He set out on a day in late October, wild and windy, full of ragged4 torn clouds of light that came and went from grey to gold and back to grey again. And everything that happened on that savage5 day he was to remember later with a literal and blazing intensity6.
Autumn had come sharp and quick that year. October had been full of frost and nipping days, the hills were glorious that year as Eugene had never seen them before. Now, only a day or two before, there had been, despite the early season, a sudden and heavy fall of snow. It still lay, light but fleecy, in the fields; and on the great bulk of the hills it lay in a pattern of shining white, stark7 greys and blacks, and the colours of the leaves, which now had fallen thickly and had lost their first sharp vividness, but were still burning with a dull massed molten glow.
An hour away, and twenty-five miles from home, the car had drawn8 up before the post office of a mountain village or resort which lay at the crest9 of the last barrier of the hills, before the road dropped sharply down the mountain-side to South Carolina.
While they were halted here, another car drove up — an open, glittering, and expensive-looking projectile10 of light grey — and in it were three young men from home, two of whom Eugene knew. This car drew up abreast11, stopped, and he saw that its driver was Robert Weaver12. And although he had not seen the other youth since a midnight visit Robert had made to his room in Cambridge, the latter peered over towards him owlishly and without a word of greeting and with that abrupt13, feverish14, and fragmentary speech that was characteristic of him and was constantly becoming more dissonant15 and broken, he barked out:
“Who’s in there? Who’s that sitting up there in the front seat? Is that you, Gene2?” he called.
When Gene assured him that it was, Robert asked where he was going. When he told him “Blackstone,” he demanded at once that he leave the service car and come with him.
“We’re going there, too,” he said. Turning to his comrades, he added earnestly:
“Aren’t we? Isn’t that where we’re going, boys?”
The two young men to whom he spoke16 now laughed boisterously17, crying: “Yeah! That’s right! That’s where we’re going, Robert,” and one of them added with a solemn gravity:
“We’re going to — Blackstone,” here a slight convulsion seemed to seize his throat, he swallowed hard, hiccoughed, and concluded, “to see a football game”— a statement which again set them off into roars of boisterous18 laughter. Then they all shouted at Eugene:
“Come on! Come on! Get in! We’ve lots of room.”
Eugene got out of the service car, paid the driver, took the small hand-case he had, and got into the other car with Robert and his two companions. They drove off fast, and almost immediately they were dropping down the mountain, along the sinuous19 curves and turns of the steep road.
Robert’s two companions on this journey were young men whom Eugene had not known in boyhood, with whom he had now only a speaking acquaintance, and both of whom were recent comers to the town. The older of these two was a man named Emmet Blake, and he now sat beside Robert on the front seat of the car.
Emmet Blake was a man of twenty-seven years, a frail20 and almost wasted-looking figure of medium height, straight black hair, black eyes, and a thin, febrile, and corrupted-looking face which, although almost dead-white in its colour, was given a kind of dark and feverish vitality21 by a faint thin smile that seemed always to hover22 about the edges of his mouth, and the dark unnatural23 glitter of his black eyes.
He lived a reckless and dissipated life and drank heavily: time after time, after a h?morrhage of the lungs, he had been taken to a sanatorium in an ambulance, and his death had seemed to be a matter of only a few hours. And time after time he had come out again, and immediately started on another wild spree of women and corn whisky with Robert and others of the same breed. He was well-off as to money, and lived expensively, because he was a nephew of George Blake, the great Middle–Western manufacturer of cheap motor cars, which in twenty years’ time had created twenty thousand jokes and glutted24 the highways of the earth in twenty million tinny and glittering repetitions.
The name of the other youth, who was Eugene’s own age and sat beside him on the back seat, was Kitchin. He was a tall, dark, handsome fellow, with agreeable manners and a pleasant voice, the nephew of a retired25 physician in the town but not native to the place. Eugene had seen him on the streets, but had never talked to him before. It was evident that both Robert and his two friends had been drinking, although not heavily: there was in their manner the subdued26 yet wild and mounting elation27 of young men when they begin to drink. They laughed a great deal, rather hilariously28, and for no good reason: they insisted frequently that they were going to the town of Blackstone to see a football game, an announcement which would set them off again in roars of laughter.
Almost as soon as Eugene got into the car, and even as they started off again, Blake thrust his thin hand into the leather pocket of the door beside him, produced a bottle that was three-quarters full of Scotch29 whisky, and turning, gave it to Eugene, saying:
“Take a big one, Gant. We’re all ahead of you.”
He drank long and deep, gulping30 the fiery31 liquor down his throat recklessly, feeling suddenly an almost desperate sense of release from the grey misery32 of hopelessness which had crushed him down for days now, since the letter had come. When he had finished he handed the bottle back to Emmet Blake, who took it, looked at it with a thin, evil, speculative33 smile, and said:
“Well, that’s pretty good. What do you say, Robert? Shall we let him pass on that?”
“Hell, no!” cried Robert hoarsely34, looking swiftly round at the bottle. “That’s no drink! Make him take a good one, Emmet. You’ve got to do better than that if you keep up with us,” he cried, and then he burst out suddenly in his staccato laugh, shaking his head to himself as he bent35 over the wheel, and crying out: “Lord! Lord!”
Blake handed Eugene the bottle again, and he drank some more. Then Kitchin took the bottle and drank; he handed it back to Emmet Blake, who drank, and Blake handed it to Robert, who took it with one hand, his face turned slightly from the wheel, his eyes still fastened on the road, and drank until the bottle was empty. Then he flung it away from him across his arm. The bottle went sailing out across the road and down the gulch36 or deep ravine that sloped away beside them far down: the bottle struck a rock, exploding brilliantly in a thousand glittering fragments, and they all roared happily, and cheered.
They had finished up that bottle in one round of gulps37 and swallows, passing it from hand to hand as they rushed down the mountain-side, and almost instantly they were at work on a beverage38 of a yet more instant and fiery power — raw, white corn-whisky, in a gallon jug39, clear as water, rank and nauseous to an unaccustomed throat, strong and instant as the kick of a mule40, fiery, choking, formidable, and savage. They hooked their thumbs into the handle of the jug and brought the stuff across their shoulders with a free-hand motion; they let the wide neck pour into their tilted41 throats with a fat thick gurgle, and they gulped42 that raw stuff down with greedy gulpings like water going down a gully drain.
It was a drink that would have felled an ox, a terrific lightning-blast of alcohol that would have thrown Polyphemus to the earth; and yet it was not drink alone that made them drunk that day. For they were all young men, and they had shouted, sung, and roared with laughter, and pounded one another with affectionate delight as they rushed on — and it was not drink alone that made them drunk.
For they felt that everything on earth was good and glorious, that everything on earth was made for their delight, that they could do no wrong and make no error, and that such invincible43 strength was in them that trees would fall beneath their stroke, the immortal44 hills bow down before their stride, and that nothing in the world could stop them.
And for Eugene it seemed that everything had come to life for him at once — that he had emerged instantly and victoriously45 from the horror of shame, the phantasmal and dreamlike unreality that had held him in its spell. It seemed to him that all the earth had come to life again in shapes of deathless and familiar brightness, that he had gloriously reentered a life he thought he had lost for ever, and that all the plain priceless joy and glory of the earth was his, as it had never been before.
And first of all, and with an almost intolerable relief and happiness, he was conscious of the pangs46 of hunger: his famished47 belly48 and his withered49 stomach, which had for days shrunk wearily and with disgust from food, now, under the stimulation51 of a ravenous53 hunger, fairly pleaded for nourishment54. He thought of food — food in a hundred glorious shapes and varieties: the literal sensual images of food blazed in his mind like paintings from the brush of a Dutch master, and it seemed to him that no one had ever painted, spoken, or written about food before in a way that would do it justice.
Later, these were the things Eugene would remember from that day with a living joy, for it was as if he had been born again, or discovered the world anew in all its glory. And besides all this — a part, an element in all this whole harmonious55 design of triumphant56 joy and rediscovery — was the way the hills had looked that day as they came down the mountain, the smell of the air which was mellow57 and autumnal, and yet had in it the premonitory breath of frost and sharpness, and the wild joy, power, and ecstasy58 that had filled their hearts, their throats, their lives — the sense of victory, triumph, and invincible strength, and of some rare, glorious, and intolerable happiness that was pending59 for them, and which seemed to swell60 the tremendous and exulting61 music of that magic day.
Around them, above them, below them — for the living and shining air of autumn, from the embrowned autumnal earth, from the great shapes of the hills behind them with their molten mass of colour — dull browns, rich bitter reds, dark bronze, and mellow yellow — from the raw crude clay of the piedmont earth and the great brown stubble of the cotton-fields — from a thousand impalpable and unutterable things, there came this glorious breath of triumph and delight. It was late October, there was a smell of smoke upon the air, an odour of burning leaves, the barking of a dog, a misty62 red, a pollenated gold in the rich, fading, sorrowful, and exultant63 light of the day — and far off, a sound of great wheels pounding on a rail, the wailing64 whistle, and the tolling65 bell of a departing train.
And finally, the immortal visage of the earth itself, with the soaring and limitless undulations of its blue ranges, the great bulk of the autumn hills, immense and near, the rugged66, homely67, and familiar trees — the pines, oaks, chestnuts68, maples69, locusts70 — the homely look of the old red clay — the unforgettable and indescribable naturalness of that earth — with its rudeness, wildness, richness, rawness, ugliness, fathomless71 mystery and utter familiarity, and finally the lonely, haunting, and enchanted72 music that it made — the strange spirit of time and solitude73 that hovered74 above it eternally, and which can never be described, but which may be evoked75 by a cow-bell broken by the wind in distant valleys, the lonely whistle of a departing train, or simply a sinuous gust50 of wind that smokes its way across coarse mountain grasses when spring comes — all this, which Eugene had felt and known in his childhood, and yet had never had a tongue to utter, he seemed now to know and understand so well that he had himself become its tongue and utterance76, the more its child because he had been so long away from it, the more its eye because he now saw it again as it must have seemed to the first men who ever saw it, with the eyes of discovery, love, and recognition.
And yet, for him all these things spoke instantly, intolerably, exultantly77, not of home, return, and settlement, but of one image, which now burned for ever in his brain, rose like a triumphant music in his heart. And that image was the image of the enchanted city, in which, it now seemed, all the frenzy78 and unrest of his spirit would find a certain goal and triumph, and toward which everything on earth, and all the hope and joy now rising in his heart, was tending.
When they got down off the mountain into South Carolina they were very drunk. On a dusty sand-clay road between some cotton-fields they stopped the car, and walked out into the fields to make water. The cotton stood stiff and dry and fleecy in its pods, the coarse brown stalks rose up in limitless planted rows, and underneath79, he could see the old and homely visage of the red-clay earth.
At one edge of the field, and seeming very far away and lonely-looking, there was a negro shanty80, and behind this a desolate81 wooded stretch of pine. Over all the earth at once, now that the roar of the engine had stopped, there was an immense and brooding quietness, a drowsed autumnal fume82 and warmth, immensely desolate and mournful, holding somehow a tragic83 prophecy of winter that must come, and death, and yet touched with the lonely, mournful and exultant mystery of the earth.
Eugene pulled several of the big cotton-stalks out of the dry red earth, thrust one through the button-hole of his coat lapel, and tore it through exultantly, although the stalk was two feet long. Then he reeled back toward the car again, holding the other stalks of cotton in his hands, got into the car, and at once began to talk to his companions about the cotton — ending up in a passionate85 oration86 about the hills, the fields, the cotton and the earth — trying to tell them all about “the South” and making of the stalks of cotton and “the South” a kind of symbol, as young men will, although they all felt and acted just as young men anywhere would do.
But at that moment, all Eugene was trying to say about his years away from home, and his return, and how he had discovered his own land again and was, “by God!” one of them — waving the stalks of cotton as he talked, and finding the whole core and kernel87 of all he wished to say in these stalks of cotton — all of this, although incoherent, drunken, and confused, seemed so eloquent88 and beautiful to him, so truthful89, passionate, and exact — that he began to weep for joy as he talked to them. And they — they were, of course, delighted: they howled with laughter, cheered enthusiastically, slapped him on the back, and shook hands all round, crying —“By God! Listen to him talk! . . . Give ’em hell, son! We’re with you! . . . Hot-damn! Thataway, boy! . . . Stay with ’em! . . . Whee!”
Meanwhile, Robert was driving at terrific speed. They had begun to rip and tear along between the cotton-fields and over the dusty sand-clay roads, mistaking the screams of women and the shouts of men, as they swerved90 by their cars and wagons91 in a cloud of yellow dust and at a murderous clip, for admiring applause and enthusiastic cheers, an illusion which only spurred them on to greater efforts.
The upshot of it was that they finally tore into town, careening hideously92 along a central street and with no slackening of their speed whatever. The excited people in that part of the State had been phoning in about them for the last fifteen miles of their mad journey, and now they were halted suddenly at sight of the police, who stood lined up across the street in a double row — big, red-faced, country cops — to stop them.
The first brilliant, sparkling and wildly soaring effects of their intoxication94 had now worn off and, although they still felt full of power and a savage rending95 strength, the corn whisky was now smouldering in their veins96 more dully and with a sombre and brutal97 drunkenness. Eugene seemed to see all shapes and figures clearly — the coarse red faces of the country cops and their clumsy lumbering98 bodies, and the street drowsy99 and dusty in the warmish autumn afternoon.
The grasses on the lawns of houses were faded, sere100 and withered-looking, the leaves upon the trees had thinned and hung yellowed, dry and dead, and in the gutters101 a few dead leaves stirred dryly, a few scampered102 dryly in the streets before a moment’s gust of wind, and then lay still again.
Robert slowed down and stopped before that solid wall of beefy country blue and red: the police surrounded them and clambered heavily over the sides of the car, two standing103 on the running-boards, two on either side of Eugene on the back seat, and one with Robert and Emmet Blake up front.
“All right, boys,” said one of them, good-naturedly and casually104 enough, in the full, sonorous105 and somewhat howling voice of the countryman, “drive on down thar to the station-house now.”
“Yes, SIR! Yes, SIR!” Robert replied at once in a meek106 and obedient tone, and with a comical drunken alacrity107. “How do you get there, Captain?” he said with a cunning and flattering ingratiation.
“Right down this here street to your right,” said the policeman in his drawling and countrified tone, “until you come to that ‘air second turning where you see that ‘air f’ar hydrant. Turn in to the left thar,” he said.
“Yes, sir!” said Robert heartily108, starting the car again. “We’re all strangers here,” he lied, as if he hoped this lie might make amends109 for them. “We don’t know our way about yet.”
“Well,” the policeman drawled with a kind of ugly heartiness110, “maybe the next time you come back you’ll be better acquainted here,” he said, winking111 at his comrades, and they all guffawed112. “We’re glad to see you, boys,” he continued, still with this ugly falseness of good nature in his tone. “We been hearin’ about you,” he said, winking at his fellows again, “an’ we wanted to git acquainted.”
Here the policemen laughed again with sonorous countrified appreciation113 of their spokesman’s wit.
The policemen were all big beefy men, with hearty114 drawling voices, red countrified faces. They had large square feet, wore dusty-looking black slouch hats with a wide brim, and were dressed in rather gaudy115 but slovenly116-looking uniforms, with stripes of gold braid running up the sides of their baggy117 trousers, and with the lower brass118 buttons of their heavy blue coats unbuttoned, exposing areas of soiled shirts and paunchy bellies119. Their faces had a look of a slow but powerful energy, a fathomless and mindless animal good nature, and at the same time a fathomless and mindless animal cruelty — instant, volcanic120, and murderous — written terribly, somehow, into their wide, thin and horribly cruel mouths, in which there was legible a vitality that had all the wild and sensual force of nature packed into it, and was therefore beyond nature — almost supernatural — in its savage and mindless qualities.
He had seen them standing idly on the corners of the little towns, huge and slovenly, swinging their thonged121 clubs in the great muttons of their hands, surveying with their great red faces and their wide thin mouths of fathomless cruelty and good nature the crowds that swarmed122 around them. He had heard their drawling howling accents of the country, that had all of the moisture and distance of the earth in them, and seen their slow minds wake to a mindless and murderous fury. Once as a child he had seen one of them, a ponderous123 giant so huge he lurched from side to side when he walked, and seemed to fill up the street with his size, beat a drunken old man — a little howling integument124 of bone and gristle — to death with his club, smashing the little old man across the skull125 until the blood rushed out in torrents126 through his sparse127 silvery hair, lacing its way in channels of brilliant red across his face and through his beard until it seemed incredible so small and old a man could have such fountains of bright blood in him.
And these huge creatures evoked for Eugene a whole history of this earth and people, monstrous128, savage, and unutterable — a congruent and unspeakable legend which he knew, and all of them knew, down to the roots, and which he could not speak about and had to speak about, somehow, or die. For in these men there was evident not only the savage and mindless energy of the earth itself, with all that was wild, sensual, fecund129, cruel and good-natured — the whole weather of life — but there was also evident the fear, the shame, the horror that had crushed them beneath its ocean weight of nameless and cowering130 dread131 and broken or destroyed their souls.
The two policemen who had clambered into the back seat of the car and now sat on each side of Eugene had these mountainous and fleshy figures, heavy, yet with a kind of solid and ugly softness, meaty, and without the muscular and sinewy132 leanness of young men. The back seat of the car was a narrow one — the car was a new “sports model” designed only for four people — and now the huge fleshy figures of these two policemen, wedged against Eugene, gave him a feeling of disgust and revulsion.
Nevertheless, the feeling of exultant and jubilant power had not yet worn off, and although he had understood at once, when he saw the men lined up across the street, that they were under arrest and would be taken to the city jail, this sordid133 prospect134 caused him no uneasiness whatever. Rather, the feeling of drunken joy was still so powerful in him that everything on earth seemed good, and everything that happened wonderful. He hailed the experience of being arrested and taken to jail exultantly as if some fortunate and glorious experience was in store for him, and his exuberant135 affection for the world was so great that he even liked the policemen.
Eugene howled with laughter, smote136 them on their broad backs, flung his arms out and around their shoulders, saying, “By God, you’re fine fellows, both of you, and you’ve got to have a drink!”
At this Robert laughed uneasily, saying to the policemen:
“Don’t pay any attention to him! We haven’t got anything to drink — I swear we haven’t.”
One of them had been rummaging137 around, however, and now triumphantly138 produced the jug from its hiding place beneath Blake’s legs.
“Here it is, boys,” he cried, as he displayed it. “I’ve got it.”
The glass jug was almost empty, but there was still perhaps an inch of the whisky at the bottom. Robert’s face had a worried look, for the law was such that a capture of this sort might also mean the confiscation139 of the owner’s car.
Blake, meanwhile, had been talking in a low, craftily140 persuasive141 tone of drunken insinuation and bribery142 to the policeman up front, saying:
“Now I know you boys don’t want to get us into any trouble. We weren’t doing anything wrong — just having a drink or two together and if you fellows will just forget about this thing, we’ll fix it up right with you — anything you say,” he whispered cunningly, “and get on out of town right now without anyone knowing a thing about it. What do you say, now? Come on! You can do it,” he said, with a leer of ingratiation.
The policeman to whom he spoke smiled good-naturedly, but said nothing. At this moment they drove up before the station-house, a shabby-looking little building of brick, with bars over the window, and which was situated143 on a side-street.
The shabby street looked warm, faded, sleepy, touched with the ghosts of autumn, but in an instant, as the police got out, opened the doors, and the gay men clambered down drunkenly among them, a rabble-rout of ragged negro boys, grinning, gape-mouthed countrymen with red faces, slouchy-looking barbers in their shirt-sleeves, and wormy-looking loafers, had gathered magically from nowhere, stood in a ring about them and snickered and shuffled144 about, pressed up to the barred windows and peered in curiously145 with shaded eyes as the policemen took them into the station.
As they started, Robert held back a little, and said hoarsely, and in a plaintive146, troubled voice to the policeman who had him by the arm:
“What are you taking us in here for? We weren’t doing anything. Honest we weren’t. What are you going to do to us?”
The policeman smiled good-humouredly, and then said in a hearty reassuring147 voice:
“Aw, we’re not goin’ to do anything to you. We were just afraid you boys might run into something and hurt yourself, that’s all. We’re just goin’ to take you in here, and let you stay here a little while until you feel better,” he said, at the same time winking at his fellows.
“Well,” said Robert sullenly148, casting a troubled and unwilling149 glance back at his shining car, “— I want to find my car here when I come out. Now if anything happens to that car, there’s going to be trouble,” he said ominously150.
“That car will be right here when you come out the way you left it,” the policeman said heartily. “No one is goin’ to touch it. No, sir! I’ll look after that car myself!” he said, winking again at the others.
“All right, then,” said Robert. “That’s all I want to know.”
Then they marched all of them into the station-house.
The room they entered was a large one, and at first, because they had come into it out of the brightness of the sun, and the swimming confusion of drunkenness and arrest, it was so dark Eugene could not distinguish clearly any of its features. Then he saw that it was a square, rather high room with worn wooden floors, wainscoting of a dark varnished151 brown, and above that rude calcimined walls of white. In the wall along the street there were, besides the door, two barred windows which were very dirty and not very large, and did not give much light.
At one end of the room, as they came in, there was a row of dull green lockers152, probably for the use of the police, and at the other end a high, square, somewhat majestical-looking desk, which was also of a dark maply-brown and which seemed to be built on an elevated rostrum or platform a few inches high. Over this desk a light with a green glass shade was burning, and behind it another large red-faced policeman was sitting. By his look of authority, and the military opulence153 of his slovenly uniform — for he had epaulets of thick gold braid upon his shoulders that would have glorified154 the uniform of a general in the Marine155 Corps156 — he seemed to be the superior in command.
As for the rest of the room, there was little decoration save for a row of worn and rickety-looking wooden chairs with rounded backs along the wall, and a liberal distribution of large brass spittoons which, to judge from the bare wooden boards around them, were used less frequently as receptacles than as targets, and obviously with uncertain success.
Finally, the whole place had the unforgettable look and smell that police-stations everywhere — and particularly those in little towns — have always had. Its stale dark air was impregnated with the odour of cheap cigars and tobacco-juice, of old worn varnished wood, of human sweat and urine and heavy wool, and with the strong tarry odour of a sanitary157 disinfectant. And somehow, in this stale, dark and weary odour, there was also a quality of terror, menace, and foreboding — as if the huge and dingy158 chronicle of human tragedy and error which this grim room had witnessed — all the brutal, shabby sinfulness of a little town — that swarming159, hideous93 and tawdry fraternity of poverty, vice3 and error — dredged from its rat-holes in the dark depths of old brick buildings, hunted out of cheap hotels, pool rooms, greasy160 little lunch rooms, nigger shacks161, and the rickety wooden brothels near the railroad tracks, with its vast brotherhood162 of scarred and battered163 men and women — chain-gang niggers, drunken country youths and cheap bootleggers, grimy prostitutes and all their furtive164 bawds and pimps, cutters, sluggers, slabbers, slashers, and brawlers — both those who live by vice and those who are its victims — this whole huge earth of pain and crime and misery had left the terrible imprint165 of its history so indelibly there that the weary air was impregnated with sorrow and fear, and the wood, walls, floors and ceilings were seasoned and ingrained with the substance of human wretchedness.
When they had come in, the police had lined up Eugene’s three companions before the imposing166 rostrum where the desk officer was sitting, but they had placed him carefully to one side against the wall, like an object too rare and precious for ordinary usage. Now, as the great man behind the desk glowered167 down gloomily and mistrustfully at them, one of the police spoke to the desk sergeant168 and, turning toward Eugene with a nod of the head, declared in a full countrified tone:
“This big ’un here’s the drunkest of the lot.”
And the enthroned law bent his gloomy gaze upon him with a hostile and suspicious look which said as plain as words that it was no more than he had suspected.
Eugene had not realized, in fact, until he felt that wall against his shoulders, how very drunk he was; but he was drunker now than he had ever been in all his life before. He could feel his back slide down along the wall, and then his bending knees would straighten with a jerk, and he would solemnly begin to slide up the wall again. Meanwhile the room swam and rocked and then was still before his eyes: the shapes of things would melt into a smear169, and then resolve into their proper selves once more.
And he was conscious that the police were searching him and his companions, patting their pockets to see if they carried weapons, examining wallets and letters for identifications, taking their watches from them, and arraigning170 them on a series of formal charges, some of which had no bearing on their case whatever. Drunk, assuredly, they were; disorderly they might have been — although it had not seemed so to them; of driving in a reckless manner they were guilty; but of resisting an officer in the performance of his duty they had been, up to that time, spotlessly innocent.
But such were the charges delivered against them in sonorous and countrified tones. And in the solemn voices of the policemen, the knowing and portentous171 way in which they searched the young men — as if they were a gang of armed desperadoes, and in a manner that smacked172 of correspondence-school detective methods — and finally in the solemn countrified tones of the one who had pointed173 to Eugene, saying: “This big ’un here’s the drunkest of the lot,” there was something comical and ludicrous.
But in their sense of banded authority, in the stubborn almost conspiratorial174 way in which they had now hardened in a group against the young men, forsaking175 the good-humoured and jovial176 manners which had heretofore distinguished177 them, there was something ugly and revolting — something stupid, provincial178, mob-like, and unreasoning, which told the young men plainly that “they had them” now, that they were “foreigners,” therefore suspect, and must bow their heads in silence to the obdurate179 and capricious tyrannies of a local and, for them, impregnable authority.
At length, the sonorous formalities of their arraignment180 having been completed, the sergeant having scrawled181 and written in his ledger182, the man looked up and ordered sternly:
“All right, boys! Take ’em back and lock ’em up!”
Then the young men were marched back along a corridor into a large two-storeyed room, which had brick walls and cement floors, two rows of dirty barred windows, a grey and gelid light, and a general feel of raw and clammy dankness. This room, which had a harsh angular steel-and-cement newness that the other did not have, seemed to be of more recent construction, and to have been added on to the front part of the jail. In this room, also, there were several rows of cells, ascending183 in tiers up to the ceiling. When they entered, the place was quiet, but immediately a drunken negress in one of the cells began to bawl184 and rave52 and sob185, smashing, hammering, and rattling186 the bars of her cell like a demented ape. There was everywhere a foul187 rank odour of undrained faecal matter, tempered with the odour of the tarry disinfectant, and cut more sharply with the acrid188 smell of some ammoniacal fluid.
At the first row of cells they paused, and the police in charge of Robert and Emmet Blake (for Eugene now discovered with a sense of shock that Kitchin was not with them) unlocked the doors of cells two and three and thrust Blake and Robert into them. The last, or end, cell in the row, Eugene now saw was intended for his occupancy and he stood waiting obediently, in the relaxed grip of one of the policemen, until his comrade should unlock the door.
Suddenly, as the door swung open, and Eugene stepped forward into the cell, his vision cleared somewhat, and he saw a young negro standing in the cell, beside the iron bed that projected from the wall, looking toward him with a startled expression on his face that suggested he had been asleep upon the cot, and had been rudely wakened by their entrance. Instantly, one fixed189 and all-obsessing belief began to burn in Eugene’s inflamed190 and drunken brain. He thought that he was being put here with this negro because the jail was crowded and the cell-space scanty191, and further — and this was the thing that maddened him and that he found intolerable — because, as the policeman had said when they arraigned192 the young men, “this big ’un here’s the drunkest of the lot,” and they thought he was too drunk to notice or to care about the advantage they were taking of him.
For this reason — and this reason only — he now acted as he did. As far as the negro himself was concerned, Eugene bore no grudge193 against him, and the feeling of shame and degradation194 which had swept over him in an overwhelming flood when he saw the cell and knew he was to be locked in it like an animal was so great that he would not have cared with whom he had to share that cell, if it had been the custom of the country so to share it. But the custom of the country was not so, he knew, and the belief that he was being put upon, his drunkenness taken advantage of, and that he was being dealt with less fairly than the others, now so stung his maddened pride that he turned and kicked the iron door back in the faces of the two policemen, just as they were closing it.
Then he started to come out of the cell. When he did, the two big red-faced policemen came running forward with a lumbering, panting, and somehow revolting clumsiness and tried to push him back into the cell. When this happened, something dark, grey, and terrible that he had never known before rose up in his soul — and this thing, which now came to him for the first time, was to return often in the savage years that followed.
As the police came rushing towards Eugene his fury and desperation were so great that he felt little or no fear, but the sensations of horror and disgust were so terrible that they drove him mad, and he seemed to be drowning in them. And the first visible and physical, although perhaps not the basic, causes of these sensations of horror and disgust came from the mountainous figures of the two policemen, and the feel of their huge soft-solid bodies as they jammed against him. For, if they had quelled195 his rebellion at the outset by smashing him over the head with their clubs, he might have felt a moment’s fear before the club crashed on his skull, but he would not have felt horror and disgust.
But the sight, the feel, the smell, the look of these huge soft-solid bodies of mountainous flesh, and the revolting clumsiness of their movements, made the thing horrible. As they rushed towards Eugene and tried to thrust him back into the cell, he grabbed hold of the bars on either side of the door, and began to howl at them and curse them foully196, and to butt84 at them with his head. When this happened the policemen braced197 themselves together like turn-squat Buddhas198, holding on to the bars with their huge muttony hands, that had no leanness in them, and butted199 back at Eugene with their huge soft-solid stomachs.
They stood, half-squatly, side by side, their muttony hands gripped around the bars, their great red faces moist and panting, their huge buttocks somehow obscenely womanish in their fat breadth, as they butted back clumsily at him with their soft ponderous bellies — all of this, and the revolting contact of their flesh against his own, filled him with such an infinite loathing200 of horror and disgust that he went mad.
He started to come out of the cell. When he did, the two big police men came running forward with a lumbering clumsiness and tried to push him back in. One of the men raised his ponderous fist and shouted: “Git back in thar now or I’ll hit ye.” A huge muttony fist smashed squarely on his nose and mouth: he butted, cursed, amid a pin-wheel aura of exploding rockets: the fist smashed hard again below one eye: the boy screamed like a wounded animal and cursing horribly all the time began to use his head as a battering201 ram202, butting203 again and again at the fat red faces.
Meanwhile the other one, grunting204 and puffing205, and with his tongue between his teeth, began to thump206, tug207 and wrench208 at the fingers of one hand, trying to loosen them from the bar, and saying to his fellow:
“You git his other hand, Jim, an’ try to make him turn a-loose.”
During all this time that Eugene had been cursing and butting at these men, he had also been shouting: “You God-damned red-faced South Car’lina bastards209, you’re not going to lock me up in here with a nigger — no, you ain’t!”— and now he felt something rough and woolly scraping underneath his arm. It was the frightened negro’s head. He went squirming out below Eugene’s arm until he was outside peering with white eyeballs over a policeman’s shoulder, and when Eugene saw they would not try to keep the negro there with him, he went back in the cell and was locked up. He felt very sick, and everything was swimming nauseously around him: for a while he leaned over the w.c. and vomited210 into it. Then he sat down on the edge of the cot and stared ahead, thinking about nothing, but with something hideous, like a great grey smear, inside him.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
frenzied
|
|
| a.激怒的；疯狂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
gene
|
|
| n.遗传因子，基因 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
vice
|
|
| n.坏事；恶习；[pl.]台钳，老虎钳；adj.副的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
ragged
|
|
| adj.衣衫褴褛的，粗糙的，刺耳的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
savage
|
|
| adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
intensity
|
|
| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
stark
|
|
| adj.荒凉的；严酷的；完全的；adv.完全地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
drawn
|
|
| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
crest
|
|
| n.顶点；饰章；羽冠；vt.达到顶点；vi.形成浪尖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
projectile
|
|
| n.投射物，发射体；adj.向前开进的；推进的；抛掷的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
abreast
|
|
| adv.并排地；跟上(时代)的步伐，与…并进地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
weaver
|
|
| n.织布工；编织者 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
abrupt
|
|
| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
feverish
|
|
| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
dissonant
|
|
| adj.不和谐的；不悦耳的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
spoke
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
boisterously
|
|
| adv.喧闹地，吵闹地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
boisterous
|
|
| adj.喧闹的，欢闹的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
sinuous
|
|
| adj.蜿蜒的，迂回的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
frail
|
|
| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
vitality
|
|
| n.活力，生命力，效力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
hover
|
|
| vi.翱翔，盘旋；徘徊；彷徨，犹豫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
unnatural
|
|
| adj.不自然的；反常的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
glutted
|
|
| v.吃得过多( glut的过去式和过去分词 )；（对胃口、欲望等）纵情满足；使厌腻；塞满 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
retired
|
|
| adj.隐退的，退休的，退役的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
subdued
|
|
| adj. 屈服的，柔和的，减弱的 动词subdue的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
elation
|
|
| n.兴高采烈，洋洋得意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
hilariously
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
scotch
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
30
gulping
|
|
| v.狼吞虎咽地吃，吞咽( gulp的现在分词 )；大口地吸（气）；哽住 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
fiery
|
|
| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
misery
|
|
| n.痛苦，苦恼，苦难；悲惨的境遇，贫苦 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
speculative
|
|
| adj.思索性的，暝想性的，推理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
hoarsely
|
|
| adv.嘶哑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
bent
|
|
| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
gulch
|
|
| n.深谷，峡谷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
gulps
|
|
| n.一大口（尤指液体）( gulp的名词复数 )v.狼吞虎咽地吃，吞咽( gulp的第三人称单数 )；大口地吸（气）；哽住 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
beverage
|
|
| n.(水，酒等之外的)饮料 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
jug
|
|
| n.(有柄，小口，可盛水等的)大壶，罐，盂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
mule
|
|
| n.骡子，杂种，执拗的人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
tilted
|
|
| v. 倾斜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
gulped
|
|
| v.狼吞虎咽地吃，吞咽( gulp的过去式和过去分词 )；大口地吸（气）；哽住 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
invincible
|
|
| adj.不可征服的，难以制服的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
immortal
|
|
| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
victoriously
|
|
| adv.获胜地，胜利地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
pangs
|
|
| 突然的剧痛( pang的名词复数 )； 悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
famished
|
|
| adj.饥饿的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
belly
|
|
| n.肚子，腹部；(像肚子一样)鼓起的部分，膛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
gust
|
|
| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
stimulation
|
|
| n.刺激，激励，鼓舞 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
rave
|
|
| vi.胡言乱语；热衷谈论；n.热情赞扬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
ravenous
|
|
| adj.极饿的，贪婪的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
54
nourishment
|
|
| n.食物，营养品；营养情况 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
55
harmonious
|
|
| adj.和睦的，调和的，和谐的，协调的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
56
triumphant
|
|
| adj.胜利的，成功的；狂欢的，喜悦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
57
mellow
|
|
| adj.柔和的；熟透的；v.变柔和；(使)成熟 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
58
ecstasy
|
|
| n.狂喜，心醉神怡，入迷 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
59
pending
|
|
| prep.直到，等待…期间；adj.待定的；迫近的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
60
swell
|
|
| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
61
exulting
|
|
| vi. 欢欣鼓舞，狂喜 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
62
misty
|
|
| adj.雾蒙蒙的，有雾的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
63
exultant
|
|
| adj.欢腾的，狂欢的，大喜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
64
wailing
|
|
| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
65
tolling
|
|
| [财]来料加工 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
66
rugged
|
|
| adj.高低不平的，粗糙的，粗壮的，强健的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
67
homely
|
|
| adj.家常的，简朴的；不漂亮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
68
chestnuts
|
|
| n.栗子( chestnut的名词复数 )；栗色；栗树；栗色马 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
69
maples
|
|
| 槭树，枫树( maple的名词复数 )； 槭木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
70
locusts
|
|
| n.蝗虫( locust的名词复数 )；贪吃的人；破坏者；槐树 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
71
fathomless
|
|
| a.深不可测的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
72
enchanted
|
|
| adj. 被施魔法的，陶醉的，入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
73
solitude
|
|
| n. 孤独; 独居,荒僻之地,幽静的地方 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
74
hovered
|
|
| 鸟( hover的过去式和过去分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
75
evoked
|
|
| [医]诱发的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
76
utterance
|
|
| n.用言语表达，话语，言语 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
77
exultantly
|
|
| adv.狂欢地，欢欣鼓舞地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
78
frenzy
|
|
| n.疯狂，狂热，极度的激动 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
79
underneath
|
|
| adj.在...下面，在...底下；adv.在下面 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
80
shanty
|
|
| n.小屋，棚屋；船工号子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
81
desolate
|
|
| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
82
fume
|
|
| n.(usu pl.)(浓烈或难闻的)烟，气，汽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
83
tragic
|
|
| adj.悲剧的，悲剧性的，悲惨的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
84
butt
|
|
| n.笑柄；烟蒂；枪托；臀部；v.用头撞或顶 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
85
passionate
|
|
| adj.热情的，热烈的，激昂的，易动情的，易怒的，性情暴躁的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
86
oration
|
|
| n.演说，致辞，叙述法 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
87
kernel
|
|
| n.(果实的)核，仁；(问题)的中心，核心 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
88
eloquent
|
|
| adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
89
truthful
|
|
| adj.真实的，说实话的，诚实的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
90
swerved
|
|
| v.（使）改变方向，改变目的( swerve的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
91
wagons
|
|
| n.四轮的运货马车( wagon的名词复数 )；铁路货车；小手推车 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
92
hideously
|
|
| adv.可怕地，非常讨厌地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
93
hideous
|
|
| adj.丑陋的，可憎的，可怕的，恐怖的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
94
intoxication
|
|
| n.wild excitement;drunkenness；poisoning | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
95
rending
|
|
| v.撕碎( rend的现在分词 )；分裂；（因愤怒、痛苦等而）揪扯（衣服或头发等）；（声音等）刺破 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
96
veins
|
|
| n.纹理；矿脉( vein的名词复数 )；静脉；叶脉；纹理 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
97
brutal
|
|
| adj.残忍的，野蛮的，不讲理的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
98
lumbering
|
|
| n.采伐林木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
99
drowsy
|
|
| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
100
sere
|
|
| adj.干枯的；n.演替系列 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
101
gutters
|
|
| （路边）排水沟( gutter的名词复数 )； 阴沟； （屋顶的）天沟； 贫贱的境地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
102
scampered
|
|
| v.蹦蹦跳跳地跑，惊惶奔跑( scamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
103
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
104
casually
|
|
| adv.漠不关心地，无动于衷地，不负责任地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
105
sonorous
|
|
| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
106
meek
|
|
| adj.温顺的，逆来顺受的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
107
alacrity
|
|
| n.敏捷，轻快，乐意 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
108
heartily
|
|
| adv.衷心地，诚恳地，十分，很 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
109
amends
|
|
| n. 赔偿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
110
heartiness
|
|
| 诚实，热心 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
111
winking
|
|
| n.瞬眼，目语v.使眼色( wink的现在分词 )；递眼色（表示友好或高兴等）；（指光）闪烁；闪亮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
112
guffawed
|
|
| v.大笑，狂笑( guffaw的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
113
appreciation
|
|
| n.评价；欣赏；感谢；领会，理解；价格上涨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
114
hearty
|
|
| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
115
gaudy
|
|
| adj.华而不实的；俗丽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
116
slovenly
|
|
| adj.懒散的，不整齐的，邋遢的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
117
baggy
|
|
| adj.膨胀如袋的，宽松下垂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
118
brass
|
|
| n.黄铜；黄铜器，铜管乐器 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
119
bellies
|
|
| n.肚子( belly的名词复数 )；腹部；（物体的）圆形或凸起部份；腹部…形的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
120
volcanic
|
|
| adj.火山的；象火山的；由火山引起的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
121
thonged
|
|
| n.皮带；皮条；皮鞭；鞭梢vt.给…装上皮带；鞭打 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
122
swarmed
|
|
| 密集( swarm的过去式和过去分词 )； 云集； 成群地移动； 蜜蜂或其他飞行昆虫成群地飞来飞去 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
123
ponderous
|
|
| adj.沉重的，笨重的，(文章)冗长的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
124
integument
|
|
| n.皮肤 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
125
skull
|
|
| n.头骨；颅骨 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
126
torrents
|
|
| n.倾注；奔流( torrent的名词复数 )；急流；爆发；连续不断 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
127
sparse
|
|
| adj.稀疏的，稀稀落落的，薄的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
128
monstrous
|
|
| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
129
fecund
|
|
| adj.多产的，丰饶的，肥沃的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
130
cowering
|
|
| v.畏缩，抖缩( cower的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
131
dread
|
|
| vt.担忧，忧虑；惧怕，不敢；n.担忧，畏惧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
132
sinewy
|
|
| adj.多腱的，强壮有力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
133
sordid
|
|
| adj.肮脏的，不干净的，卑鄙的，暗淡的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
134
prospect
|
|
| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
135
exuberant
|
|
| adj.充满活力的；（植物）繁茂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
136
smote
|
|
| v.猛打，重击，打击( smite的过去式 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
137
rummaging
|
|
| 翻找，搜寻( rummage的现在分词 )； 海关检查 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
138
triumphantly
|
|
| ad.得意洋洋地；得胜地；成功地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
139
confiscation
|
|
| n. 没收, 充公, 征收 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
140
craftily
|
|
| 狡猾地，狡诈地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
141
persuasive
|
|
| adj.有说服力的，能说得使人相信的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
142
bribery
|
|
| n.贿络行为，行贿，受贿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
143
situated
|
|
| adj.坐落在...的，处于某种境地的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
144
shuffled
|
|
| 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 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
145
curiously
|
|
| adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
146
plaintive
|
|
| adj.可怜的，伤心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
147
reassuring
|
|
| a.使人消除恐惧和疑虑的，使人放心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
148
sullenly
|
|
| 不高兴地，绷着脸，忧郁地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
149
unwilling
|
|
| adj.不情愿的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
150
ominously
|
|
| adv.恶兆地，不吉利地；预示地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
151
varnished
|
|
| 浸渍过的，涂漆的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
152
lockers
|
|
| n.寄物柜( locker的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
153
opulence
|
|
| n.财富，富裕 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
154
glorified
|
|
| 美其名的，变荣耀的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
155
marine
|
|
| adj.海的；海生的；航海的；海事的；n.水兵 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
156
corps
|
|
| n.(通信等兵种的)部队；(同类作的)一组 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
157
sanitary
|
|
| adj.卫生方面的，卫生的，清洁的，卫生的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
158
dingy
|
|
| adj.昏暗的，肮脏的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
159
swarming
|
|
| 密集( swarm的现在分词 )； 云集； 成群地移动； 蜜蜂或其他飞行昆虫成群地飞来飞去 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
160
greasy
|
|
| adj. 多脂的，油脂的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
161
shacks
|
|
| n.窝棚，简陋的小屋( shack的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
162
brotherhood
|
|
| n.兄弟般的关系，手中情谊 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
163
battered
|
|
| adj.磨损的；v.连续猛击；磨损 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
164
furtive
|
|
| adj.鬼鬼崇崇的，偷偷摸摸的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
165
imprint
|
|
| n.印痕，痕迹；深刻的印象；vt.压印，牢记 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
166
imposing
|
|
| adj.使人难忘的，壮丽的，堂皇的，雄伟的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
167
glowered
|
|
| v.怒视( glower的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
168
sergeant
|
|
| n.警官，中士 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
169
smear
|
|
| v.涂抹；诽谤，玷污；n.污点；诽谤，污蔑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
170
arraigning
|
|
| v.告发( arraign的现在分词 )；控告；传讯；指责 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
|
171
portentous
|
|
| adj.不祥的，可怕的，装腔作势的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
172
smacked
|
|
| 拍，打，掴( smack的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
173
pointed
|
|
| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
174
conspiratorial
|
|
| adj.阴谋的，阴谋者的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
175
forsaking
|
|
| 放弃( forsake的现在分词 )； 弃绝； 抛弃； 摒弃 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
176
jovial
|
|
| adj.快乐的，好交际的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
177
distinguished
|
|
| adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
178
provincial
|
|
| adj.省的，地方的；n．外省人，乡下人 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
179
obdurate
|
|
| adj.固执的，顽固的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
180
arraignment
|
|
| n.提问，传讯，责难 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
181
scrawled
|
|
| 乱涂，潦草地写( scrawl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
182
ledger
|
|
| n.总帐，分类帐；帐簿 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
183
ascending
|
|
| adj.上升的，向上的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
184
bawl
|
|
| v.大喊大叫，大声地喊，咆哮 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
185
sob
|
|
| n.空间轨道的轰炸机；呜咽，哭泣 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
186
rattling
|
|
| adj. 格格作响的, 活泼的, 很好的 adv. 极其, 很, 非常 动词rattle的现在分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
187
foul
|
|
| adj.污秽的；邪恶的；v.弄脏；妨害；犯规；n.犯规 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
188
acrid
|
|
| adj.辛辣的，尖刻的，刻薄的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
189
fixed
|
|
| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
190
inflamed
|
|
| adj.发炎的，红肿的v.（使）变红，发怒，过热( inflame的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
191
scanty
|
|
| adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
192
arraigned
|
|
| v.告发( arraign的过去式和过去分词 )；控告；传讯；指责 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
193
grudge
|
|
| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
194
degradation
|
|
| n.降级；低落；退化；陵削；降解；衰变 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
195
quelled
|
|
| v.（用武力）制止，结束，镇压( quell的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
196
foully
|
|
| ad.卑鄙地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
197
braced
|
|
| adj.拉牢的v.支住( brace的过去式和过去分词 )；撑牢；使自己站稳；振作起来 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
198
Buddhas
|
|
| n.佛，佛陀，佛像( Buddha的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
199
butted
|
|
| 对接的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
200
loathing
|
|
| n.厌恶，憎恨v.憎恨，厌恶( loathe的现在分词)；极不喜欢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
201
battering
|
|
| n.用坏，损坏v.连续猛击( batter的现在分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
202
ram
|
|
| (random access memory)随机存取存储器 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
203
butting
|
|
| 用头撞人（犯规动作） | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
204
grunting
|
|
| 咕哝的，呼噜的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
205
puffing
|
|
| v.使喷出( puff的现在分词 )；喷着汽（或烟）移动；吹嘘；吹捧 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
206
thump
|
|
| v.重击，砰然地响；n.重击，重击声 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
207
tug
|
|
| v.用力拖(或拉)；苦干；n.拖；苦干；拖船 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
208
wrench
|
|
| v.猛拧；挣脱；使扭伤；n.扳手；痛苦，难受 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
209
bastards
|
|
| 私生子( bastard的名词复数 )； 坏蛋； 讨厌的事物； 麻烦事 （认为别人走运或不幸时说）家伙 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
210
vomited
|
|
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |