He was startled by a cough close at hand.
He turned sharply, and peering, saw a small, hunched-up figure sitting a couple of yards off in the shadow of the enclosure.
"Have ye any news?" asked the high-pitched wheezy voice of a very old man.
Graham hesitated. "None," he said.
"I stay here till the lights come again," said the old man. "These blue scoundrels are everywhere--everywhere."
Graham's answer was inarticulate assent1. He tried to see the old man but the darkness hid his face. He wanted very much to respond, to talk, but he did not know how to begin.
"Dark and damnable," said the old man suddenly. "Dark and damnable. Turned out of my room among all these dangers."
"That's hard," ventured Graham. "That's hard on you."
"Darkness. An old man lost in the darkness. And all the world gone mad. War and fighting. The police beaten and rogues2 abroad. Why don't they bring some negroes to protect us? ... No more dark passages for me. I fell over a dead man."
"You're safer with company," said the old man, "if it's company of the right sort," and peered frankly3. He rose suddenly and came towards Graham.
Apparently4 the scrutiny5 was satisfactory. The old man sat down as if relieved to be no longer alone. "Eh!" he said, "but this is a terrible time! War and fighting, and the dead lying there--men, strong men, dying in the dark. Sons! I have three sons. God knows where they are to-night."
The voice ceased. Then repeated quavering: "God knows where they are to-night."
Graham stood revolving6 a question that should not betray his ignorance. Again the old man's voice ended the pause.
"This Ostrog will win," he said. "He will win. And what the world will be like under him no one can tell. My sons are under the wind-vanes, all three. One of my daughters-in-law was his mistress for a while. His mistress! We're not common people. Though they've sent me to wander to-night and take my chance.... I knew what was going on. Before most people. But this darkness! And to fall over a dead body suddenly in the dark!"
His wheezy breathing could be heard.
"Ostrog!" said Graham.
"The greatest Boss the world has ever seen," said the voice.
Graham ransacked7 his mind. "The Council has few friends among the people," he hazarded.
"Few friends. And poor ones at that. They've had their time. Eh! They should have kept to the clever ones. But twice they held election. And Ostrog--. And now it has burst out and nothing can stay it, nothing can stay it. Twice they rejected Ostrog--Ostrog the Boss. I heard of his rages at the time--he was terrible. Heaven save them! For nothing on earth can now he has raised the Labour Companies upon them. No one else would have dared. All the blue canvas armed and marching! He will go through with it. He will go through."
He was silent for a little while. "This Sleeper8," he said, and stopped.
"Yes," said Graham. "Well?"
The senile voice sank to a confidential9 whisper, the dim, pale face came close. "The real Sleeper--"
"Yes," said Graham.
"Died years ago."
"What?" said Graham, sharply.
"Years ago. Died. Years ago."
"You don't say so!" said Graham.
"I do. I do say so. He died. This Sleeper who's woke up--they changed in the night. A poor, drugged insensible creature. But I mustn't tell all I know. I mustn't tell all I know."
For a little while he muttered inaudibly. His secret was too much for him. "I don't know the ones that put him to sleep--that was before my time--but I know the man who injected the stimulants10 and woke him again. It was ten to one--wake or kill. Wake or kill. Ostrog's way."
Graham was so astonished at these things that he had to interrupt, to make the old man repeat his words, to re-question vaguely11, before he was sure of the meaning and folly12 of what he heard. And his awakening13 had not been natural! Was that an old man's senile superstition14, too, or had it any truth in it? Feeling in the dark corners of his memory, he presently came on something that might conceivably be an impression of some such stimulating15 effect. It dawned upon him that he had happened upon a lucky encounter, that at last he might learn something of the new age. The old man wheezed16 awhile and spat17, and then the piping, reminiscent voice resumed:
"The first time they rejected him. I've followed it all."
"Rejected whom?" said Graham. "The Sleeper?"
"Sleeper? _No_. Ostrog. He was terrible--terrible! And he was promised then, promised certainly the next time. Fools they were--not to be more afraid of him. Now all the city's his millstone, and such as we dust ground upon it. Dust ground upon it. Until he set to work--the workers cut each other's throats, and murdered a Chinaman or a Labour policeman at times, and left the rest of us in peace. Dead bodies! Robbing! Darkness! Such a thing hasn't been this gross of years. Eh!--but 'tis ill on small folks when the great fall out! It's ill."
"Did you say--there had not been--what?--for a gross of years?"
"Eh?" said the old man.
The old man said something about clipping his words, and made him repeat this a third time. "Fighting and slaying18, and weapons in hand, and fools bawling19 freedom and the like," said the old man. "Not in all my life has there been that. These are like the old days--for sure--when the Paris people broke out--three gross of years ago. That's what I mean hasn't been. But it's the world's way. It had to come back. I know. I know. This five years Ostrog has been working, and there has been trouble and trouble, and hunger and threats and high talk and arms. Blue canvas and murmurs20. No one safe. Everything sliding and slipping. And now here we are! Revolt and fighting, and the Council come to its end."
"You are rather well-informed on these things," said Graham.
"I know what I hear. It isn't all Babble21 Machine with me."
"No," said Graham, wondering what Babble Machine might be. "And you are certain this Ostrog--you are certain Ostrog organised this rebellion and arranged for the waking of the Sleeper? Just to assert himself--because he was not elected to the Council?"
"Everyone knows that, I should think," said the old man. "Except--just fools. He meant to be master somehow. In the Council or not. Everyone who knows anything knows that. And here we are with dead bodies lying in the dark! Why, where have you been if you haven't heard all about the trouble between Ostrog and the Verneys? And what do you think the troubles are about? The Sleeper? Eh? You think the Sleeper's real and woke of his own accord--eh?"
"I'm a dull man, older than I look, and forgetful," said Graham. "Lots of things that have happened--especially of late years--. If I was the Sleeper, to tell you the truth, I couldn't know less about them."
"Eh!" said the voice. "Old, are you? You don't sound so very old! But it's not everyone keeps his memory to my time of life--truly. But these notorious things! But you're not so old as me--not nearly so old as me. Well! I ought not to judge other men by myself, perhaps. I'm young--for so old a man. Maybe you're old for so young."
"That's it," said Graham. "And I've a queer history. I know very little. And history! Practically I know no history. The Sleeper and Julius Caesar are all the same to me. It's interesting to hear you talk of these things."
"I know a few things," said the old man. "I know a thing or two. But--. Hark!"
The two men became silent, listening. There was a heavy thud, a concussion22 that made their seat shiver. The passers-by stopped, shouted to one another. The old man was full of questions; he shouted to a man who passed near. Graham, emboldened23 by his example, got up and accosted24 others. None knew what had happened.
He returned to the seat and found the old man muttering vague interrogations in an undertone. For a while they said nothing to one another.
The sense of this gigantic struggle, so near and yet so remote, oppressed Graham's imagination. Was this old man right, was the report of the people right, and were the revolutionaries winning? Or were they all in error, and were the red guards driving all before them? At any time the flood of warfare25 might pour into this silent quarter of the city and seize upon him again. It behoved him to learn all he could while there was time. He turned suddenly to the old man with a question and left it unsaid. But his motion moved the old man to speech again.
"Eh! but how things work together!" said the old man. "This Sleeper that all the fools put their trust in! I've the whole history of it--I was always a good one for histories. When I was a boy--I'm that old--I used to read printed books. You'd hardly think it. Likely you've seen none--they rot and dust so--and the Sanitary26 Company burns them to make ashlarite. But they were convenient in their dirty way. One learnt a lot. These new-fangled Babble Machines--they don't seem new-fangled to you, eh?--they're easy to hear, easy to forget. But I've traced all the Sleeper business from the first."
"You will scarcely believe it," said Graham slowly, "I'm so ignorant--I've been so preoccupied27 in my own little affairs, my circumstances have been so odd--I know nothing of this Sleeper's history. Who was he?"
"Eh!" said the old man. "I know, I know. He was a poor nobody, and set on a playful woman, poor soul! And he fell into a trance. There's the old things they had, those brown things--silver photographs--still showing him as he lay, a gross and a half years ago--a gross and a half of years."
"Set on a playful woman, poor soul," said Graham softly to himself, and then aloud, "Yes--well go on."
"You must know he had a cousin named Warming, a solitary28 man without children, who made a big fortune speculating in roads--the first Eadhamite roads. But surely you've heard? No? Why? He bought all the patent rights and made a big company. In those days there were grosses of grosses of separate businesses and business companies. Grosses of grosses! His roads killed the railroads--the old things--in two dozen years; he bought up and Eadhamited the tracks. And because he didn't want to break up his great property or let in shareholders29, he left it all to the Sleeper, and put it under a Board of Trustees that he had picked and trained. He knew then the Sleeper wouldn't wake, that he would go on sleeping, sleeping till he died. He knew that quite well! And plump! a man in the United States, who had lost two sons in a boat accident, followed that up with another great bequest30. His trustees found themselves with a dozen myriads31 of lions'-worth or more of property at the very beginning."
"What was his name?"
"Graham."
"No--I mean--that American's."
"Isbister."
"Isbister!" cried Graham. "Why, I don't even know the name."
"Of course not," said the old man. "Of course not. People don't learn much in the schools nowadays. But I know all about him. He was a rich American who went from England, and he left the Sleeper even more than Warming. How he made it? That I don't know. Something about pictures by machinery32. But he made it and left it, and so the Council had its start. It was just a council of trustees at first."
"And how did it grow?"
"Eh!--but you're not up to things. Money attracts money--and twelve brains are better than one. They played it cleverly. They worked politics with money, and kept on adding to the money by working currency and tariffs33. They grew--they grew. And for years the twelve trustees hid the growing of the Sleeper's estate under double names and company titles and all that. The Council spread by title deed, mortgage, share, every political party, every newspaper they bought. If you listen to the old stories you will see the Council growing and growing. Billions and billions of lions at last--the Sleeper's estate. And all growing out of a whim--out of this Warming's will, and an accident to Isbister's sons.
"Men are strange," said the old man. "The strange thing to me is how the Council worked together so long. As many as twelve. But they worked in cliques34 from the first. And they've slipped back. In my young days speaking of the Council was like an ignorant man speaking of God. We didn't think they could do wrong. We didn't know of their women and all that! Or else I've got wiser.
"Men are strange," said the old man. "Here are you, young and ignorant, and me--sevendy years old, and I might reasonably before getting--explaining it all to you short and clear.
"Sevendy," he said, "sevendy, and I hear and see--hear better than I see. And reason clearly, and keep myself up to all the happenings of things. Sevendy!
"Life is strange. I was twaindy before Ostrog was a baby. I remember him long before he'd pushed his way to the head of the Wind Vanes Control. I've seen many changes. Eh! I've worn the blue. And at last I've come to see this crush and darkness and tumult35 and dead men carried by in heaps on the ways. And all his doing! All his doing!"
His voice died away in scarcely articulate praises of Ostrog.
Graham thought. "Let me see," he said, "if I have it right."
He extended a hand and ticked off points upon his fingers. "The Sleeper has been asleep--"
"Changed," said the old man.
"Perhaps. And meanwhile the Sleeper's property grew in the hands of Twelve Trustees, until it swallowed up nearly all the great ownership of the world. The Twelve Trustees--by virtue36 of this property have become masters of the world. Because they are the paying power--just as the old English Parliament used to be--"
"Eh!" said the old man. "That's so--that's a good comparison. You're not so--"
"And now this Ostrog--has suddenly revolutionised the world by waking the Sleeper--whom no one but the superstitious37, common people had ever dreamt would wake again--raising the Sleeper to claim his property from the Council, after all these years."
The old man endorsed38 this statement with a cough. "It's strange," he said, "to meet a man who learns these things for the first time to-night."
"Aye," said Graham, "it's strange."
"Have you been in a Pleasure City?" said the old man. "All my life I've longed--" He laughed. "Even now," he said, "I could enjoy a little fun. Enjoy seeing things, anyhow." He mumbled39 a sentence Graham did not understand.
"The Sleeper--when did he awake?" said Graham suddenly.
"Three days ago."
"Where is he?"
"Ostrog has him. He escaped from the Council not four hours ago. My dear sir, where were you at the time? He was in the hall of the markets--where the fighting has been. All the city was screaming about it. All the Babble Machines. Everywhere it was shouted. Even the fools who speak for the Council were admitting it. Everyone was rushing off to see him--everyone was getting arms. Were you drunk or asleep? And even then! But you're joking! Surely you're pretending. It was to stop the shouting of the Babble Machines and prevent the people gathering40 that they turned off the electricity--and put this damned darkness upon us. Do you mean to say--?"
"I had heard the Sleeper was rescued," said Graham. "But--to come back a minute. Are you sure Ostrog has him?"
"He won't let him go," said the old man.
"And the Sleeper. Are you sure he is not genuine? I have never heard--"
"So all the fools think. So they think. As if there wasn't a thousand things that were never heard. I know Ostrog too well for that. Did I tell you? In a way I'm a sort of relation of Ostrog's. A sort of relation. Through my daughter-in-law."
"I suppose--"
"Well?"
"I suppose there's no chance of this Sleeper asserting himself. I suppose he's certain to be a puppet--in Ostrog's hands or the Council's, as soon as the struggle is over."
"In Ostrog's hands--certainly. Why shouldn't he be a puppet? Look at his position. Everything done for him, every pleasure possible. Why should he want to assert himself?"
"What are these Pleasure Cities?" said Graham, abruptly41.
The old man made him repeat the question. When at last he was assured of Graham's words, he nudged him violently. "That's _too_ much," said he. "You're poking42 fun at an old man. I've been suspecting you know more than you pretend."
"Perhaps I do," said Graham. "But no! why should I go on acting43? No, I do not know what a Pleasure City is."
The old man laughed in an intimate way.
"What is more, I do not know how to read your letters, I do not know what money you use, I do not know what foreign countries there are. I do not know where I am. I cannot count. I do not know where to get food, nor drink, nor shelter."
"Come, come," said the old man, "if you had a glass of drink now, would you put it in your ear or your eye?"
"I want you to tell me all these things."
"He, he! Well, gentlemen who dress in silk must have their fun." A withered44 hand caressed45 Graham's arm for a moment. "Silk. Well, well! But, all the same, I wish I was the man who was put up as the Sleeper. He'll have a fine time of it. All the pomp and pleasure. He's a queer looking face. When they used to let anyone go to see him, I've got tickets and been. The image of the real one, as the photographs show him, this substitute used to be. Yellow. But he'll get fed up. It's a queer world. Think of the luck of it. The luck of it. I expect he'll be sent to Capri. It's the best fun for a greener."
His cough overtook him again. Then he began mumbling46 enviously47 of pleasures and strange delights. "The luck of it, the luck of it! All my life I've been in London, hoping to get my chance."
"But you don't know that the Sleeper died," said Graham, suddenly.
The old man made him repeat his words.
"Men don't live beyond ten dozen. It's not in the order of things," said the old man. "I'm not a fool. Fools may believe it, but not me."
Graham became angry with the old man's assurance. "Whether you are a fool or not," he said, "it happens you are wrong about the Sleeper."
"Eh?"
"You are wrong about the Sleeper. I haven't told you before, but I will tell you now. You are wrong about the Sleeper."
"How do you know? I thought you didn't know anything--not even about Pleasure Cities."
Graham paused.
"You don't know," said the old man. "How are you to know? It's very few men--"
"I _am_ the Sleeper."
He had to repeat it.
There was a brief pause. "There's a silly thing to say, sir, if you'll excuse me. It might get you into trouble in a time like this," said the old man.
Graham, slightly dashed, repeated his assertion.
"I was saying I was the Sleeper. That years and years ago I did, indeed, fall asleep, in a little stone-built village, in the days when there were hedgerows, and villages, and inns, and all the countryside cut up into little pieces, little fields. Have you never heard of those days? And it is I--I who speak to you--who awakened48 again these four days since."
"Four days since!--the Sleeper! But they've _got_ the Sleeper. They have him and they won't let him go. Nonsense! You've been talking sensibly enough up to now. I can see it as though I was there. There will be Lincoln like a keeper just behind him; they won't let him go about alone. Trust them. You're a queer fellow. One of these fun pokers49. I see now why you have been clipping your words so oddly, but--"
He stopped abruptly, and Graham could see his gesture.
"As if Ostrog would let the Sleeper run about alone! No, you're telling that to the wrong man altogether. Eh! as if I should believe. What's your game? And besides, we've been talking of the Sleeper."
Graham stood up. "Listen," he said. "I am the Sleeper."
"You're an odd man," said the old man, "to sit here in the dark, talking clipped, and telling a lie of that sort. But--"
Graham's exasperation50 fell to laughter. "It is preposterous51," he cried. "Preposterous. The dream must end. It gets wilder and wilder. Here am I--in this damned twilight52--I never knew a dream in twilight before--an anachronism by two hundred years and trying to persuade an old fool that I am myself, and meanwhile--Ugh!"
He moved in gusty53 irritation54 and went striding. In a moment the old man was pursuing him. "Eh! but don't go!" cried the old man. "I'm an old fool, I know. Don't go. Don't leave me in all this darkness."
Graham hesitated, stopped. Suddenly the folly of telling his secret flashed into his mind.
"I didn't mean to offend you--disbelieving you," said the old man coming near. "It's no manner of harm. Call yourself the Sleeper if it pleases you. 'Tis a foolish trick--"
Graham hesitated, turned abruptly and went on his way.
For a time he heard the old man's hobbling pursuit and his wheezy cries receding55. But at last the darkness swallowed him, and Graham saw him no more.
1 assent | |
v.批准,认可;n.批准,认可 | |
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2 rogues | |
n.流氓( rogue的名词复数 );无赖;调皮捣蛋的人;离群的野兽 | |
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3 frankly | |
adv.坦白地,直率地;坦率地说 | |
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4 apparently | |
adv.显然地;表面上,似乎 | |
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5 scrutiny | |
n.详细检查,仔细观察 | |
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6 revolving | |
adj.旋转的,轮转式的;循环的v.(使)旋转( revolve的现在分词 );细想 | |
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7 ransacked | |
v.彻底搜查( ransack的过去式和过去分词 );抢劫,掠夺 | |
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8 sleeper | |
n.睡眠者,卧车,卧铺 | |
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9 confidential | |
adj.秘(机)密的,表示信任的,担任机密工作的 | |
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10 stimulants | |
n.兴奋剂( stimulant的名词复数 );含兴奋剂的饮料;刺激物;激励物 | |
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11 vaguely | |
adv.含糊地,暖昧地 | |
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12 folly | |
n.愚笨,愚蠢,蠢事,蠢行,傻话 | |
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13 awakening | |
n.觉醒,醒悟 adj.觉醒中的;唤醒的 | |
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14 superstition | |
n.迷信,迷信行为 | |
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15 stimulating | |
adj.有启发性的,能激发人思考的 | |
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16 wheezed | |
v.喘息,发出呼哧呼哧的喘息声( wheeze的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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17 spat | |
n.口角,掌击;v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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18 slaying | |
杀戮。 | |
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19 bawling | |
v.大叫,大喊( bawl的现在分词 );放声大哭;大声叫出;叫卖(货物) | |
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20 murmurs | |
n.低沉、连续而不清的声音( murmur的名词复数 );低语声;怨言;嘀咕 | |
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21 babble | |
v.含糊不清地说,胡言乱语地说,儿语 | |
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22 concussion | |
n.脑震荡;震动 | |
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23 emboldened | |
v.鼓励,使有胆量( embolden的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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24 accosted | |
v.走过去跟…讲话( accost的过去式和过去分词 );跟…搭讪;(乞丐等)上前向…乞讨;(妓女等)勾搭 | |
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25 warfare | |
n.战争(状态);斗争;冲突 | |
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26 sanitary | |
adj.卫生方面的,卫生的,清洁的,卫生的 | |
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27 preoccupied | |
adj.全神贯注的,入神的;被抢先占有的;心事重重的v.占据(某人)思想,使对…全神贯注,使专心于( preoccupy的过去式) | |
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28 solitary | |
adj.孤独的,独立的,荒凉的;n.隐士 | |
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29 shareholders | |
n.股东( shareholder的名词复数 ) | |
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30 bequest | |
n.遗赠;遗产,遗物 | |
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31 myriads | |
n.无数,极大数量( myriad的名词复数 ) | |
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32 machinery | |
n.(总称)机械,机器;机构 | |
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33 tariffs | |
关税制度; 关税( tariff的名词复数 ); 关税表; (旅馆或饭店等的)收费表; 量刑标准 | |
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34 cliques | |
n.小集团,小圈子,派系( clique的名词复数 ) | |
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35 tumult | |
n.喧哗;激动,混乱;吵闹 | |
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36 virtue | |
n.德行,美德;贞操;优点;功效,效力 | |
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37 superstitious | |
adj.迷信的 | |
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38 endorsed | |
vt.& vi.endorse的过去式或过去分词形式v.赞同( endorse的过去式和过去分词 );在(尤指支票的)背面签字;在(文件的)背面写评论;在广告上说本人使用并赞同某产品 | |
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39 mumbled | |
含糊地说某事,叽咕,咕哝( mumble的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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40 gathering | |
n.集会,聚会,聚集 | |
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41 abruptly | |
adv.突然地,出其不意地 | |
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42 poking | |
n. 刺,戳,袋 vt. 拨开,刺,戳 vi. 戳,刺,捅,搜索,伸出,行动散慢 | |
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43 acting | |
n.演戏,行为,假装;adj.代理的,临时的,演出用的 | |
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44 withered | |
adj. 枯萎的,干瘪的,(人身体的部分器官)因病萎缩的或未发育良好的 动词wither的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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45 caressed | |
爱抚或抚摸…( caress的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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46 mumbling | |
含糊地说某事,叽咕,咕哝( mumble的现在分词 ) | |
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47 enviously | |
adv.满怀嫉妒地 | |
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48 awakened | |
v.(使)醒( awaken的过去式和过去分词 );(使)觉醒;弄醒;(使)意识到 | |
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49 pokers | |
n.拨火铁棒( poker的名词复数 );纸牌;扑克;(通常指人)(坐或站得)直挺挺的 | |
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50 exasperation | |
n.愤慨 | |
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51 preposterous | |
adj.荒谬的,可笑的 | |
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52 twilight | |
n.暮光,黄昏;暮年,晚期,衰落时期 | |
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53 gusty | |
adj.起大风的 | |
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54 irritation | |
n.激怒,恼怒,生气 | |
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55 receding | |
v.逐渐远离( recede的现在分词 );向后倾斜;自原处后退或避开别人的注视;尤指问题 | |
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