1-50

 

50.

One of Willy’s friends was having a birthday party. In the countryside near Gloucestershire. Morethan a birthday party, it was a fancy-dress party, with a cringy theme. Natives and colonials.

Guests were required to dress accordingly.

January 2005.

I didn’t love fancy-dress parties. And I couldn’t stand themes. For Willy’s last birthday, or theone before, he’d had a fancy-dress party with a theme: Out of Africa. I found it irritating andbaffling. Every time I’d gone to Africa I’d worn shorts and a T-shirt, maybe a kikoi. Would thatdo, Willy? But this was magnitudes worse.

Not one item of native or colonial garb¹ hung in my wardrobe. I was crashing with Pa andCamilla, some days at St. James’s, some days at Highgrove, largely living out of a suitcase, so Ididn’t give a damn about clothes. I looked most days as if I’d got dressed in a very dark anddisordered room. A fancy-dress party, therefore, with a theme, was my nightmare.

Pass. Hard pass.

Willy, however, insisted. We’ll find you something to wear, Harold.

His new girlfriend promised to help.

I liked his new girlfriend. She was carefree, sweet, kind. She’d done a gap year in Florence,knew about photography, art. And clothes. She loved clothes.

Her name was Kate. I forget what native or colonial thing she was wearing to the party, butwith her help Willy had chosen for himself some kind of…feline outfit². Skintight leotard with (amI remembering this correctly?) a springy, bouncy tail. He tried it on for us and he looked like across between Tigger and Baryshnikov. Kate and I had a great time pointing our fingers at him androlling around on the floor. It was ridiculous, especially in a three-way mirror. But ridiculous, theyboth said, was the point of the upcoming party.

I liked seeing Kate laugh. Better yet, I liked making her laugh. And I was quite good at it. Mytransparently silly side connected with her heavily disguised silly side. Whenever I worried thatKate was going to be the one to take Willy from me, I consoled myself with thoughts of all ourfuture laughing fits together, and I told myself how great everything would be when I had aserious girlfriend who could laugh along with us. Maybe it would be Chelsy.

Maybe, I thought, I can make Kate laugh with my costume.

But what would it be? What’s Harold going to be? This became our constant topic.

On the day of the party it was decided³ that I’d go to a nearby village, Nailsworth, where therewas a well-known costume shop. Surely I could find something there.

It’s a bit blurry⁴, though some things come back with total certainty. The shop had anunforgettable smell. I remember its musty, moldy⁵ funk, with an undercurrent of something else,something indefinable, some airborne by-product⁶ of a tightly sealed room, containing hundreds ofpairs of trousers, shared over several decades, by thousands of humans.

I went up and down the rows, sifting⁷ through the racks, seeing nothing I liked. With timerunning out I narrowed my options to two.

A British pilot’s uniform.

And a sand-colored Nazi⁸ uniform.

With a swastika armband.

And a flat cap.

I phoned Willy and Kate, asked what they thought.

Nazi uniform, they said.

I rented it, plus a silly mustache, and went back to the house. I tried it all on. They bothhowled. Worse than Willy’s leotard outfit! Way more ridiculous!

Which, again, was the point.

But the mustache needed trimming, so I snipped⁹ the long bits on the ends, made it a properHitler mouser. Then added in some cargo¹⁰ trousers.

Off we went to the party, where no one looked twice at my costume. All the natives andcolonials were more focused on getting drunk and groping each other. No one took any notice ofme, which I put down as a small win.

Someone, however, snapped photos. Days later this someone saw a chance to make some cash,or some trouble, and sought out a reporter. How much for snaps from a recent party attended byyoung royals? The crown jewel of the photos was thought to be Willy in his leotard.

But the reporter spotted¹¹ something else. Hello, what’s this? The Spare? As a Nazi?

There was some haggling¹² over price, according to reports I’ve heard. A sum of five thousandpounds was agreed upon and weeks later the photo appeared in every paper in the known world,beneath titanic¹³ headlines.

Heil Harry¹⁴!

Heir Aberrant¹⁵.

Royal Heil to Pay.

What followed was a firestorm, which I thought at times would engulf¹⁶ me. And I felt that Ideserved to be engulfed¹⁷. There were moments over the course of the next several weeks andmonths when I thought I might die of shame.

The typical response to the photos was: What could he have been thinking? The simplestanswer was: I wasn’t. When I saw those photos, I recognized immediately that my brain had beenshut off, that perhaps it had been shut off for some time. I wanted to go around Britain knockingon doors, explaining to people: I wasn’t thinking. I meant no harm. But it wouldn’t have made anydifference. Judgment¹⁸ was swift, harsh. I was either a crypto Nazi or else a mental defective¹⁹.

I turned to Willy. He was sympathetic, but there wasn’t much to say. Then I phoned Pa. To mysurprise he was serene²⁰. At first I was suspicious. I thought maybe he was seeing my crisis asanother opportunity to bolster²¹ his PR. But he spoke²² to me with such tenderness, such genuinecompassion, that I was disarmed²³. And grateful.

He didn’t gloss²⁴ over the facts. Darling boy, how could you be so foolish? My cheeks burned. Iknow, I know. But he quickly went on to say that it was the foolishness of youth, that heremembered being publicly vilified²⁵ for youthful sins, and it wasn’t fair, because youth is the timewhen you’re, by definition, unfinished. You’re still growing, still becoming, still learning, he said.

He didn’t specifically cite any of his youthful humiliations, but I knew. His most intimateconversations had been leaked, his most ill- conceived remarks had been trumpeted²⁷. Pastgirlfriends had been interrogated²⁸, their rating of his lovemaking spread across tabloids²⁹, evenbooks. He knew all about humiliation²⁶.

He promised that the fury about this would blow over, the shame would fade. I loved him forthat promise, even though—or maybe because—I knew it to be false. The shame would neverfade. Nor should it.

Day after day the scandal grew. I was excoriated³⁰ in newspapers, on radio, on TV. Members ofParliament called for my head on a spike³¹. One said I should be barred from entering Sandhurst.

The blowing-over, therefore, according to Pa’s staff, would need some help. I’d need to makesome sort of public atonement.

Fine by me, I said. Sooner the better.

So Pa sent me to a holy man.

 

1 garb   

n.服装，装束

参考例句：

• He wore the garb of a general.他身着将军的制服。
• Certain political,social,and legal forms reappear in seemingly different garb.一些政治、社会和法律的形式在表面不同的外衣下重复出现。

2 outfit   

n.（为特殊用途的）全套装备，全套服装

参考例句：

• Jenney bought a new outfit for her daughter's wedding.珍妮为参加女儿的婚礼买了一套新装。
• His father bought a ski outfit for him on his birthday.他父亲在他生日那天给他买了一套滑雪用具。

3 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

4 blurry   

adj.模糊的；污脏的，污斑的

参考例句：

• My blurry vision makes it hard to drive. 我的视力有点模糊，使得开起车来相当吃力。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The lines are pretty blurry at this point. 界线在这个时候是很模糊的。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 moldy   

adj.发霉的

参考例句：

• She chucked the moldy potatoes in the dustbin.她把发霉的土豆扔进垃圾箱。
• Oranges can be kept for a long time without going moldy.橙子可以存放很长时间而不腐烂。

6 by-product   

n.副产品，附带产生的结果

参考例句：

• Freedom is the by-product of economic surplus.自由是经济盈余的副产品。
• The raw material for the tyre is a by-product of petrol refining.制造轮胎的原材料是提炼汽油时产生的一种副产品。

7 sifting   

n.筛，过滤v.筛( sift的现在分词 )；筛滤；细查；详审

参考例句：

• He lay on the beach, sifting the sand through his fingers. 他躺在沙滩上用手筛砂子玩。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I was sifting the cinders when she came in. 她进来时，我正在筛煤渣。 来自辞典例句

8 Nazi   

n.纳粹分子，adj.纳粹党的，纳粹的

参考例句：

• They declare the Nazi regime overthrown and sue for peace.他们宣布纳粹政权已被推翻，并出面求和。
• Nazi closes those war criminals inside their concentration camp.纳粹把那些战犯关在他们的集中营里。

9 snipped   

v.剪( snip的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He snipped off the corner of the packet. 他将包的一角剪了下来。 来自辞典例句
• The police officer snipped the tape and untied the hostage. 警方把胶带剪断，松绑了人质。 来自互联网

10 cargo   

n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物

参考例句：

• The ship has a cargo of about 200 ton.这条船大约有200吨的货物。
• A lot of people discharged the cargo from a ship.许多人从船上卸下货物。

11 spotted   

adj.有斑点的，斑纹的，弄污了的

参考例句：

• The milkman selected the spotted cows,from among a herd of two hundred.牛奶商从一群200头牛中选出有斑点的牛。
• Sam's shop stocks short spotted socks.山姆的商店屯积了有斑点的短袜。

12 haggling   

v.讨价还价( haggle的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• I left him in the market haggling over the price of a shirt. 我扔下他自己在市场上就一件衬衫讨价还价。
• Some were haggling loudly with traders as they hawked their wares. 有些人正在大声同兜售货物的商贩讲价钱。 来自辞典例句

13 titanic   

adj.巨人的，庞大的，强大的

参考例句：

• We have been making titanic effort to achieve our purpose.我们一直在作极大的努力，以达到我们的目的。
• The island was created by titanic powers and they are still at work today.台湾岛是由一个至今仍然在运作的巨大力量塑造出来的。

14 harry   

vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼

参考例句：

• Today,people feel more hurried and harried.今天，人们感到更加忙碌和苦恼。
• Obama harried business by Healthcare Reform plan.奥巴马用医改掠夺了商界。

15 aberrant   

adj.畸变的，异常的，脱离常轨的

参考例句：

• His aberrant behavior at the party shocked everyone.他在晚会上的异常举止令所有人感到震惊！
• I saw that the insects and spiders were displaying the same kind of aberrant behavior.我看到昆虫和蜘蛛正在表现出相同反常的行为。

16 engulf   

vt.吞没，吞食

参考例句：

• Floodwaters engulf a housing project in the Bajo Yuna community in central Dominican Republic.洪水吞没了多米尼加中部巴杰优那社区的一处在建的住房工程项目。
• If we are not strong enough to cover all the minds up,then they will engulf us,and we are in danger.如果我们不够坚强来抵挡大众的意念，就会有被他们吞没的危险。

17 engulfed   

v.吞没，包住( engulf的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He was engulfed by a crowd of reporters. 他被一群记者团团围住。
• The little boat was engulfed by the waves. 小船被波浪吞没了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

18 judgment   

n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见

参考例句：

• The chairman flatters himself on his judgment of people.主席自认为他审视人比别人高明。
• He's a man of excellent judgment.他眼力过人。

19 defective   

adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的

参考例句：

• The firm had received bad publicity over a defective product. 该公司因为一件次品而受到媒体攻击。
• If the goods prove defective, the customer has the right to compensation. 如果货品证明有缺陷， 顾客有权索赔。

20 serene   

adj. 安详的，宁静的，平静的

参考例句：

• He has entered the serene autumn of his life.他已进入了美好的中年时期。
• He didn't speak much,he just smiled with that serene smile of his.他话不多，只是脸上露出他招牌式的淡定的微笑。

21 bolster   

n.枕垫；v.支持，鼓励

参考例句：

• The high interest rates helped to bolster up the economy.高利率使经济更稳健。
• He tried to bolster up their morale.他尽力鼓舞他们的士气。

22 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：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

23 disarmed   

v.裁军( disarm的过去式和过去分词 )；使息怒

参考例句：

• Most of the rebels were captured and disarmed. 大部分叛乱分子被俘获并解除了武装。
• The swordsman disarmed his opponent and ran him through. 剑客缴了对手的械，并对其乱刺一气。 来自《简明英汉词典》

24 gloss   

n.光泽，光滑；虚饰；注释；vt.加光泽于；掩饰

参考例句：

• John tried in vain to gloss over his faults.约翰极力想掩饰自己的缺点，但是没有用。
• She rubbed up the silver plates to a high gloss.她把银盘擦得很亮。

25 vilified   

v.中伤，诽谤( vilify的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He was vilified in newspapers. 他在报纸上受到了诽谤。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• She was vilified by the press for her controversial views. 因她持有异议，新闻界对她横加挞伐。 来自互联网

26 humiliation   

n.羞辱

参考例句：

• He suffered the humiliation of being forced to ask for his cards.他蒙受了被迫要求辞职的羞辱。
• He will wish to revenge his humiliation in last Season's Final.他会为在上个季度的决赛中所受的耻辱而报复的。

27 trumpeted   

大声说出或宣告（trumpet的过去式与过去分词形式）

参考例句：

• Soldiers trumpeted and bugled. 士兵们吹喇叭鸣号角。
• The radio trumpeted the presidential campaign across the country. 电台在全国范围大力宣传总统竞选运动。

28 interrogated   

v.询问( interrogate的过去式和过去分词 )；审问；（在计算机或其他机器上）查询

参考例句：

• He was interrogated by the police for over 12 hours. 他被警察审问了12个多小时。
• Two suspects are now being interrogated in connection with the killing. 与杀人案有关的两名嫌疑犯正在接受审讯。 来自《简明英汉词典》

29 tabloids   

n.小报，通俗小报（版面通常比大报小一半，文章短，图片多，经常报道名人佚事）( tabloid的名词复数 )；药片

参考例句：

• The story was on the front pages of all the tabloids. 所有小报都在头版报道了这件事。
• The story made the front page in all the tabloids. 这件事成了所有小报的头版新闻。

30 excoriated   

v.擦伤( excoriate的过去式和过去分词 )；擦破（皮肤）；剥（皮）；严厉指责

参考例句：

• His palms were excoriated by the hard labor of shoveling. 他的手掌因干挖土的活儿而磨破了皮。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• His palms were excoriated by the hard labour of shoveling. 他的手掌因挖土之苦工而破皮了。 来自辞典例句

31 spike   

n.长钉，钉鞋；v.以大钉钉牢，使...失效

参考例句：

• The spike pierced the receipts and held them in order.那个钉子穿过那些收据并使之按顺序排列。
• They'll do anything to spike the guns of the opposition.他们会使出各种手段来挫败对手。