 | |
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127
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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128
haughtily
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| adv. 傲慢地, 高傲地 | |
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129
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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130
ascertained
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| v.弄清，确定，查明( ascertain的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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131
fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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132
assent
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| v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可 | |
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133
ineffable
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| adj.无法表达的，不可言喻的 | |
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134
sneer
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| v.轻蔑；嘲笑；n.嘲笑，讥讽的言语 | |
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135
akin
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| adj.同族的，类似的 | |
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136
promptly
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| adv.及时地，敏捷地 | |
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137
bedlam
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|
| n.混乱，骚乱；疯人院 | |
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138
placidly
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|
| adv.平稳地，平静地 | |
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139
juggler
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|
| n. 变戏法者, 行骗者 | |
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140
conjuring
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| n.魔术 | |
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141
prematurely
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|
| adv.过早地，贸然地 | |
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142
juggling
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|
| n. 欺骗, 杂耍(=jugglery) adj. 欺骗的, 欺诈的 动词juggle的现在分词 | |
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143
rotation
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|
| n.旋转；循环，轮流 | |
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144
dodges
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|
| n.闪躲( dodge的名词复数 )；躲避；伎俩；妙计v.闪躲( dodge的第三人称单数 )；回避 | |
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145
unnatural
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| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
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146
attentive
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| adj.注意的，专心的；关心(别人)的，殷勤的 | |
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147
giggle
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| n.痴笑，咯咯地笑；v.咯咯地笑着说 | |
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148
complacently
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| adv. 满足地, 自满地, 沾沾自喜地 | |
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149
precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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