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Tender Is the Night - Book Three
by F. Scott Fitzgerald
Chapter 2
Dick told Nicole an expurgated version of the catastrophe1 in Rome—in his version he had gone philanthropically to the rescue of a drunken friend. He could trust Baby Warren to hold her tongue, since he had painted the disastrous3 effect of the truth upon Nicole. All this, however, was a low hurdle4 compared to the lingering effect of the episode upon him.
In reaction he took himself for an intensified5 beating in his work, so that Franz, trying to break with him, could find no basis on which to begin a disagreement. No friendship worth the name was ever destroyed in an hour without some painful flesh being torn—so Franz let himself believe with ever-increasing conviction that Dick travelled intellectually and emotionally at such a rate of speed that the vibrations6 jarred him—this was a contrast that had previously7 been considered a virtue8 in their relation. So, for the shoddiness of needs, are shoes made out of last year's hide.
Yet it was May before Franz found an opportunity to insert the first wedge. Dick came into his office white and tired one noon and sat down, saying:
"Well, she's gone."
"She's dead?"
"The heart quit."
Dick sat exhausted9 in the chair nearest the door. During three nights he had remained with the scabbed anonymous10 woman-artist he had come to love, formally to portion out the adrenaline, but really to throw as much wan11 light as he could into the darkness ahead.
Half appreciating his feeling, Franz travelled quickly over an opinion:
"Never mind," said Dick. "Oh, God, never mind! If she cared enough about her secret to take it away with her, let it go at that."
"You better lay off for a day."
"Don't worry, I'm going to."
Franz had his wedge; looking up from the telegram that he was writing to the woman's brother he inquired: "Or do you want to take a little trip?"
"Not now."
"I don't mean a vacation. There's a case in Lausanne. I've been on the phone with a Chilian all morning—"
"She was so damn brave," said Dick. "And it took her so long." Franz shook his head sympathetically and Dick got himself together. "Excuse me for interrupting you."
"This is just a change—the situation is a father's problem with his son—the father can't get the son up here. He wants somebody to come down there."
"What is it? Alcoholism? Homosexuality? When you say Lausanne—"
"A little of everything."
"I'll go down. Is there any money in it?"
"Quite a lot, I'd say. Count on staying two or three days, and get the boy up here if he needs to be watched. In any case take your time, take your ease; combine business with pleasure."
After two hours' train sleep Dick felt renewed, and he approached the interview with Señor Pardo y Cuidad Real in good spirits.
These interviews were much of a type. Often the sheer hysteria of the family representative was as interesting psychologically as the condition of the patient. This one was no exception: Señor Pardo y Cuidad Real, a handsome iron-gray Spaniard, noble of carriage, with all the appurtenances of wealth and power, raged up and down his suite14 in the Hôtel de Trois Mondes and told the story of his son with no more self-control than a drunken woman.
"I am at the end of my invention. My son is corrupt15. He was corrupt at Harrow, he was corrupt at King's College, Cambridge. He's incorrigibly16 corrupt. Now that there is this drinking it is more and more obvious how he is, and there is continual scandal. I have tried everything—I worked out a plan with a doctor friend of mine, sent them together for a tour of Spain. Every evening Francisco had an injection of cantharides and then the two went together to a reputable bordello—for a week or so it seemed to work but the result was nothing. Finally last week in this very room, rather in that bathroom—" he pointed17 at it, "—I made Francisco strip to the waist and lashed18 him with a whip—"
"That was foolish—the trip to Spain was futile20 also—" He struggled against an upsurging hilarity—that any reputable medical man should have lent himself to such an amateurish21 experiment! "—Señor, I must tell you that in these cases we can promise nothing. In the case of the drinking we can often accomplish something—with proper co-operation. The first thing is to see the boy and get enough of his confidence to find whether he has any insight into the matter."
—The boy, with whom he sat on the terrace, was about twenty, handsome and alert.
"I'd like to know your attitude," Dick said. "Do you feel that the situation is getting worse? And do you want to do anything about it?"
"I suppose I do," said Francisco, "I am very unhappy."
"Do you think it's from the drinking or from the abnormality?"
"I think the drinking is caused by the other." He was serious for a while—suddenly an irrepressible facetiousness22 broke through and he laughed, saying, "It's hopeless. At King's I was known as the Queen of Chili13. That trip to Spain—all it did was to make me nauseated23 by the sight of a woman."
Dick caught him up sharply.
"If you're happy in this mess, then I can't help you and I'm wasting my time."
"No, let's talk—I despise most of the others so." There was some manliness24 in the boy, perverted25 now into an active resistance to his father. But he had that typically roguish look in his eyes that homosexuals assume in discussing the subject.
"It's a hole-and-corner business at best," Dick told him. "You'll spend your life on it, and its consequences, and you won't have time or energy for any other decent or social act. If you want to face the world you'll have to begin by controlling your sensuality—and, first of all, the drinking that provokes it—"
He talked automatically, having abandoned the case ten minutes before. They talked pleasantly through another hour about the boy's home in Chili and about his ambitions. It was as close as Dick had ever come to comprehending such a character from any but the pathological angle—he gathered that this very charm made it possible for Francisco to perpetrate his outrages26, and, for Dick, charm always had an independent existence, whether it was the mad gallantry of the wretch27 who had died in the clinic this morning, or the courageous28 grace which this lost young man brought to a drab old story. Dick tried to dissect29 it into pieces small enough to store away—realizing that the totality of a life may be different in quality from its segments, and also that life during the forties seemed capable of being observed only in segments. His love for Nicole and Rosemary, his friendship with Abe North, with Tommy Barban in the broken universe of the war's ending—in such contacts the personalities30 had seemed to press up so close to him that he became the personality itself—there seemed some necessity of taking all or nothing; it was as if for the remainder of his life he was condemned31 to carry with him the egos32 of certain people, early met and early loved, and to be only as complete as they were complete themselves. There was some element of loneliness involved—so easy to be loved—so hard to love.
As he sat on the veranda33 with young Francisco, a ghost of the past swam into his ken2. A tall, singularly swaying male detached himself from the shrubbery and approached Dick and Francisco with feeble resolution. For a moment he formed such an apologetic part of the vibrant34 landscape that Dick scarcely remarked him—then Dick was on his feet, shaking hands with an abstracted air, thinking, "My God, I've stirred up a nest!" and trying to collect the man's name.
"This is Doctor Diver, isn't it?"
"Well, well—Mr. Dumphry, isn't it?"
"Royal Dumphry. I had the pleasure of having dinner one night in that lovely garden of yours."
"Of course." Trying to dampen Mr. Dumphry's enthusiasm, Dick went into impersonal35 chronology. "It was in nineteen—twenty-four—or twenty-five—"
He had remained standing36, but Royal Dumphry, shy as he had seemed at first, was no laggard37 with his pick and spade; he spoke to Francisco in a flip38, intimate manner, but the latter, ashamed of him, joined Dick in trying to freeze him away.
"Doctor Diver—one thing I want to say before you go. I've never forgotten that evening in your garden—how nice you and your wife were. To me it's one of the finest memories in my life, one of the happiest ones. I've always thought of it as the most civilized39 gathering40 of people that I have ever known."
Dick continued a crab-like retreat toward the nearest door of the hotel.
"I'm glad you remembered it so pleasantly. Now I've got to see—"
"I understand," Royal Dumphry pursued sympathetically. "I hear he's dying."
"Who's dying?"
"Perhaps I shouldn't have said that—but we have the same physician."
Dick paused, regarding him in astonishment41. "Who're you talking about?"
"Why, your wife's father—perhaps I—"
"My what?"
"I suppose—you mean I'm the first person—"
"You mean my wife's father is here, in Lausanne?"
"Why, I thought you knew—I thought that was why you were here."
"What doctor is taking care of him?"
It was convenient for Doctor Dangeu to see Doctor Diver at his house immediately.
Doctor Dangeu was a young Génevois; for a moment he was afraid that he was going to lose a profitable patient, but, when Dick reassured43 him, he divulged44 the fact that Mr. Warren was indeed dying.
"He is only fifty but the liver has stopped restoring itself; the precipitating45 factor is alcoholism."
"Doesn't respond?"
"The man can take nothing except liquids—I give him three days, or at most, a week."
"Does his elder daughter, Miss Warren, know his condition?"
"By his own wish no one knows except the man-servant. It was only this morning I felt I had to tell him—he took it excitedly, although he has been in a very religious and resigned mood from the beginning of his illness."
Dick considered: "Well—" he decided46 slowly, "in any case I'll take care of the family angle. But I imagine they would want a consultation47."
"As you like."
"I know I speak for them when I ask you to call in one of the best-known medicine men around the lake—Herbrugge, from Geneva."
"I was thinking of Herbrugge."
"Meanwhile I'm here for a day at least and I'll keep in touch with you."
That evening Dick went to Señor Pardo y Cuidad Real and they talked.
"We have large estates in Chili—" said the old man. "My son could well be taking care of them. Or I can get him in any one of a dozen enterprises in Paris—" He shook his head and paced across the windows against a spring rain so cheerful that it didn't even drive the swans to cover, "My only son! Can't you take him with you?"
The Spaniard knelt suddenly at Dick's feet.
"Can't you cure my only son? I believe in you—you can take him with you, cure him."
"It's impossible to commit a person on such grounds. I wouldn't if I could."
The Spaniard got up from his knees.
"I have been hasty—I have been driven—"
Descending48 to the lobby Dick met Doctor Dangeu in the elevator.
"I was about to call your room," the latter said. "Can we speak out on the terrace?"
"Is Mr. Warren dead?" Dick demanded.
"He is the same—the consultation is in the morning. Meanwhile he wants to see his daughter—your wife—with the greatest fervor49. It seems there was some quarrel—"
"I know all about that."
The doctors looked at each other, thinking.
"Why don't you talk to him before you make up your mind?" Dangeu suggested. "His death will be graceful—merely a weakening and sinking."
With an effort Dick consented.
"All right."
The suite in which Devereux Warren was gracefully50 weakening and sinking was of the same size as that of the Señor Pardo y Cuidad Real—throughout this hotel there were many chambers51 wherein rich ruins, fugitives52 from justice, claimants to the thrones of mediatized principalities, lived on the derivatives53 of opium54 or barbitol listening eternally as to an inescapable radio, to the coarse melodies of old sins. This corner of Europe does not so much draw people as accept them without inconvenient55 questions. Routes cross here—people bound for private sanitariums or tuberculosis56 resorts in the mountains, people who are no longer persona gratis57 in France or Italy.
The suite was darkened. A nun58 with a holy face was nursing the man whose emaciated59 fingers stirred a rosary on the white sheet. He was still handsome and his voice summoned up a thick burr of individuality as he spoke to Dick, after Dangeu had left them together.
"We get a lot of understanding at the end of life. Only now, Doctor Diver, do I realize what it was all about."
Dick waited.
"I've been a bad man. You must know how little right I have to see Nicole again, yet a Bigger Man than either of us says to forgive and to pity." The rosary slipped from his weak hands and slid off the smooth bed covers. Dick picked it up for him. "If I could see Nicole for ten minutes I would go happy out of the world."
"It's not a decision I can make for myself," said Dick. "Nicole is not strong." He made his decision but pretended to hesitate. "I can put it up to my professional associate."
"What your associate says goes with me—very well, Doctor. Let me tell you my debt to you is so large—"
Dick stood up quickly.
"I'll let you know the result through Doctor Dangeu."
In his room he called the clinic on the Zugersee. After a long time Kaethe answered from her own house.
"I want to get in touch with Franz."
"Franz is up on the mountain. I'm going up myself—is it something I can tell him, Dick?"
"It's about Nicole—her father is dying here in Lausanne. Tell Franz that, to show him it's important; and ask him to phone me from up there."
"I will."
"Tell him I'll be in my room here at the hotel from three to five, and again from seven to eight, and after that to page me in the dining-room."
In plotting these hours he forgot to add that Nicole was not to be told; when he remembered it he was talking into a dead telephone. Certainly Kaethe should realize.
… Kaethe had no exact intention of telling Nicole about the call when she rode up the deserted60 hill of mountain wild-flowers and secret winds, where the patients were taken to ski in winter and to climb in spring. Getting off the train she saw Nicole shepherding the children through some organized romp61. Approaching, she drew her arm gently along Nicole's shoulder, saying: "You are clever with children—you must teach them more about swimming in the summer."
In the play they had grown hot, and Nicole's reflex in drawing away from Kaethe's arm was automatic to the point of rudeness. Kaethe's hand fell awkwardly into space, and then she too reacted, verbally, and deplorably.
"Did you think I was going to embrace you?" she demanded sharply. "It was only about Dick, I talked on the phone to him and I was sorry—"
"Is anything the matter with Dick?"
Kaethe suddenly realized her error, but she had taken a tactless course and there was no choice but to answer as Nicole pursued her with reiterated62 questions: "… then why were you sorry?"
"Nothing about Dick. I must talk to Franz."
"It is about Dick."
There was terror in her face and collaborating63 alarm in the faces of the Diver children, near at hand. Kaethe collapsed65 with: "Your father is ill in Lausanne—Dick wants to talk to Franz about it."
"Is he very sick?" Nicole demanded—just as Franz came up with his hearty66 hospital manner. Gratefully Kaethe passed the remnant of the buck67 to him—but the damage was done.
"I'm going to Lausanne," announced Nicole.
"One minute," said Franz. "I'm not sure it's advisable. I must first talk on the phone to Dick."
"Then I'll miss the train down," Nicole protested, "and then I'll miss the three o'clock from Zurich! If my father is dying I must—" She left this in the air, afraid to formulate68 it. "I must go. I'll have to run for the train." She was running even as she spoke toward the sequence of flat cars that crowned the bare hill with bursting steam and sound. Over her shoulder she called back, "If you phone Dick tell him I'm coming, Franz!" …
… Dick was in his own room in the hotel reading The New York Herald69 when the swallow-like nun rushed in—simultaneously the phone rang.
"Is he dead?" Dick demanded of the nun, hopefully.
"Monsieur, il est parti—he has gone away."
"Comment?"
"Il est parti—his man and his baggage have gone away too!"
It was incredible. A man in that condition to arise and depart.
Dick answered the phone-call from Franz. "You shouldn't have told Nicole," he protested.
"Kaethe told her, very unwisely."
"I suppose it was my fault. Never tell a thing to a woman till it's done. However, I'll meet Nicole … say, Franz, the craziest thing has happened down here—the old boy took up his bed and walked… ."
"At what? What did you say?"
"I say he walked, old Warren—he walked!"
"But why not?"
"He was supposed to be dying of general collapse64 … he got up and walked away, back to Chicago, I guess… . I don't know, the nurse is here now… . I don't know, Franz—I've just heard about it… . Call me later."
He spent the better part of two hours tracing Warren's movements. The patient had found an opportunity between the change of day and night nurses to resort to the bar where he had gulped70 down four whiskeys; he paid his hotel bill with a thousand dollar note, instructing the desk that the change should be sent after him, and departed, presumably for America. A last minute dash by Dick and Dangeu to overtake him at the station resulted only in Dick's failing to meet Nicole; when they did meet in the lobby of the hotel she seemed suddenly tired, and there was a tight purse to her lips that disquieted71 him.
"How's father?" she demanded.
"He's much better. He seemed to have a good deal of reserve energy after all." He hesitated, breaking it to her easy. "In fact he got up and went away."
Wanting a drink, for the chase had occupied the dinner hour, he led her, puzzled, toward the grill72, and continued as they occupied two leather easy-chairs and ordered a high-ball and a glass of beer: "The man who was taking care of him made a wrong prognosis or something—wait a minute, I've hardly had time to think the thing out myself."
"He's gone?"
"He got the evening train for Paris."
"It was instinct," Dick said, finally. "He was really dying, but he tried to get a resumption of rhythm—he's not the first person that ever walked off his death-bed—like an old clock—you know, you shake it and somehow from sheer habit it gets going again. Now your father—"
"Oh, don't tell me," she said.
"His principal fuel was fear," he continued. "He got afraid, and off he went. He'll probably live till ninety—"
"Please don't tell me any more," she said. "Please don't—I couldn't stand any more."
"All right. The little devil I came down to see is hopeless. We may as well go back to-morrow."
"Oh, don't you? Sometimes I don't either."
She put her hand on his.
"Oh, I'm sorry I said that, Dick."
Some one had brought a phonograph into the bar and they sat listening to The Wedding of the Painted Doll.
点击收听单词发音
1 catastrophe | |
n.大灾难,大祸 | |
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2 ken | |
n.视野,知识领域 | |
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3 disastrous | |
adj.灾难性的,造成灾害的;极坏的,很糟的 | |
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4 hurdle | |
n.跳栏,栏架;障碍,困难;vi.进行跨栏赛 | |
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5 intensified | |
v.(使)增强, (使)加剧( intensify的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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6 vibrations | |
n.摆动( vibration的名词复数 );震动;感受;(偏离平衡位置的)一次性往复振动 | |
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7 previously | |
adv.以前,先前(地) | |
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8 virtue | |
n.德行,美德;贞操;优点;功效,效力 | |
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9 exhausted | |
adj.极其疲惫的,精疲力尽的 | |
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10 anonymous | |
adj.无名的;匿名的;无特色的 | |
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11 wan | |
(wide area network)广域网 | |
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12 spinal | |
adj.针的,尖刺的,尖刺状突起的;adj.脊骨的,脊髓的 | |
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13 chili | |
n.辣椒 | |
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14 suite | |
n.一套(家具);套房;随从人员 | |
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15 corrupt | |
v.贿赂,收买;adj.腐败的,贪污的 | |
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16 incorrigibly | |
adv.无法矫正地;屡教不改地;无可救药地;不能矫正地 | |
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17 pointed | |
adj.尖的,直截了当的 | |
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18 lashed | |
adj.具睫毛的v.鞭打( lash的过去式和过去分词 );煽动;紧系;怒斥 | |
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19 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 | |
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20 futile | |
adj.无效的,无用的,无希望的 | |
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21 amateurish | |
n.业余爱好的,不熟练的 | |
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22 facetiousness | |
n.滑稽 | |
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23 nauseated | |
adj.作呕的,厌恶的v.使恶心,作呕( nauseate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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24 manliness | |
刚毅 | |
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25 perverted | |
adj.不正当的v.滥用( pervert的过去式和过去分词 );腐蚀;败坏;使堕落 | |
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26 outrages | |
引起…的义愤,激怒( outrage的第三人称单数 ) | |
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27 wretch | |
n.可怜的人,不幸的人;卑鄙的人 | |
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28 courageous | |
adj.勇敢的,有胆量的 | |
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29 dissect | |
v.分割;解剖 | |
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30 personalities | |
n. 诽谤,(对某人容貌、性格等所进行的)人身攻击; 人身攻击;人格, 个性, 名人( personality的名词复数 ) | |
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31 condemned | |
adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词 | |
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32 egos | |
自我,自尊,自负( ego的名词复数 ) | |
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33 veranda | |
n.走廊;阳台 | |
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34 vibrant | |
adj.震颤的,响亮的,充满活力的,精力充沛的,(色彩)鲜明的 | |
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35 impersonal | |
adj.无个人感情的,与个人无关的,非人称的 | |
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36 standing | |
n.持续,地位;adj.永久的,不动的,直立的,不流动的 | |
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37 laggard | |
n.落后者;adj.缓慢的,落后的 | |
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38 flip | |
vt.快速翻动;轻抛;轻拍;n.轻抛;adj.轻浮的 | |
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39 civilized | |
a.有教养的,文雅的 | |
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40 gathering | |
n.集会,聚会,聚集 | |
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41 astonishment | |
n.惊奇,惊异 | |
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42 scrawled | |
乱涂,潦草地写( scrawl的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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43 reassured | |
adj.使消除疑虑的;使放心的v.再保证,恢复信心( reassure的过去式和过去分词) | |
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44 divulged | |
v.吐露,泄露( divulge的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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45 precipitating | |
adj.急落的,猛冲的v.(突如其来地)使发生( precipitate的现在分词 );促成;猛然摔下;使沉淀 | |
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46 decided | |
adj.决定了的,坚决的;明显的,明确的 | |
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47 consultation | |
n.咨询;商量;商议;会议 | |
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48 descending | |
n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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49 fervor | |
n.热诚;热心;炽热 | |
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50 gracefully | |
ad.大大方方地;优美地 | |
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51 chambers | |
n.房间( chamber的名词复数 );(议会的)议院;卧室;会议厅 | |
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52 fugitives | |
n.亡命者,逃命者( fugitive的名词复数 ) | |
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53 derivatives | |
n.衍生性金融商品;派生物,引出物( derivative的名词复数 );导数 | |
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54 opium | |
n.鸦片;adj.鸦片的 | |
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55 inconvenient | |
adj.不方便的,令人感到麻烦的 | |
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56 tuberculosis | |
n.结核病,肺结核 | |
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57 gratis | |
adj.免费的 | |
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58 nun | |
n.修女,尼姑 | |
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59 emaciated | |
adj.衰弱的,消瘦的 | |
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60 deserted | |
adj.荒芜的,荒废的,无人的,被遗弃的 | |
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61 romp | |
n.欢闹;v.嬉闹玩笑 | |
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62 reiterated | |
反复地说,重申( reiterate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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63 collaborating | |
合作( collaborate的现在分词 ); 勾结叛国 | |
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64 collapse | |
vi.累倒;昏倒;倒塌;塌陷 | |
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65 collapsed | |
adj.倒塌的 | |
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66 hearty | |
adj.热情友好的;衷心的;尽情的,纵情的 | |
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67 buck | |
n.雄鹿,雄兔;v.马离地跳跃 | |
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68 formulate | |
v.用公式表示;规划;设计;系统地阐述 | |
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69 herald | |
vt.预示...的来临,预告,宣布,欢迎 | |
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70 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 | |
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71 disquieted | |
v.使不安,使忧虑,使烦恼( disquiet的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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72 grill | |
n.烤架,铁格子,烤肉;v.烧,烤,严加盘问 | |
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73 tragic | |
adj.悲剧的,悲剧性的,悲惨的 | |
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74 apathy | |
n.漠不关心,无动于衷;冷淡 | |
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75 forth | |
adv.向前;向外,往外 | |
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