Wondrous Words Wednesday: Vintage Murder Finds

I've been trying to finish up a book chapter due next week, so my reading has been confined to a few minutes before bedtime. But at least Ngaio Marsh’s Vintage Murder has been providing me with some Wondrous Words!

The first was a complete mystery:

“Is she a good actress?”
“Dire.”
“Then how - - -?”
“Pomfret,” said Hambledon, “and push.”

According to the dictionary, pomfret is either a 1) black fish or 2) a licorice-like confection. So my guess is that this was a colloquialism that meant someone offered something sweet (in this case money) to push his own agenda (in this case, getting his daughter an acting job).

The second was pretty clear from context, but I had never heard it before:

“That’s what Hambledon said,” agreed Wade gloomily. “It’s a blooming nark, dinkum it is. Still, there’s better alibis that have gone west before now, and I’m not going to forget this will. Mason’s a whole lot better off by this murder.”

The fourth meaning of nark, is primarily Australian, and means a killjoy or wet blanket. In this case, I think they’re referring to the alibi taking Mason off the suspect list, even though he appears to profit most from the murder. The book actually is set in New Zealand.

I hope even if things are hectic, you’ve found some Wondrous Words this week. Thanks so much to Kathy at bermudaonion for hosting!

Wondrous Words Wednesday: Old Verb Edition

I love seeing how word usage has shifted over time. Reading Anna Katherine Green’s The Mill Mystery, I came upon the following sentence:

“But as we approached the mill, and I caught a glimpse of its frowning walls glooming so darkly from out the cluster of trees that environed them, I own that a sensation akin to that which had been awakened in me by Mrs. Pollard’s threats, and the portentous darkness of her somber mansion, once again swept with its chilling effect over my nerves.”

Quite a mouthful, but what struck me was that two root words appear as verbs, although we now usually see them as nouns – “glooming” and “environ.” So I headed to the dictionary.

gloom: (archaic verb) to make murky or dark
environ: ( verb) to form a ring around

Interesting to think of the environment as a ring around us, isn’t it? And of gloom actually obscuring our real selves? What Wondrous Words have you come across this week?

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme where we share new (to us) words that we’ve encountered in our reading. To participate, and to see what other words readers have come across this week, head over to BermudaOnion’s Weblog. Thanks to Kathy for hosting!