Hercule Poirot walked along the main street of Long Basing. That is, if you can describe as a mainstreet a street that is to all intents and purposes the only street, which was the case in Long Basing.
It was one of those villages that exhibit a tendency to length without breadth. It had an impressivechurch with a tall tower and a yew1 tree of elderly dignity in its churchyard. It had its full quota2 ofvillage shops disclosing much variety. It had two antique shops, one mostly consisting of strippedpine chimneypieces, the other disclosing a full house of piled up ancient maps, a good deal ofporcelain, most of it chipped, some worm-eaten old oak chests, shelves of glass, some Victoriansilver, all somewhat hampered3 in display by lack of space. There were two cafés, both rathernasty, there was a basket shop, quite delightful4, with a large variety of homemade wares5, there wasa post office-cum-greengrocer, there was a draper’s which dealt largely in millinery and also ashoe department for children and a large miscellaneous selection of haberdashery of all kinds.
There was a stationery6 and newspaper shop which also dealt in tobacco and sweets. There was awool shop which was clearly the aristocrat7 of the place. Two white-haired severe women were incharge of shelves and shelves of knitting materials of every description. Also large quantities ofdressmaking patterns and knitting patterns and which branched off into a counter for artneedlework. What had lately been the local grocer’s had now blossomed into calling itself “asupermarket” complete with stacks of wire baskets and packaged materials of every cereal andcleaning material, all in dazzling paper boxes. And there was a small establishment with one smallwindow with Lillah written across it in fancy letters, a fashion display of one French blouse,labelled “Latest chic,” and a navy skirt and a purple striped jumper labelled “separates.” Thesewere displayed by being flung down as by a careless hand in the window.
All of this Poirot observed with a detached interest. Also contained within the limits of thevillage and facing on the street were several small houses, old-fashioned in style, sometimesretaining Georgian purity, more often showing some signs of Victorian improvement, as averanda, bow window, or a small conservatory8. One or two houses had had a complete face-liftand showed signs of claiming to be new and proud of it. There were also some delightful anddecrepit old-world cottages, some pretending to be a hundred or so years older than they were,others completely genuine, any added comforts of plumbing9 or such being carefully hidden fromany casual glance.
Poirot walked gently along digesting all that he saw. If his impatient friend, Mrs. Oliver, hadbeen with him, she would have immediately demanded why he was wasting time, as the house towhich he was bound was a quarter of a mile beyond the village limits. Poirot would have told herthat he was absorbing the local atmosphere; that these things were sometimes important. At theend of the village there came an abrupt10 transition. On one side, set back from the road, was a rowof newly built council houses, a strip of green in front of them and a gay note set by each househaving been given a different coloured front door. Beyond the council houses the sway of fieldsand hedges resumed its course interspersed11 now and then by the occasional “desirable residences”
of a house agent’s list, with their own trees and gardens and a general air of reserve and of keepingthemselves to themselves. Ahead of him farther down the road Poirot descried12 a house, the topstorey of which displayed an unusual note of bulbous construction. Something had evidently beentacked on up there not so many years ago. This no doubt was the Mecca towards which his feetwere bent13. He arrived at a gate to which the nameplate Crosshedges was attached. He surveyed thehouse. It was a conventional house dating perhaps to the beginning of the century. It was neitherbeautiful nor ugly. Commonplace was perhaps the word to describe it. The garden was moreattractive than the house and had obviously been the subject of a great deal of care and attention inits time, though it had been allowed to fall into disarray14. It still had smooth green lawns, plenty offlower beds, carefully planted areas of shrubs15 to display a certain landscape effect. It was all ingood order. A gardener was certainly employed in this garden, Poirot reflected. A personal interestwas perhaps also taken, since he noted16 in a corner near the house a woman bending over one ofthe flower beds, tying up dahlias, he thought. Her head showed as a bright circle of pure goldcolour. She was tall, slim but square- shouldered. He unlatched the gate, passed through andwalked up towards the house. The woman turned her head and then straightened herself, turningtowards him inquiringly.
She remained standing17, waiting for him to speak, some garden twine18 hanging from her lefthand. She looked, he noted, puzzled.
“Yes?” she said.
Poirot, very foreign, took off his hat with a flourish and bowed. Her eyes rested on hismoustaches with a kind of fascination19.
“Mrs. Restarick?”
“Yes. I—”
“I hope I do not derange20 you, Madame.”
A faint smile touched her lips. “Not at all. Are you—”
“I have permitted myself to pay a visit on you. A friend of mine, Mrs. Ariadne Oliver—”
“Oh, of course. I know who you must be. Monsieur Poiret.”
“Monsieur Poirot,” he corrected her with an emphasis on the last syllable21. “Hercule Poirot, atyour service. I was passing through this neighbourhood and I ventured to call upon you here in thehope that I might be allowed to pay my respects to Sir Roderick Horsefield.”
“Yes. Naomi Lorrimer told us you might turn up.”
“I hope it is not inconvenient22?”
“Oh, it is not inconvenient at all. Ariadne Oliver was here last weekend. She came over with theLorrimers. Her books are most amusing, aren’t they? But perhaps you don’t find detective storiesamusing. You are a detective yourself, aren’t you—a real one?”
“I am all that there is of the most real,” said Hercule Poirot.
He noticed that she repressed a smile. He studied her more closely. She was handsome in arather artificial fashion. Her golden hair was stiffly arranged. He wondered whether she might notat heart be secretly unsure of herself, whether she were not carefully playing the part of theEnglish lady absorbed in her garden. He wondered a little what her social background might havebeen.
“You have a very fine garden here,” he said.
“You like gardens?”
“Not as the English like gardens. You have for a garden a special talent in England. It meanssomething to you that it does not to us.”
“To French people, you mean? Oh yes. I believe that Mrs. Oliver mentioned that you were oncewith the Belgian Police Force?”
“That is so. Me, I am an old Belgian police dog.” He gave a polite little laugh and said, wavinghis hands, “But your gardens, you English, I admire. I sit at your feet! The Latin races, they likethe formal garden, the gardens of the ch?teau, the Ch?teau of Versailles in miniature, and also ofcourse they invented the potager. Very important, the potager. Here in England you have thepotager, but you got it from France and you do not love your potager as much as you love yourflowers. Hein? That is so?”
“Yes, I think you are right,” said Mary Restarick. “Do come into the house. You came to see myuncle.”
“I came, as you say, to pay homage24 to Sir Roderick, but I pay homage to you also, Madame.
Always I pay homage to beauty when I meet it.” He bowed.
She laughed with slight embarrassment25. “You mustn’t pay me so many compliments.”
She led the way through an open French window and he followed her.
“I knew your uncle slightly in 1944.”
“Poor dear, he’s getting quite an old man now. He’s very deaf, I’m afraid.”
“It was long ago that I encountered him. He will probably have forgotten. It was a matter ofespionage and of scientific developments of a certain invention. We owed that invention to theingenuity of Sir Roderick. He will be willing, I hope, to receive me.”
“Oh, I’m sure he’ll love it,” said Mrs. Restarick. “He has rather a dull life in some waysnowadays. I have to be so much in London—we are looking for a suitable house there.” Shesighed and said, “Elderly people can be very difficult sometimes.”
“I know,” said Poirot. “Frequently I, too, am difficult.”
She laughed. “Ah no, M. Poirot, come now, you mustn’t pretend you’re old.”
“Sometimes I am told so,” said Poirot. He sighed. “By young girls,” he added mournfully.
“That’s very unkind of them. It’s probably the sort of thing that our daughter would do,” sheadded.
“Ah, you have a daughter?”
“Yes. At least, she is my stepdaughter.”
“I shall have much pleasure in meeting her,” said Poirot politely.
“Oh well, I’m afraid she is not here. She’s in London. She works there.”
“The young girls, they all do jobs nowadays.”
“Everybody’s supposed to do a job,” said Mrs. Restarick vaguely26. “Even when they get marriedthey’re always being persuaded back into industry or back into teaching.”
“Have they persuaded you, Madame, to come back into anything?”
“No. I was brought up in South Africa. I only came here with my husband a short time ago—It’s all—rather strange to me still.”
She looked round her with what Poirot judged to be an absence of enthusiasm. It was ahandsomely furnished room of a conventional type—without personality. Two large portraits hungon the walls—the only personal touch. The first was that of a thin lipped woman in a grey velvetevening dress. Facing her on the opposite wall was a man of about thirty-odd with an air ofrepressed energy about him.
“Your daughter, I suppose, finds it dull in the country?”
“Yes, it is much better for her to be in London. She doesn’t like it here.” She paused abruptly,and then as though the last words were almost dragged out of her, she said, “—and she doesn’tlike me.”
“Impossible,” said Hercule Poirot, with Gallic politeness.
“Not at all impossible! Oh well, I suppose it often happens. I suppose it’s hard for girls to accepta stepmother.”
“Was your daughter very fond of her own mother?”
“I suppose she must have been. She’s a difficult girl. I suppose most girls are.”
Poirot sighed and said, “Mothers and fathers have much less control over daughters nowadays.
It is not as it used to be in the old good-fashioned days.”
“No indeed.”
“One dare not say so, Madame, but I must confess I regret that they show so very littlediscrimination in choosing their—how do you say it?—their boyfriends?”
“Norma has been a great worry to her father in that way. However, I suppose it is no goodcomplaining. People must make their own experiments. But I must take you up to Uncle Roddy—he has his own rooms upstairs.”
She led the way out of the room. Poirot looked back over his shoulder. A dull room, a roomwithout character—except perhaps for the two portraits. By the style of the woman’s dress, Poirotjudged that they dated from some years back. If that was the first Mrs. Restarick, Poirot did notthink that he would have liked her.
He said, “Those are fine portraits, Madame.”
“Yes. Lansberger did them.”
It was the name of a famous and exceedingly expensive fashionable portrait painter of twentyyears ago. His meticulous28 naturalism had now gone out of fashion, and since his death, he waslittle spoken of. His sitters were sometimes sneeringly30 spoken of as “clothes props,” but Poirotthought they were a good deal more than that. He suspected that there was a carefully concealedmockery behind the smooth exteriors31 that Lansberger executed so effortlessly.
Mary Restarick said as she went up the stairs ahead of him:
“They have just come out of storage—and been cleaned up and—”
She stopped abruptly—coming to a dead halt, one hand on the stair rail.
Above her, a figure had just turned the corner of the staircase on its way down. It was a figurethat seemed strangely incongruous. It might have been someone in fancy dress, someone whocertainly did not match with this house.
He was a figure familiar enough to Poirot in different conditions, a figure often met in the streetsof London or even at parties. A representative of the youth of today. He wore a black coat, anelaborate velvet27 waistcoat, skintight pants, and rich curls of chestnut32 hair hung down on his neck.
He looked exotic and rather beautiful, and it needed a few moments to be certain of his sex.
“David!” Mary Restarick spoke29 sharply. “What on earth are you doing here?”
The young man was by no means taken aback. “Startled you?” he asked. “So sorry.”
“What are you doing here—in this house? You—have you come down here with Norma?”
“Norma? No, I hoped to find her here.”
“Find her here—what do you mean? She’s in London.”
“Oh, but my dear, she isn’t. At any rate, she’s not at 67 Borodene Mansions33.”
“What do you mean, she isn’t there?”
“Well, since she didn’t come back this weekend, I thought she was probably here with you. Icame down to see what she was up to.”
“She left here Sunday night as usual.” She added in an angry voice, “Why didn’t you ring thebell and let us know you were here? What are you doing roaming about the house?”
“Really, darling, you seem to be thinking I’m going to pinch the spoons or something. Surelyit’s natural to walk into a house in broad daylight. Why ever not?”
“Well, we’re old-fashioned and we don’t like it.”
“Oh dear, dear.” David sighed. “The fuss everyone makes. Well, my dear, if I’m not going tohave a welcome and you don’t seem to know where your stepdaughter is, I suppose I’d better bemoving along. Shall I turn out my pockets before I go?”
“Don’t be absurd, David.”
“Ta-ta, then.” The young man passed them, waved an airy hand and went on down and outthrough the open front door.
“Horrible creature,” said Mary Restarick, with a sharpness of rancour that startled Poirot. “Ican’t bear him. I simply can’t stand him. Why is En gland23 absolutely full of these peoplenowadays?”
“Ah, Madame, do not disquiet34 yourself. It is all a question of fashion. There have always beenfashions. You see less in the country, but in London you meet plenty of them.”
“Dreadful,” said Mary. “Absolutely dreadful. Effeminate, exotic.”
“And yet not unlike a Vandyke portrait, do you not think so, Madame? In a gold frame, wearinga lace collar, you would not then say he was effeminate or exotic.”
“Daring to come down here like that. Andrew would have been furious. It worries himdreadfully. Daughters can be very worrying. It’s not even as though Andrew knew Norma well.
He’s been abroad since she was a child. He left her entirely35 to her mother to bring up, and now hefinds her a complete puzzle. So do I for that matter. I can’t help feeling that she is a very odd typeof girl. One has no kind of authority over them these days. They seem to like the worst type ofyoung men. She’s absolutely infatuated with this David Baker36. One can’t do anything. Andrewforbade him the house, and look, he turns up here, walks in as cool as a cucumber. I think—Ialmost think I’d better not tell Andrew. I don’t want him to be unduly37 worried. I believe she goesabout with this creature in London, and not only with him. There are some much worse ones even.
The kind that don’t wash, completely unshaven faces and funny sprouting38 beards and greasyclothes.”
Poirot said cheerfully, “Alas, Madame, you must not distress39 yourself. The indiscretions ofyouth pass.”
“I hope so, I’m sure. Norma is a very difficult girl. Sometimes I think she’s not right in the head.
She’s so peculiar40. She really looks sometimes as though she isn’t all there. These extraordinarydislikes she takes—”
“Dislikes?”
“She hates me. Really hates me. I don’t see why it’s necessary. I suppose she was very devotedto her mother, but after all it’s only reasonable that her father should marry again, isn’t it?”
“Do you think she really hates you?”
“Oh, I know she does. I’ve had ample proof of it. I can’t say how relieved I was when she wentoff to London. I didn’t want to make trouble—” She stopped suddenly. It was as though for thefirst time she realised that she was talking to a stranger.
Poirot had the capacity to attract confidences. It was as though when people were talking to himthey hardly realised who it was they were talking to. She gave a short laugh now.
“Dear me,” she said, “I don’t really know why I’m saying all this to you. I expect every familyhas these problems. Poor stepmothers, we have a hard time of it. Ah, here we are.”
She tapped on a door.
“Come in, come in.”
It was a stentorian41 roar.
“Here is a visitor to see you, Uncle,” said Mary Restarick, as she walked into the room, Poirotbehind her.
A broad-shouldered, square-faced, red-cheeked, irascible looking elderly man had been pacingthe floor. He stumped42 forward towards them. At the table behind him a girl was sitting sortingletters and papers. Her head was bent over them, a sleek43, dark head.
“This is Monsieur Hercule Poirot, Uncle Roddy,” said Mary Restarick.
Poirot stepped forward gracefully44 into action and speech. “Ah, Sir Roderick, it is many years—many years since I have had the pleasure of meeting you. We have to go back, so far as the lastwar. It was, I think, in Normandy the last time. How well I remember, there was there alsoColonel Race and there was General Abercromby and there was Air- Marshal Sir EdmundCollingsby. What decisions we had to take! And what difficulties we had with security. Ah,nowadays, there is no longer the need for secrecy45. I recall the unmasking of that secret agent whosucceeded for so long—you remember Captain Henderson.”
“Ah. Captain Henderson indeed. Lord, that damned swine! Unmasked!”
“You may not remember me, Hercule Poirot.”
“Yes, yes, of course I remember you. Ah, it was a close shave that, a close shave. You were theFrench representative, weren’t you? There were one or two of them, one I couldn’t get on with—can’t remember his name. Ah well, sit down, sit down. Nothing like having a chat over old days.”
“I feared so much that you might not remember me or my colleague, Monsieur Giraud.”
“Yes, yes, of course I remember both of you. Ah, those were the days, those were the daysindeed.”
The girl at the table got up. She moved a chair politely towards Poirot.
“That’s right, Sonia, that’s right,” said Sir Roderick. “Let me introduce you,” he said, “to mycharming little secretary here. Makes a great difference to me. Helps me, you know, files all mywork. Don’t know how I ever got on without her.”
Poirot bowed politely. “Enchanté, mademoiselle,” he murmured.
The girl murmured something in rejoinder. She was a small creature with black bobbed hair.
She looked shy. Her dark blue eyes were usually modestly cast down, but she smiled up sweetlyand shyly at her employer. He patted her on the shoulder.
“Don’t know what I should do without her,” he said. “I don’t really.”
“Oh, no,” the girl protested. “I am not much good really. I cannot type very fast.”
“You type quite fast enough, my dear. You’re my memory, too. My eyes and my ears and agreat many other things.”
She smiled again at him.
“One remembers,” murmured Poirot, “some of the excellent stories that used to go the round. Idon’t know if they were exaggerated or not. Now, for instance, the day that someone stole yourcar and—” he proceeded to follow up the tale.
Sir Roderick was delighted. “Ha, ha, of course now. Yes, indeed, well, bit of exaggeration, Iexpect. But on the whole, that’s how it was. Yes, yes, well, fancy your remembering that, after allthis long time. But I could tell you a better one than that now.” He launched forth46 into another tale.
Poirot listened, applauded. Finally he glanced at his watch and rose to his feet.
“But I must detain you no longer,” he said. “You are engaged, I can see, in important work. Itwas just that being in this neighbourhood I could not help paying my respects. Years pass, butyou, I see, have lost none of your vigour47, of your enjoyment48 of life.”
“Well, well, perhaps you may say so. Anyway, you mustn’t pay me too many compliments—but surely you’ll stay and have tea. I’m sure Mary will give you some tea.” He looked round. “Oh,she’s gone away. Nice girl.”
“Yes, indeed, and very handsome. I expect she has been a great comfort to you for many years.”
“Oh! They’ve only married recently. She’s my nephew’s second wife. I’ll be frank with you.
I’ve never cared very much for this nephew of mine, Andrew—not a steady chap. Always restless.
His elder brother Simon was my favourite. Not that I knew him well, either. As for Andrew, hebehaved very badly to his first wife. Went off, you know. Left her high and dry. Went off with athoroughly bad lot. Everybody knew about her. But he was infatuated with her. The whole thingbroke up in a year or two: silly fellow. The girl he’s married seems all right. Nothing wrong withher as far as I know. Now Simon was a steady chap—damned dull, though. I can’t say I liked itwhen my sister married into that family. Marrying into trade, you know. Rich, of course, butmoney isn’t everything — we’ve usually married into the Services. I never saw much of theRestarick lot.”
“They have, I believe, a daughter. A friend of mine met her last week.”
“Oh, Norma. Silly girl. Goes about in dreadful clothes and has picked up with a dreadful youngman. Ah well, they’re all alike nowadays. Long-haired young fellows, beatniks, Beatles, all sortsof names they’ve got. I can’t keep up with them. Practically talk a foreign language. Still, nobodycares to hear an old man’s criticisms, so there we are. Even Mary—I always thought she was agood, sensible sort, but as far as I can see she can be thoroughly49 hysterical50 in some ways—mainlyabout her health. Some fuss about going to hospital for observation or something. What about adrink? Whisky? No? Sure you won’t stop and have a drop of tea?”
“Thank you, but I am staying with friends.”
“Well, I must say I have enjoyed this chat with you very much. Nice to remember some of thethings that happened in the old days. Sonia, dear, perhaps you’ll take Monsieur—sorry, what’syour name, it’s gone again—ah, yes, Poirot. Take him down to Mary, will you?”
“No, no,” Hercule Poirot hastily waved aside the offer. “I could not dream of troubling Madameanymore. I am quite all right. Quite all right. I can find my way perfectly51. It has been a greatpleasure to meet you again.”
He left the room.
“Haven’t the faintest idea who that chap was,” said Sir Roderick, after Poirot had gone.
“You do not know who he was?” Sonia asked, looking at him in a startled manner.
“Personally I don’t remember who half the people are who come up and talk to me nowadays.
Of course, I have to make a good shot at it. One learns to get away with that, you know. Samething at parties. Up comes a chap and says, ‘Perhaps you don’t remember me. I last saw you in1939.’ I have to say ‘Of course I remember,’ but I don’t. It’s a handicap being nearly blind anddeaf. We got pally with a lot of frogs like that towards the end of the war. Don’t remember half ofthem. Oh, he’d been there all right. He knew me and I knew a good many of the chaps he talkedabout. That story about me and the stolen car, that was true enough. Exaggerated a bit, of course,they made a pretty good story of it at the time. Ah well, I don’t think he knew I didn’t rememberhim. Clever chap, I should say, but a thorough frog, isn’t he? You know, mincing52 and dancing andbowing and scraping. Now then, where were we?”
Sonia picked up a letter and handed it to him. She tentatively proffered53 a pair of spectacleswhich he immediately rejected.
“Don’t want those damned things—I can see all right.”
He screwed up his eyes and peered down at the letter he was holding. Then he capitulated andthrust it back into her hands.
“Well, perhaps you’d better read it to me.”
She started reading it in her clear soft voice.
点击
收听单词发音
收听单词发音 |
1
yew
|
|
| n.紫杉属树木 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
2
quota
|
|
| n.（生产、进出口等的）配额，（移民的）限额 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
3
hampered
|
|
| 妨碍，束缚，限制( hamper的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
4
delightful
|
|
| adj.令人高兴的，使人快乐的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
5
wares
|
|
| n. 货物, 商品 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
6
stationery
|
|
| n.文具；(配套的)信笺信封 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
7
aristocrat
|
|
| n.贵族，有贵族气派的人，上层人物 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
8
conservatory
|
|
| n.温室，音乐学院；adj.保存性的，有保存力的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
9
plumbing
|
|
| n.水管装置；水暖工的工作；管道工程v.用铅锤测量（plumb的现在分词）；探究 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
10
abrupt
|
|
| adj.突然的，意外的；唐突的，鲁莽的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
11
interspersed
|
|
| adj.[医]散开的；点缀的v.intersperse的过去式和过去分词 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
12
descried
|
|
| adj.被注意到的，被发现的，被看到的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
13
bent
|
|
| n.爱好，癖好；adj.弯的；决心的，一心的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
14
disarray
|
|
| n.混乱，紊乱，凌乱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
15
shrubs
|
|
| 灌木( shrub的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
16
noted
|
|
| adj.著名的，知名的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
17
standing
|
|
| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
18
twine
|
|
| v.搓，织，编饰；（使）缠绕 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
19
fascination
|
|
| n.令人着迷的事物，魅力，迷恋 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
20
derange
|
|
| v.使精神错乱 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
21
syllable
|
|
| n.音节；vt.分音节 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
22
inconvenient
|
|
| adj.不方便的，令人感到麻烦的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
23
gland
|
|
| n.腺体，(机)密封压盖，填料盖 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
24
homage
|
|
| n.尊敬，敬意，崇敬 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
25
embarrassment
|
|
| n.尴尬；使人为难的人(事物)；障碍；窘迫 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
26
vaguely
|
|
| adv.含糊地，暖昧地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
27
velvet
|
|
| n.丝绒，天鹅绒；adj.丝绒制的，柔软的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
28
meticulous
|
|
| adj.极其仔细的，一丝不苟的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
29
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： |
|
|
|
|
30
sneeringly
|
|
| 嘲笑地，轻蔑地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
31
exteriors
|
|
| n.外面( exterior的名词复数 )；外貌；户外景色图 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
32
chestnut
|
|
| n.栗树，栗子 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
33
mansions
|
|
| n.宅第，公馆，大厦( mansion的名词复数 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
34
disquiet
|
|
| n.担心，焦虑 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
35
entirely
|
|
| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
36
baker
|
|
| n.面包师 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
37
unduly
|
|
| adv.过度地，不适当地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
38
sprouting
|
|
| v.发芽( sprout的现在分词 )；抽芽；出现；（使）涌现出 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
39
distress
|
|
| n.苦恼，痛苦，不舒适；不幸；vt.使悲痛 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
40
peculiar
|
|
| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
41
stentorian
|
|
| adj.大声的，响亮的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
42
stumped
|
|
| 僵直地行走，跺步行走( stump的过去式和过去分词 )； 把（某人）难住； 使为难； （选举前）在某一地区作政治性巡回演说 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
43
sleek
|
|
| adj.光滑的，井然有序的；v.使光滑，梳拢 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
44
gracefully
|
|
| ad.大大方方地；优美地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
45
secrecy
|
|
| n.秘密，保密，隐蔽 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
46
forth
|
|
| adv.向前；向外，往外 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
47
vigour
|
|
| （=vigor）n.智力，体力，精力 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
48
enjoyment
|
|
| n.乐趣；享有；享用 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
49
thoroughly
|
|
| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
50
hysterical
|
|
| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
51
perfectly
|
|
| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
52
mincing
|
|
| adj.矫饰的；v.切碎；切碎 | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
|
53
proffered
|
|
| v.提供，贡献，提出( proffer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
参考例句： |
|
|
|
| 欢迎访问英文小说网 |