Jacob Have I Loved: Chapters 6–9

by Katherine Paterson
Growing up on a remote fishing island in the 1940s, Sara Louise attempts to escape the shadow of her talented and favored twin sister.

Here are links to our lists for the novel: Rass Island–Chapter 2, Chapters 3–5, Chapters 6–9, Chapters 10–13, Chapters 14–20

Here are links to our lists for other works by Katherine Paterson: Bridge to Terabithia, Lyddie, The Great Gilly Hopkins
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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. indict
    accuse formally of a crime
    She was using my fingernails to indict my soul.
  2. rivulet
    a small stream
    Even as I yelled, I could feel a tiny rivulet of satisfaction invading the flood of my anger.
  3. liable
    likely to be or do something
    I hated my sister. I, who belonged to a religion which taught that simply to be angry with another made one liable to the judgment of God and that to hate was the equivalent of murder.
  4. exultation
    a feeling of extreme joy
    Always there were two feelings in the dream—a wild exultation that now I was free of her and...terrible guilt.
  5. enlightenment
    education that results in the spread of knowledge
    I would search the Scriptures, but not for enlightenment or instruction. I was looking for some tiny shred of evidence that I was not to be eternally damned for hating my sister.
  6. grudgingly
    in a reluctant manner
    Call went along, somewhat grudgingly, because I was unwilling to explain my great zeal for work.
  7. zeal
    a feeling of strong eagerness
    Call went along, somewhat grudgingly, because I was unwilling to explain my great zeal for work.
  8. fickle
    liable to sudden unpredictable change
    I was too clever to pin all my hopes on crabs. Crabs are fickle creatures.
  9. squander
    spend thoughtlessly; throw away
    I even squandered a dime of my hard-earned cash to buy the book, which I hid with my other treasures in the underwear drawer.
  10. allusion
    passing reference or indirect mention
    It had all the elements—romance, sadness, an allusion to the war, and faithful love.
  11. varmint
    any usually predatory wild animal considered undesirable
    He shook his head, the picture of patient disbelief, and I forgot I was pretending not to care about crabs and devoted my full attention to the pesky varmints.
  12. dampen
    lessen in force or effect
    Call’s total lack of enthusiasm for my poem had had a dampening effect.
  13. saboteur
    someone who deliberately destroys or disrupts something
    It was about that time that our day-old Baltimore Sun carried huge headlines about the eight German saboteurs.
  14. contempt
    lack of respect accompanied by a feeling of intense dislike
    If he was not a spy, if he was indeed Hiram Wallace, why had he come back after all these years to an island where he was hardly remembered except with contempt?
  15. ramshackle
    in poor or broken-down condition
    I don’t mind admitting I wasn’t too keen to step out on that ramshackle dock, but after Call had jumped onto it, and it had only shuddered a bit, I climbed carefully out and walked off to the shore as quickly as I dared.
  16. grim
    filled with melancholy and despondency
    I noticed grimly that he didn’t mind at all ordering us around, even though we were supposed to be doing him a favor.
  17. par
    a state of being essentially equal or equivalent
    My spiritual health was about on a par with a person who’s been dead three days, but I wasn’t about to admit it and get prayed for out loud on Wednesday night by that bunch of old sooks.
  18. concession
    a point that is yielded
    His one concession to the temperature was that we work indoors and not on the dock in the sun.
  19. dainty
    affectedly refined
    When the Captain took a swing at him there, he leaped daintily to the floor, taking a cup down with his tail.
  20. futile
    producing no result or effect
    He took another futile swing before he answered. “Call, I know those blasted commandments as well as you do, and there is not one word in them about how to speak to tomcats. Now stop trying to play preacher and help me catch that damn cat and let’s get him out of here.”
  21. proscribe
    command against
    Why was it so funny? Was it because it was so wonderful to discover something on this island that was free—something unproscribed by God, Moses, or the Methodist conference? We could talk to cats any way we pleased.
  22. interloper
    someone who intrudes on the privacy or property of another
    I no longer wanted the Captain to be a Nazi spy or an interloper.
  23. irreverent
    showing lack of due respect or veneration
    For some reason my irreverent description of Auntie Braxton’s house triggered Call.
  24. dilapidated
    in a state of decay, ruin, or deterioration
    If I let go the tom to knock or open the door, I might lose him, so I just stood there on the dilapidated porch and hollered.
  25. makeshift
    done or made using whatever is available
    Then the four men began to lift the awkward makeshift stretcher.
  26. aberration
    a state or condition markedly different from the norm
    But despite these aberrations he seemed to be accepted as an islander, simply because he had called Auntie Braxton “Trudy,” a name nobody had used for her since she was a young woman.
  27. missionary
    someone who attempts to convert others to a doctrine
    He sadly admitted that I was right, but since the alternative to our doing the cleaning was having it become a missionary endeavor, I had to agree that we were certainly the lesser of two evils.
  28. endeavor
    a purposeful or industrious undertaking
    He sadly admitted that I was right, but since the alternative to our doing the cleaning was having it become a missionary endeavor, I had to agree that we were certainly the lesser of two evils.
  29. flabbergasted
    as if struck dumb with astonishment and surprise
    Even Call was flabbergasted. “What makes you think a thing like that?” he asked.
  30. scrimp
    be very thrifty or frugal
    He let his wife and child scrimp by on next to nothing.
  31. intrigue
    a crafty and involved plot to achieve your ends
    Real intrigue was far more delicious than the pretend kind.
  32. hysterical
    characterized by a state of violent mental agitation
    “Drown them?” I was getting hysterical. “Just take them out and throw them in?”
  33. wholesale
    on a large scale without careful discrimination
    How could anything that called itself the “Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals” engage in wholesale murder?
  34. wily
    marked by skill in deception
    By the second bag, I had become more wily.
  35. infernal
    extremely evil or cruel
    I lured those fool cats right to me and into those infernal sacks.
  36. gingerly
    in a manner marked by extreme care or delicacy
    I sneaked down to our house and got the wagon. Very gingerly we loaded the live sacks onto it.
  37. writhe
    move in a twisting or contorted motion
    Once one of the sacks writhed and wiggled its way off the wagon and into the street, but we got it back on and down the path to the Captain’s dock.
  38. coax
    influence or persuade by gentle and persistent urging
    She got my bathrobe for me, and then she dried my hair with those powerful fingers of hers as gently as she might coax a nocturne from our old piano.
  39. liberal
    given or giving freely
    Meantime, Caroline had prepared an assortment of sixteen saucers, cups, and bowls, rationing out the cans of tuna fish to each container. She laced each liberally with paregoric.
  40. befuddled
    perplexed by many conflicting situations or statements
    They laughed and imitated the befuddled women at the door.
Created on Mon Jun 10 22:05:20 EDT 2019 (updated Mon Jul 01 15:27:33 EDT 2019)

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