The City Beautiful: Chapters 28–39

by Aden Polydoros
Ahead of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago, Jewish teenage boys begin to disappear from the city's streets. After his best friend goes missing, Alter must race to solve the mystery before he becomes the killer's next victim.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Chapters 1–5, Chapters 6–14, Chapters 15–27, Chapters 28–39, Chapter 40–Epilogue
40 words 14 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. speculation
    a message expressing an opinion based on incomplete evidence
    “If the story were just about Mr. Katz, the Arbeiter-Zeitung might publish it, but we’d need more than what we have. We can’t just publish an article based on speculation.”
  2. tousle
    disarrange or rumple; dishevel
    He ran a hand through his tousled curls, as though self-conscious of having his head uncovered in a place so Jewish that there were mezuzahs on every doorpost.
  3. flippant
    showing an inappropriate lack of seriousness
    “All the more reason to go,” he said, with a smile I would have found appealing if his flippancy wasn’t so aggravating.
  4. mangy
    affected with a skin disease causing itching and hair loss
    Most of those places don’t serve Jews. You enter the room, and they look at you like you’re a mangy mutt.
  5. languid
    lacking spirit or liveliness
    He gave a languid wave of his hand.
  6. verdant
    characterized by abundance of vegetation and green foliage
    The Washington Park racetrack sat on a verdant strip of land along the city’s southwestern edge, within walking distance of both the Fair’s Midway Plaisance and the University of Chicago.
  7. coddle
    treat with excessive indulgence
    “Da, that’s perfect.”
    “Ah, don’t coddle me. I know that my pronunciation is atrocious.”
  8. flourish
    a showy gesture
    “The next race is about to begin, gentlemen,” Mr. Whitby guffawed, punctuating the statement with a jab of his cigar, in a flourish as enthusiastic as an orchestra conductor.
  9. resounding
    characterized by loud, deep sound
    We were too far away to hear their hoofbeats, but as they surged down the track, I thought I could feel the resounding force resonating through my bones.
  10. rococo
    having excessive asymmetrical ornamentation
    Grimy brick tenements shifted in the corner of my eye, acquiring decorative statues and rococo stuccowork—the adornments of a European city.
  11. fitful
    intermittently stopping and starting
    I had spent several hours resting fitfully in Michael Reese Hospital’s lobby, stirred from uncertain dreams by the pealing ambulance bells and the groans of patients.
  12. din
    a loud, harsh, or strident noise
    It disoriented me to hear the two men speaking, their voices overlapping in a low din.
  13. disarming
    capable of allaying hostility
    “I see,” Rariden said with a smile that would have been disarming, if not for the glint of white teeth when he did it.
  14. pervasive
    spreading or spread throughout
    The noise was so pervasive that I even thought I heard the movements of those giant presses in the walls and the ceiling, as though the building itself were a vast meat grinder.
  15. placard
    a sign posted in a public place
    Rubbish and abandoned placards lay in the dirt. Signs in English, German, and Yiddish.
  16. gauntlet
    a severe or trying experience
    I passed through a gauntlet of enraged faces and shifting bodies, ducking my head to avoid hurled stones.
  17. offal
    viscera and trimmings of a butchered animal
    Just as the carcasses were sent down below after slaughter, the blood and offal were probably pumped to the sublevel through a network of chutes and pipes.
  18. rancid
    having an offensive smell or taste
    Filtered through the Stockyards haze, the light of the setting sun congealed like rancid lard on the stairs.
  19. scanty
    lacking in extent or quantity
    The scanty group of strikebreakers—the first of many, I was sure—wouldn’t be enough to keep a slaughterhouse of this size in operation.
  20. sepulchral
    gruesomely indicative of death or the dead
    Darkness, the sepulchral silence down below, and the groan of hooves and steam-powered machinery from the levels far above.
  21. congeal
    solidify, thicken, or come together
    In places, blood had dripped from the drainage pipes and congealed on the floor in puddles of black and burgundy, some blotched with mold.
  22. viscera
    internal organs collectively
    A rat scuttled from the shadows, dragging a glistening chunk of meat or viscera.
  23. fetid
    offensively malodorous
    As I lifted the trapdoor, a burst of hot, fetid air billowed from the hole, accompanied by hundreds of black gnats.
  24. enigmatic
    not clear to the understanding
    His enigmatic beauty seemed better suited for dim Gothic chambers and the silence of ruined castles, aristocracy that had cracked around the edges, clothed itself in ivy, and crawled back into the wilderness.
  25. virility
    the trait of being manly
    With sunflower petals ensnared in his raven-black hair and his eyes violet in the burnished light, he radiated that dark, primal virility now more than ever.
  26. respite
    a relief from harm or discomfort
    It came as an unspeakable relief to see that my clothes were undisturbed, but that respite lasted only as long as it took for my eyes to adjust to the darkness.
  27. fickle
    liable to sudden unpredictable change
    “You were unconscious for so long, I was a little worried I’d killed you. Chloroform is fickle in that way.”
  28. filigree
    delicate and intricate ornamentation
    She had thrust the pins up to their shanks. One had caught the meat of his biceps and gone all the way through to the other side, the filigree orb bobbing up and down with his frantic motions.
  29. entrails
    internal organs collectively
    He was down in the cellar, among the waste and entrails.
  30. wan
    lacking vitality as from weariness or illness or unhappiness
    A wan smile touched her lips.
  31. prissy
    exaggeratedly proper
    I thought about all the small ways Dovid and Haskel poked fun at me—prude, frigid, prissy, frum, pious, cold, quiet as a mouse—and I lowered my eyes to the ground because I was too embarrassed to meet Frankie’s gaze.
  32. curio
    something unusual, maybe worthy of collecting
    Along with the stifling crowds, there were jugglers and swordsmen and curio sellers and camels lumbering under the weight of tourists in starched suits and petticoats.
  33. lurid
    glaringly vivid and graphic; marked by sensationalism
    He transformed Yakov’s death into cheap, pulpy entertainment with his lurid descriptions.
  34. carrion
    the dead and rotting body of an animal; unfit for human food
    Mr. Lewin sat at his desk on the third floor, crouched over his typewriter like a vulture dining on carrion.
  35. backwater
    a place or condition in which no progress is occurring
    “I read your notes. They were incoherent, inarticulate. Absolutely unsophisticated. Your writing might be considered adequate in a backwater shtetl in Russia—”
  36. truculence
    stubborn and defiant aggressiveness
    “Alter, when you first came to work here, I sensed a certain hint of, dare I say, truculence,” Mr. Stieglitz said blandly.
  37. listless
    marked by low spirits; showing no enthusiasm
    Stooped over in the chair in the corner, Kuna, the gravedigger, flipped listlessly through a well-creased book.
  38. profane
    grossly irreverent toward what is held to be sacred
    Dry blood caked the brass Star of David pendant he wore around his neck. His shirt was torn down the middle, as was what lay beneath the shirt. The wound was profane.
  39. slough
    cast off hair, skin, horn, or feathers
    The rotting flower petals sloughed off in my fingers as I wheeled forward, sunken to the knees in the muddy water.
  40. tepid
    moderately warm
    The sky overhead was as filmy white as a corpse’s eyes, no sun, just a tepid glow from beyond the horizon.
Created on Fri Aug 19 10:06:21 EDT 2022 (updated Fri Sep 09 09:54:14 EDT 2022)

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