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● if they turned black：假如女儿给晒黑了。
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● stunning：美极了，美得使人目眩神移。
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That was why she had taken her book and her spectacles and gone off alone to sit under the reclusive calm of the acacia tree, irritated about things and not realizing, until the wooden chock of croquet balls began to scrape more and more harshly on her nerves, how vulgar the sound of shrieking could be in the hot still afternoon.
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“You really must stop it!” she lifted her voice at last in a spurt of anger. “Can’t you play quietly for a change?”
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● 上文几段都是倒叙过去，讲到这里，才回到开头出发点。
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● reclusive：隐遁的。not realizing的宾语是“how vulgar…”这一从句。scrape on her nerves：扰乱（擦伤）她的神经。harshly：刺耳地。vulgar：恶俗。等到她感到木球之声愈来愈聒耳烦心，她才明白这种尖声怪叫，在平静（still）的热天下午听来，是多么的恶俗可厌。
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● a spurt of anger：怒气突发，从今天下午开始，Mrs. Fairfax是百般地不痛快，女儿丈夫都在惹她生气，饭后想求片刻宁静，偏偏木球声、笑声、叫声扰得她心情更为不安，现在忍无可忍，怒火直冒矣。
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Then she realized, slowly, and at first with unbelief, that there was not a sound in the afternoon. The air above the tall acacia tree was not strong enough to quiver the smallest leaves. Coming down so suddenly, after the shrieking and the laughter, the silence had a creepiness about it. She actually heard a bird scratching at dry earth, among summer-burned leaves, under the bushes of guelder-rose, a small obsessional sound of tiny claws searching in shadow that awoke in her, almost before she was aware of it, new sources of irritation.
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● realized：明明白白地觉得；下随that从句，作其宾语。
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● slowly, and at first with unbelief：她慢慢地才听出来（园里已经寂然无声），起初她还不信呢。照语法结构，realized应直跟that；可是作者插进了一个副词（slowly）和一个副词短语，加上了三个逗点，念的时候就得多停三次。本来可以一气直下的，现在便多顿挫。浩浩荡荡，一鼓作气，固然痛快；然而吞吐盘旋，一波三折，文章便多妩媚。初学作文者，往往直叙无文，如欲更进一层，稍事修饰增益，宜在此等地方用功夫。
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● air名曰气，实即风也。风弱，虽至细之叶亦不为吹动。quiver：使之震颤。Coming为现在分词，形容主语silence。creepiness：身上如有物爬行之感。怪叫大笑之后，沉寂如此突然地来临，令人起某种（a creepiness）悚然之感。
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● scratching：扒抓。obsessional：萦绕心头的，盘旋耳边的。a small obsessional sound是同位语，说明前面的a bird scratching。tiny：细小的。claws：爪。searching：搜寻。that是关系代名词，代替sound。awoke：唤醒，引起；其宾语为“new sources（根由）of irritation”。细微的扒抓之声，在她耳边萦绕不去，在她心头造成了新的烦恼因素。
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● almost before she was aware of it：几乎在她自觉烦恼之前，烦恼已经上了身了。她的新烦恼是不知不觉中来的。
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Now what had happened? Now where had everyone disappeared to? Now what were they up to?
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In uneasiness she tried to peer first over, then half under, the canopy seat, searching for the movement of figures through the lower branches of the shrubbery of acacia and guelder-rose. But it was no use; there was nothing there to see.
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● up to=doing；about to do。她们在“搞”些什么呢？
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● uneasiness：不安，不自在。peer：窥视。over是介词，其宾语为the canopy seat。她先从椅子上面探望，继而半俯身子，向下窥视。figures：人的身形。branches：树枝。shrubbery：灌木。
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It was in a final effort towards calmness, towards being rational, that she lay full length on the seat. The toes of her shoes clung to her feet by the tips and presently one of them fell off, dropping down on the lawn, as she moved on the canopy.
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● 她力求镇静，力求合理（rational，自寻烦恼便是无理取闹）；东张西望，既然看不出一个结果，她索性全身伸直（full length）了，躺在摇椅之上。这是她使自己心平气和的最后一次努力（final effort），以后孩子们不管多么吵闹，或是在偷偷摸摸地顽皮，她都不去理会了。
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● toes：鞋的前端。clung：附着。by the tips：只有鞋尖一点点的地方，还附着在脚尖上。人躺好了，神经宽舒，鞋自然松下；所以她在椅上（canopy是canopy seat的简写）挪动一下，鞋就落在草地之上。她当然也懒得去捡了。
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A moment or two later she was aware that the creeping sound of the bird in its obsessional scratching among leaves seemed to be growing louder. It seemed also to be coming nearer. And suddenly she was aware of it under the very corner of the canopy. She saw that it belonged to the tousled dark head of a young man who was crawling almost underneath her on his hands and knees.
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● tousled（过去分词）：头发蓬松的。
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● crawling on his hands and knees：两手两膝着地地爬。地上悉悉索索在扒的，扰乱得她心神不宁的，原来并不是鸟。
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“Oh! my God,” he said.
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He was already holding her shoe in his hand.
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