Katherine Massarene noticed that her father paired early in the season and was ordered by his physician to take the waters of Ems. But she made no remark on the fact, and her mother said, quite unsuspiciously, to her husband on his departure, “If you see the Duchess there, William, give her my love. She was looking worried and worn when she left.” She was always fascinated by that lovely apparition1 which had seemed to her so splendid an incarnation of aristocracy and grace, delicious insolence2 and incomparable sorcery.
“Them German waters are wonderful curers,” she said to her daughter. “They’re good for the Duchess’s nerves, and your father’s rheumatics.”
Katherine said nothing. Was her mother as simple as she seemed? she wondered. Herself, in her own despite, she felt a curious reluctant pity for Hurstmanceaux’s sister; such pity as she might have felt if she had seen a lithe4 young jaguar5 crushed by the hirsute6 strength of a baboon7. The jaguar is itself cruel, stealthy, pitiless, but still—the duel8 is unequal, and is decided9 by sheer brutal10 savage11 force.
“Somehow or other,” she thought, “my father has frightened her and cowed her; she looks as racing13 mares do when they come in off the trotting14 piste, with their strained eyes and their nervous trembling.”
She felt a vague desire to warn the victim of her father’s character, of his pitiless cruelty, of his unutterable brutality15; but she knew that it would be unfilial to do so, and would be probably an act useless, misunderstood, and attributed to some selfish motive16. She knew the world well enough to be aware that, whatever we may do to serve another, we are always suspected of serving our own interests.
To her it was evident that the saucy17 and thievish rodent18 had run once too often and once too near the[333] claws and teeth of the tom-cat, who had let her gambol19 before him only to seize her and crunch20 her at leisure. She came very close toward the truth in her observations and deductions21, but she shut her suspicions up in her own breast, and said nothing to anyone, being used to live without confidantes and to put a padlock on her lips.
“Who would ever have thought Sourisette would be so depressed22 by her little beast of a husband’s death?” said the friends who saw her at Ems that summer, one to another. They found her extremely altered; she was nervous, pale, had lost her spirits, and shut herself up a great deal, alleging23 her mourning.
“Mouse as la veuve inconsolable is too droll,” said her world; but when it became known that the guardians24 and executors had taken away the Otterbourne jewels, including the roc’s egg, and locked them up, never to be unlocked until Jack25 should attain26 his majority, her female friends argued that it was no wonder she felt such an insult.
“It is not an insult. It is the law. The trustees are obliged to do it; the little Duke’s a minor,” explained their male relatives. But to the female mind this kind of explanation always appears as trivial as it is impertinent. The general impression was given in society that Hurstmanceaux was very harsh to his sister, and that his unkindness was the cause of her loss of spirits and change of habits; moreover, it was said that it was he who had insisted on her rupture27 with Brancepeth.
Altogether she was pitied and admired, for her conduct had been quite admirable ever since the day that her wreath of forget-me-nots had been placed on poor Cocky’s grave, almost side by side with Lily Larking’s harp28 of calla lilies.
No one noticed that when she went on from Ems to Homburg, William Massarene went there also a few days later, whilst his wife and daughter remained at Vale Royal; no one except the courtly diplomatist of the silk dressing-gown, who was at Homburg too, and who observed that she did not bully29 “Billy” as she had done in the days of the Bird rooms, and that when “Billy” approached her there came into her eyes a flash of hate, a[334] gleam of fear and loathing30. Also that whatever he proposed in the way of walking, driving, or dining, she acquiesced31 in with a certain sullenness32 but with unusual docility33.
If ever in his sturdy life William Massarene had been shy, he was so when the gaze of this accomplished34 person met his own. But whatever the minister observed, and any conclusions he might draw from his observations, he kept to himself, having in his career learned that there is no proverb truer than that of l’arbre et l’écorce. He was bland35 and charming both to l’ours et l’agneau, as he called them. Pauvre agneau! She had gambolled36 too carelessly and skipped too nearly the hairy arms of the ponderous37 bear! The diplomatist felt thankful that he could look calmly as a spectator at the struggle. He was prudent38 by nature and by habit, and beyond all women who were ever created his own personal reputation and his own personal ambitions were dear to him.
Equally circumspect39, Massarene, as he took great care not to compromise himself, did not compromise her, except in the inductions40 of such very fine and accomplished observers as this diplomatist, of whom there are few left in the hurry and hurly-burly of modern society. If the whole of his constituency had been watching him, he could not have been more careful. A man has not been President of the Band of Purity and the White Riband Association in an American township without learning how to keep his neighbors’ noses out of his own whiskey and candy stores.
But he was an ever present horror in her life. He could subdue41 her with a glance of his colorless, dull eyes. She no longer dragged him behind in the dust of her chariot; she was dragged in the dust behind his. She was tortured by the ever harrowing dread42 that others would notice the change. She had even lost the spirits and the nerve to invent fictions to account for such a change to her friends. She let things drift in apathy43 and disgust and fear.
From Homburg he let her go on to Carlsbad, where he did not show himself, and thence on a visit to a sister of hers who had married a Magyar magnate, where she was[335] for a while in peace, since there certainly her tyrant44 could not go.
Her children were meantime still at Whiteleaf, a ducal property, of which Alberic Orme held the living, where they and the Blenheims had a healthier, if less brilliant, life than had been their portion when with her. She had no anxiety about them. She knew that their uncle Ronnie would see to all that was necessary for them. She hated his conscientiousness45 bitterly, but she trusted to it as to a staff which would never break.
The vast domain46 of Staghurst had already been let to an Indian maharajah. Otterbourne House had been leased to the representative of a great Power. All other houses and estates were similarly disposed of, and the strictest measures were being taken to make the little Duke’s minority fruitful.
The dreadful debaucheries of Cocky had impoverished47 his father woefully, and the entail48 had been eaten into as the eastern coast of England is being gnawed49 away by the sea. But the long minority would do much to restore the fallen fortunes of the great dukedom, and a strict economy was inaugurated.
Her own jointure was of course paid regularly to her; but it seemed to her brother that it must be utterly50 insufficient51 to afford her means to live as she chose to live. A great disquietude and alarm always weighed on him about her, but she had chosen to quarrel with him. He could not sue for reconciliation52 when he was in the right.
Hurstmanceaux was as tender-hearted as he was proud, and if she had made any sign of contrition53 or affection he would have forgiven all her insolence and have gone to her at once. But she had shut the door in his face; she had insulted him by the lips of her little daughter. He could not make any advances to her. For her own part she was relieved not to see him. Something might have transpired54 to excite his suspicions; he might have noticed the altered tone of William Massarene, or he might have interrogated55 her as to her ways and means, and found her replies unsatisfactory. He was much better away, and she made no sign to him. Her movements he heard of from his other sisters, and from the columns of the Morning[336] Post. In the late autumn he saw that she was staying at Vale Royal; the Christmas recess56 she passed with Carrie Wisbeach; the new year saw her in a suite57 of rooms at the Residential58 Hotel facing Hyde Park.
“How does she get the ready money?” he said to Lady Wisbeach, who had come from her journey round the globe as though she had only been down to Greenwich.
“Oh, a woman alone, you know, with only a maid,” said that loyal lady carelessly, “a woman alone needn’t spend more than a sparrow. It isn’t as if she had the children. And then in mourning, and hardly going out except to quiet little things——”
Hurstmanceaux did not find the explanation very satisfactory.
“Do you think she regrets that man?” he said, after a pause.
“What man?”
“Lord Brancepeth.”
“Oh, no,” said Carrie Wisbeach. “My dear Ronnie, where do you live? Who regrets things when they have been on all that while?”
He was silent; he felt that his sisters were far beyond him in the knowledge of life.
“You might as well talk of regretting a worn-out shoe,” said Lady Wisbeach, with some impatience59.
“Surely you admit she should have married him?”
“I?” cried his sister with amazement60. “I implored61 her not to marry him. She would have been mad if she had married him. She would not marry him when—when she was wild about him. She married Cocky. She did quite right. The Inversays are utterly ruined. The old people have nothing. The very little he ever had came from his grandmother, old Lady Luce, and that little was—was—well, was got rid of in a year or two. Besides, nothing is so stupid—such a want of sense and savoir faire—as to marry a person who has been talked about in connection with you. It is foolish. It confirms things. It makes people laugh. Of course if you get a very great position by it, it’s a different thing. But even in that case I should always say to a woman—at least to a young woman—don’t!”
[337]“Why especially to a young woman?”
“My dear Ronnie, you are really too stupid for anything! If a woman isn’t young she isn’t likely to have many offers of marriage, is she?”
“I see,” replied Hurstmanceaux, and felt once more that beside the worldly wisdom of his sisters he was indeed a novice62.
“You live in the country till you forget everything,” said Lady Wisbeach.
During the visits of the Duchess of Otterbourne to Vale Royal her hostess saw a great change in her. “That pretty creature isn’t what she was, William,” she said to her husband. “She don’t cheek you as she used to do, and she seems quite down in the dumps. Surely it can’t be that she’s fretting63 on account of the death of that little drunkard?”
William Massarene did not look at his wife as he answered. “’Tis want of dollars frets64 her, my good woman. That’s a disease as ages these young ’uns fast. Thoroughbred mares want gilded65 oats.”
“Deary me! What’s the use of being a duchess if you don’t get gilded oats?” said his wife. She was troubled by the idea of anyone so exalted66 being brought so low as to want money. Being tender-hearted she redoubled her attentions to her guest, but being tactless she mingled67 with them a familiarity for which their object would willingly have murdered her, and which she resented all the more bitterly because she was forced to conceal68 her resentment69.
He got far beyond all social need of her now. His position was secure in the county, in the country, in the world. Men knew what he was worth both in millions and in mind, and they feared him. He did not scruple70 to treat them like dirt, as he expressed it, and it was they who wanted him now, they who had to sue for his good offices and bear his snubs.
For some few people like Hurstmanceaux he was still only a cad sitting on a pile of money-bags; but these were so very few that they did not count, and he could very well do without them.
All the pick of the Tory party came to Vale Royal, shot[338] his pheasants and partridges, drank his rare wines, asked his opinion, and shook his hand. If out of his hearing they still called him a blackguard American, they were now extremely civil to his face, and when he wanted them he had only to whistle. It pleased his love of dominion71 and his sense of successful effort. He felt that all these noble people, pretty people, fastidious people, all these political chiefs and swell72 notabilities and leaders of parliament and of fashion, were as so many comedians73, all playing for him. He hated them for a great many reasons: for their polished accents, for their way of bowing, for the ease with which they wore their clothes, for the trick they had of looking well-bred even in shabby gowns or old shooting-coats. But he despised them; he could afford to despise them, and they could not afford to despise him.
When he thought of this he passed his tongue over his lips with a relishing74 gesture, like a dog who has been eating a beefsteak.
With the world, as with the Duchess of Otterbourne, he had ceased to be suppliant—he had become master; and he had always been a hard master, he had always thought that the best argument was a long strip of cowhide.
“Oh, you brute76—you unutterable brute! If a look could kill you, you would fall dead where you stand!” thought Mouse one day as she looked from one of the windows of the Bird room, and saw his short broad figure, with the squat77 legs cased in the gaiters of a country gentleman and the country gentleman’s round felt hat on his stubbly iron-grey hair, as he went over the turf with his back to her, having on his left the lord-lieutenant of the county, and on his right the Tory Chancellor78 of the Exchequer79, each of them bending their tall forms affably and listening to him with deference80.
But looks cannot kill; and he continued to walk on across the sunlight and shadow over the grass, and she continued to watch him from the upper windows, convulsed with a deadly loathing impotent rage against him, such as Marie Antoinette must have felt for the gaoler of the Concièrgerie.
[339]There were men who loved her to insanity81; even in the weary, shallow, indifferent, modern world there are still women who inspire insane if short-lived passions, and she was of those women; but she could not appeal to any one of these men since appeal would entail confession82; and confession to one would mean exposure to all, for she knew that her tyrant would be merciless if she freed herself from him, or he would not keep her signatures as he did keep them. Skilled in male human nature, and the management of it, though she was, she had no experience to guide her in dealing83 with Massarene, because all the men amongst whom she had lived had been gentlemen; and the way of treating women of the gentlemen and the cad is as different as their way of shooting. A man capable of acting84 as Massarene did could not have been met with in her world.
“It is all our own fault,” she thought. “Why do we let these boors85 and brutes86 in at our gates because they have got their sacks of bullion87 on their backs?” And as she always blamed somebody for the issue of her own errors, she thought with detestation of Cocky coming up to her under the trees at Homburg, and telling her to make the acquaintance of the Massarenes.
Happily for her William Massarene was too cautious, too busy, and too ambitious a man to lose much of his time in torturing her. He delighted in her hatred88, her helplessness, her servitude, but she was only a toy to him; his gigantic schemes of self-advancement, and his many financial enterprises, engrossed89 him much more, and he would not have risked his social position by a scandal for all the beautiful women in creation. He supplied her with the money she wanted, but he made her beg, and he made her sign, for every penny of it. It was fine sport!
Her own people attributed the change in her to her rupture with Brancepeth; and, in himself, Hurstmanceaux did so also. But it was a subject on which he could know nothing since the scene she had with him concerning her late friend, and he could only suppose that like many another woman she sorrowed for the loss of what she had refused to keep. He knew that she stayed a good deal with the folks at Vale Royal, but his penetration90 did[340] not go farther than to conclude that she did so because it saved her expense. He saw nothing of her personally in the autumn and winter following Cocky’s death; his unavoidable communications with her on business were made by letter. Sometimes he wondered how she and the lady with whom he had walked to Greater Thorpe got on together; he did not think that they could suit each other; but he saw little of the one and nothing at all of the other.
Of William Massarene he of course saw nothing either; so that the curt91 and insolent92 tone which Massarene at times now allowed himself to use to one whose humble93 slave he had once been was unknown to him; if he had heard it and resented it, the “bull-dozing boss” would have cast the truth in his teeth, and, grinning, have awaited his reception of it, for courage had never been lacking to the man who for thirty years had held his own against the hatred of the whole Central States.
This terror lest he should thus tell the truth to her brother haunted her night and day. She did not think there was much fear because she knew that he held his social position as dear as life itself, and he would be well aware that Hurstmanceaux would destroy it at a blow. Still she could not be sure, for she knew that temper sometimes hurries the wisest and most ambitious man into irrevocable indiscretion.
She had herself lost absolutely all power over the man who had been so blindly her slave. Their positions had wholly changed. It was she who shrank from his glance; it was he who ordered and was obeyed. She, who had no acquaintance with pain, suffered as never before would she have believed it possible to suffer. Humiliation94, terror, abhorrence95, self-contempt, were all united to an agony of apprehension96 with regard to the future. She would easily have made a second marriage, but her tyrant forbade her any such issue from her difficulties.
She had never before supposed that it would ever be possible for her to be miserable97 in London, but she was so now; the dull cold bleak98 weather aiding her depression, and the mourning which she had still to wear seeming to her indeed the very livery of gloom.
[341]A whole hothouse of flowers emptied into her room could not make opaque99 yellow fog supportable, and the sight of William Massarene driving past her windows or coming up the staircase anything less than torture.
How she envied those women of ruder ages who could hire bravoes for a quick cold steel to rid them of what they loathed100. She hated him so intensely that there were even times when she looked wistfully in at the gunsmiths’ shops in Piccadilly.
But she lived in a world in which all strong passions seemed farcical, and the ridicule101 of the thing restrained her from buying a revolver. A tragedy with Billy as the slain102! She laughed a hollow little laugh of misery103 and scorn as she threw herself back in her brougham and ceased to look at the little ivory mounted weapons so temptingly displayed by the gunsmiths.
She had insight enough to perceive that his adoration104 of her was a thing dead and gone for ever; she saw that the only dregs of it which remained with him were love of hurting her, of mortifying105 her, of ordering her about as though she were a factory wench in one of his cotton-mills in North Dakota. Fortunately for her his prudence106 saved her from any display of this tyranny in public; but in private he treated her as a tanner of the Ile de France might have treated a young duchess of the Faubourg when it only needed a sign to the mob for the axe107 to fall and the pikes to be twisted in the perfumed hair. She had no will of her own; she dared not dispose of her time for a week; she had to know what he permitted and what he forbade.
“She’s a morsel108 for a king,” he would say to himself, passing his tongue over his lips. Still he had become very indifferent to her, except that his power of humiliating her was always agreeable and stimulating109 to him.
“You’ve found out as Billy ain’t a fool, haven’t you, my beauty,” he said a hundred times to her. “Billy’s been one too many for you, eh?”
And at such moments if a revolver had been near her she would have shot him dead.
The harassing110 torment111 of her compulsory112 submission113 to him made her look worn, anxious, thin. “Surely I am[342] not losing my beauty,” she thought with horror, as she looked at herself in the mirrors, and each day she was obliged to have a little more recourse to the aids of art.
She knew well enough that however brilliant may be artificial loveliness, it is never quite the same as the radiance of that natural beauty which can affront114 the drenching115 rain of a hunting-field or the scorching116 sun on a yacht-deck, or, most difficult to bear of all, the clear light of early day after a ball.
Oh, how she hated everyone! Cocky in his grave, and Beaumont in his shop, and Ronald who had brought all this misery upon her, and Brancepeth who had taken her at her word; and—oh, how bitterly and with what deadly hatred!—this coarse, common, hideous117 creature who said to her in his brutal derision:
“Billy’s been one too many for you, eh, my dear?”
He had put this thoroughbred trotter into the harness of his homely118 wagon119, and it never ceased to please him to watch her jib, and start, and tremble, and pant, as he flogged her along the stony120 road of subservience121 to his will and desires.
The more intensely she dreaded122 and loathed him the more entirely123 did he enjoy his revenge. It had cost him a great deal of money, but he did not grudge124 the money. The sport was rare.
“Stow that, my pretty,” he said to her when he saw her receiving as if she liked it the attentions of some man who might very well be in earnest and desire to persuade her to a second marriage. “Stow that, my pretty. You aren’t a-going to wed12 with nobody—Billy’s here.”
Her disgust, her indignation, her helpless revolt, were all infinitely125 diverting to him; he let her free herself a moment, only to pull her up with a jerk and remind her that he was her master. She felt that as long as he lived he would never let her escape him.
“Perhaps I’ll marry you myself if the old woman goes to glory,” he said with a grin. “Don’t you count on it though, my dear; I may see somebody else and disappoint you!”
His position was too dear to him for any jeopardy126 of it to be risked for any other consideration on earth. It was[343] to his own fear for himself that she owed such partial relief from him as she obtained, such comparative liberty as his jealous vengeance127 permitted; such formal politeness as he showed her in society. He was afraid she might make a confession to Hurstmanceaux if he pressed her too hard, and this feeling alone kept his tyrannies within certain bounds, and compelled him to treat her with courtesy before the world.
But the low-bred ruffianism which was his true inner man showed itself frequently in private.
“A duchess’s frock makes a nice door-mat,” he said with relish75. “Don’t you squeal128, my pretty, or damn me if I don’t wipe ’em with your hair next.”
She knew that he would do as he said.
He kept her in perpetual slavery also for him in the world; he made her serve his interests with all her relatives and friends; he sometimes exacted what was not only difficult but almost impossible, and she had to get it done somehow or other. His ambitions grew with what they fed on, and he became arrogant129, critical, overbearing in his expectations.
“I mean to die a lord and a cabinet minister,” he said, with a sense that death could only be his obedient valet like the Conservative party.
“If wishes could kill you, you would fall dead where you stand,” she thought; but she dared not say so, and she devoured130 her hatred and her humiliation in silence.
“You aren’t so young as you were, my beauty,” he said one day out of doors, staring ruthlessly at her. “Billy don’t agree with you, eh? Keep worrying the curb131, don’t you? Pull as hard as you will, you won’t get your head. You’re between my shafts132, and you must just go quiet over the stones at my pace, my lady fair.”
The stones were very sharp, and this road was apparently133 without an end. She grew thin, she looked harassed134 and hectic135, she contracted a nervous way of glancing back over her shoulder to see if he were within earshot, even when she knew that he was a hundred miles away.
One day when he was with her one of her many admirers[344] sent her a large gilded gondola136-shaped basket filled with Palestine lilies and La France roses.
“Who sent these?” he growled137, and he pulled the card off it and read the name. It was a great name. “What’s this mean, eh?” he said as he showed her the card.
“It means nothing at all,” she said, with that tremor138 in her which was partly impotent rage and chiefly genuine fear; and added, with a little nervous laugh, “We have no language of flowers like the Orientals.”
“Eh?” said Massarene, who did not understand—“mean nothing, do they? That’s one of your damned lies. Now ye hearken to me, my lady. Him as sent ’em’s so deep in my debt that he’d hev to turn crossin’ sweeper if I held up my little finger. Now I won’t hev my debtors139 come gallivantin’ to my sweetheart. Mind that. Make him keep his distance or it’ll be worse for him and for you. You know Billy by this time.”
Her nerves gave way under the sickening nausea141 of the scene. She buried her face in her hands and sobbed142 aloud, her tortured pride of race and of womanhood writhing143 like some delicate animal in a steel trap.
William Massarene stood and watched her, his thumbs in the armholes of his coat, his legs wide apart, his yellow teeth showing in a broad grin. It was rare sport. It had cost him an almighty144 pile of dollars, but it was rare sport. He felt that after his long career of hard work and self-denial he had earned the right to some such fun and feast as this.
点击收听单词发音
1 apparition | |
n.幽灵,神奇的现象 | |
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2 insolence | |
n.傲慢;无礼;厚颜;傲慢的态度 | |
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3 hem | |
n.贴边,镶边;vt.缝贴边;(in)包围,限制 | |
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4 lithe | |
adj.(指人、身体)柔软的,易弯的 | |
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5 jaguar | |
n.美洲虎 | |
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6 hirsute | |
adj.多毛的 | |
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7 baboon | |
n.狒狒 | |
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8 duel | |
n./v.决斗;(双方的)斗争 | |
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9 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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10 brutal | |
adj.残忍的,野蛮的,不讲理的 | |
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11 savage | |
adj.野蛮的;凶恶的,残暴的;n.未开化的人 | |
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12 wed | |
v.娶,嫁,与…结婚 | |
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13 racing | |
n.竞赛,赛马;adj.竞赛用的,赛马用的 | |
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14 trotting | |
小跑,急走( trot的现在分词 ); 匆匆忙忙地走 | |
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15 brutality | |
n.野蛮的行为,残忍,野蛮 | |
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16 motive | |
n.动机,目的;adv.发动的,运动的 | |
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17 saucy | |
adj.无礼的;俊俏的;活泼的 | |
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18 rodent | |
n.啮齿动物;adj.啮齿目的 | |
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19 gambol | |
v.欢呼,雀跃 | |
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20 crunch | |
n.关键时刻;艰难局面;v.发出碎裂声 | |
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21 deductions | |
扣除( deduction的名词复数 ); 结论; 扣除的量; 推演 | |
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22 depressed | |
adj.沮丧的,抑郁的,不景气的,萧条的 | |
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23 alleging | |
断言,宣称,辩解( allege的现在分词 ) | |
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24 guardians | |
监护人( guardian的名词复数 ); 保护者,维护者 | |
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25 jack | |
n.插座,千斤顶,男人;v.抬起,提醒,扛举;n.(Jake)杰克 | |
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26 attain | |
vt.达到,获得,完成 | |
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27 rupture | |
n.破裂;(关系的)决裂;v.(使)破裂 | |
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28 harp | |
n.竖琴;天琴座 | |
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29 bully | |
n.恃强欺弱者,小流氓;vt.威胁,欺侮 | |
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30 loathing | |
n.厌恶,憎恨v.憎恨,厌恶( loathe的现在分词);极不喜欢 | |
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31 acquiesced | |
v.默认,默许( acquiesce的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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32 sullenness | |
n. 愠怒, 沉闷, 情绪消沉 | |
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33 docility | |
n.容易教,易驾驶,驯服 | |
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34 accomplished | |
adj.有才艺的;有造诣的;达到了的 | |
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35 bland | |
adj.淡而无味的,温和的,无刺激性的 | |
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36 gambolled | |
v.蹦跳,跳跃,嬉戏( gambol的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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37 ponderous | |
adj.沉重的,笨重的,(文章)冗长的 | |
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38 prudent | |
adj.谨慎的,有远见的,精打细算的 | |
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39 circumspect | |
adj.慎重的,谨慎的 | |
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40 inductions | |
归纳(法)( induction的名词复数 ); (电或磁的)感应; 就职; 吸入 | |
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41 subdue | |
vt.制服,使顺从,征服;抑制,克制 | |
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42 dread | |
vt.担忧,忧虑;惧怕,不敢;n.担忧,畏惧 | |
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43 apathy | |
n.漠不关心,无动于衷;冷淡 | |
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44 tyrant | |
n.暴君,专制的君主,残暴的人 | |
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45 conscientiousness | |
责任心 | |
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46 domain | |
n.(活动等)领域,范围;领地,势力范围 | |
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47 impoverished | |
adj.穷困的,无力的,用尽了的v.使(某人)贫穷( impoverish的过去式和过去分词 );使(某物)贫瘠或恶化 | |
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48 entail | |
vt.使承担,使成为必要,需要 | |
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49 gnawed | |
咬( gnaw的过去式和过去分词 ); (长时间) 折磨某人; (使)苦恼; (长时间)危害某事物 | |
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50 utterly | |
adv.完全地,绝对地 | |
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51 insufficient | |
adj.(for,of)不足的,不够的 | |
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52 reconciliation | |
n.和解,和谐,一致 | |
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53 contrition | |
n.悔罪,痛悔 | |
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54 transpired | |
(事实,秘密等)被人知道( transpire的过去式和过去分词 ); 泄露; 显露; 发生 | |
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55 interrogated | |
v.询问( interrogate的过去式和过去分词 );审问;(在计算机或其他机器上)查询 | |
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56 recess | |
n.短期休息,壁凹(墙上装架子,柜子等凹处) | |
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57 suite | |
n.一套(家具);套房;随从人员 | |
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58 residential | |
adj.提供住宿的;居住的;住宅的 | |
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59 impatience | |
n.不耐烦,急躁 | |
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60 amazement | |
n.惊奇,惊讶 | |
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61 implored | |
恳求或乞求(某人)( implore的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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62 novice | |
adj.新手的,生手的 | |
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63 fretting | |
n. 微振磨损 adj. 烦躁的, 焦虑的 | |
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64 frets | |
基质间片; 品丝(吉他等指板上定音的)( fret的名词复数 ) | |
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65 gilded | |
a.镀金的,富有的 | |
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66 exalted | |
adj.(地位等)高的,崇高的;尊贵的,高尚的 | |
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67 mingled | |
混合,混入( mingle的过去式和过去分词 ); 混进,与…交往[联系] | |
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68 conceal | |
v.隐藏,隐瞒,隐蔽 | |
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69 resentment | |
n.怨愤,忿恨 | |
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70 scruple | |
n./v.顾忌,迟疑 | |
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71 dominion | |
n.统治,管辖,支配权;领土,版图 | |
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72 swell | |
vi.膨胀,肿胀;增长,增强 | |
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73 comedians | |
n.喜剧演员,丑角( comedian的名词复数 ) | |
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74 relishing | |
v.欣赏( relish的现在分词 );从…获得乐趣;渴望 | |
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75 relish | |
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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76 brute | |
n.野兽,兽性 | |
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77 squat | |
v.蹲坐,蹲下;n.蹲下;adj.矮胖的,粗矮的 | |
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78 chancellor | |
n.(英)大臣;法官;(德、奥)总理;大学校长 | |
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79 exchequer | |
n.财政部;国库 | |
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80 deference | |
n.尊重,顺从;敬意 | |
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81 insanity | |
n.疯狂,精神错乱;极端的愚蠢,荒唐 | |
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82 confession | |
n.自白,供认,承认 | |
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83 dealing | |
n.经商方法,待人态度 | |
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84 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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85 boors | |
n.农民( boor的名词复数 );乡下佬;没礼貌的人;粗野的人 | |
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86 brutes | |
兽( brute的名词复数 ); 畜生; 残酷无情的人; 兽性 | |
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87 bullion | |
n.金条,银条 | |
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88 hatred | |
n.憎恶,憎恨,仇恨 | |
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89 engrossed | |
adj.全神贯注的 | |
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90 penetration | |
n.穿透,穿人,渗透 | |
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91 curt | |
adj.简短的,草率的 | |
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92 insolent | |
adj.傲慢的,无理的 | |
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93 humble | |
adj.谦卑的,恭顺的;地位低下的;v.降低,贬低 | |
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94 humiliation | |
n.羞辱 | |
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95 abhorrence | |
n.憎恶;可憎恶的事 | |
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96 apprehension | |
n.理解,领悟;逮捕,拘捕;忧虑 | |
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97 miserable | |
adj.悲惨的,痛苦的;可怜的,糟糕的 | |
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98 bleak | |
adj.(天气)阴冷的;凄凉的;暗淡的 | |
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99 opaque | |
adj.不透光的;不反光的,不传导的;晦涩的 | |
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100 loathed | |
v.憎恨,厌恶( loathe的过去式和过去分词 );极不喜欢 | |
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101 ridicule | |
v.讥讽,挖苦;n.嘲弄 | |
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102 slain | |
杀死,宰杀,杀戮( slay的过去分词 ); (slay的过去分词) | |
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103 misery | |
n.痛苦,苦恼,苦难;悲惨的境遇,贫苦 | |
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104 adoration | |
n.爱慕,崇拜 | |
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105 mortifying | |
adj.抑制的,苦修的v.使受辱( mortify的现在分词 );伤害(人的感情);克制;抑制(肉体、情感等) | |
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106 prudence | |
n.谨慎,精明,节俭 | |
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107 axe | |
n.斧子;v.用斧头砍,削减 | |
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108 morsel | |
n.一口,一点点 | |
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109 stimulating | |
adj.有启发性的,能激发人思考的 | |
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110 harassing | |
v.侵扰,骚扰( harass的现在分词 );不断攻击(敌人) | |
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111 torment | |
n.折磨;令人痛苦的东西(人);vt.折磨;纠缠 | |
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112 compulsory | |
n.强制的,必修的;规定的,义务的 | |
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113 submission | |
n.服从,投降;温顺,谦虚;提出 | |
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114 affront | |
n./v.侮辱,触怒 | |
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115 drenching | |
n.湿透v.使湿透( drench的现在分词 );在某人(某物)上大量使用(某液体) | |
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116 scorching | |
adj. 灼热的 | |
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117 hideous | |
adj.丑陋的,可憎的,可怕的,恐怖的 | |
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118 homely | |
adj.家常的,简朴的;不漂亮的 | |
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119 wagon | |
n.四轮马车,手推车,面包车;无盖运货列车 | |
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120 stony | |
adj.石头的,多石头的,冷酷的,无情的 | |
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121 subservience | |
n.有利,有益;从属(地位),附属性;屈从,恭顺;媚态 | |
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122 dreaded | |
adj.令人畏惧的;害怕的v.害怕,恐惧,担心( dread的过去式和过去分词) | |
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123 entirely | |
ad.全部地,完整地;完全地,彻底地 | |
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124 grudge | |
n.不满,怨恨,妒嫉;vt.勉强给,不情愿做 | |
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125 infinitely | |
adv.无限地,无穷地 | |
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126 jeopardy | |
n.危险;危难 | |
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127 vengeance | |
n.报复,报仇,复仇 | |
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128 squeal | |
v.发出长而尖的声音;n.长而尖的声音 | |
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129 arrogant | |
adj.傲慢的,自大的 | |
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130 devoured | |
吞没( devour的过去式和过去分词 ); 耗尽; 津津有味地看; 狼吞虎咽地吃光 | |
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131 curb | |
n.场外证券市场,场外交易;vt.制止,抑制 | |
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132 shafts | |
n.轴( shaft的名词复数 );(箭、高尔夫球棒等的)杆;通风井;一阵(疼痛、害怕等) | |
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133 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
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134 harassed | |
adj. 疲倦的,厌烦的 动词harass的过去式和过去分词 | |
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135 hectic | |
adj.肺病的;消耗热的;发热的;闹哄哄的 | |
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136 gondola | |
n.威尼斯的平底轻舟;飞船的吊船 | |
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137 growled | |
v.(动物)发狺狺声, (雷)作隆隆声( growl的过去式和过去分词 );低声咆哮着说 | |
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138 tremor | |
n.震动,颤动,战栗,兴奋,地震 | |
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139 debtors | |
n.债务人,借方( debtor的名词复数 ) | |
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140 trampled | |
踩( trample的过去式和过去分词 ); 践踏; 无视; 侵犯 | |
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141 nausea | |
n.作呕,恶心;极端的憎恶(或厌恶) | |
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142 sobbed | |
哭泣,啜泣( sob的过去式和过去分词 ); 哭诉,呜咽地说 | |
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143 writhing | |
(因极度痛苦而)扭动或翻滚( writhe的现在分词 ) | |
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144 almighty | |
adj.全能的,万能的;很大的,很强的 | |
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