As she stood in the fuzzy [’fʌzɪ] (неясный, туманный, смазанный) green light of the vegetable garden, Dick crossed the path ahead of (впереди неё) her going to his work house. Nicole waited silently till he had passed (пройти мимо); then she went on through (через, сквозь) lines of prospective (будущий) salads to a little menagerie (зверинец) where pigeons and rabbits and a parrot made a medley (мешанина, «попурри») of insolent (дерзкий, наглый, нахальный) noises at her. Descending to another ledge (выступ, уступ; край) she reached a low, curved (изогнутый, кривой) wall and looked down seven hundred feet to the Mediterranean Sea.
She stood in the ancient (древний, античный) hill (холм) village of Tarmes. The villa and its grounds were made out of a row (ряд) of peasant (крестьянский) dwellings (жилище) that abutted (примыкать к, граничить с, упираться во (что-л.) on the cliff (утёс) – five small houses had been combined (соединять) to make the house and four destroyed (разрушать) to make the garden. The exterior (внешний) walls were untouched (нетронутый) so that (так что) from the road far below (далеко внизу) it was indistinguishable (неразличимый) from the violet (фиолетоый) gray mass of the town.
For a moment Nicole stood looking down at the Mediterranean but there was nothing to do with that, even with her tireless hands. Presently (вскоре) Dick came out of his one-room house carrying a telescope and looked east toward Cannes. In a moment Nicole swam into his field of vision (обзор, видение), whereupon he disappeared into his house and came out with a megaphone. He had many light mechanical devices.
«Nicole,» he shouted, «I forgot to tell you that as a final apostolic [апостолический; папский, святейший] gesture I invited Mrs. Abrams, the woman with the white hair.»
«I suspected (подозревать) it. It’s an outrage (грубое нарушение (закона, прав, приличий); произвол).»
The ease (лёгкость) with which her reply reached him seemed to belittle (недооценивать, принижать) his megaphone, so she raised her voice and called, «Can you hear me?»
«Yes.» He lowered the megaphone and then raised it stubbornly (упрямо). «I’m going to invite some more people too. I’m going to invite the two young men.»
«All right,» she agreed placidly (миролюбиво).
«I want to give a really BAD party. I mean it. I want to give a party where there’s a brawl (шумная ссора, перебранка, скандал; драка) and seductions (совращение, обольщение) and people going home with their feelings hurt (ранить) and women passed out (терять сознание, отключаться) in the cabinet de toilette. You wait and see.»
He went back into his house and Nicole saw that one of his most characteristic moods was upon him, the excitement that swept everyone up into it and was inevitably (неизбежно) followed by his own form of melancholy (меланхолия), which he never displayed (показывать) but at which she guessed (догадываться). This excitement (волнение, возбуждение) about things reached an intensity (напряжение) out of proportion (пропорция, отношение) to their importance, generating (вызывать, достигать) a really extraordinary virtuosity (виртуозность) with people. Save (за исключением, кроме, если бы не) among a few of the tough-minded (практичный, трезвый) and perennially (всегда, вечно; неизменно, постоянно) suspicious (подозрительный), he had the power of arousing (вызывать) a fascinated (очарованный; загипнотизированный) and uncritical love. The reaction came when he realized the waste and extravagance involved (вовлечённый, участвующий). He sometimes looked back with awe (страх, трепет, благоговение) at the carnivals (фестиваль; праздник) of affection любовь, привязанность) he had given, as a general might gaze (пристально глядеть; вглядываться; уставиться) upon a massacre (резня; бойня, избиение) he had ordered to satisfy an impersonal blood lust (вожделение).