What is the meaning of "backhander" in the following sentences? "Was there anything on the side?a little extra from a lawyer, a slice of the pie from a litigant, a nice backhander as the Brits...
What is the meaning of "An opera could barely be heard in the background." in the following sentences? "Thank you," he said stiffly. No calls, no cards, no letters, no flowers, not one word of...
What is the meaning of "wrote her off" in the following sentences? He had decided to have dinner with Kaley before he went South for a while, and before she technically became a former student....
What is the meaning of "said to hell with everything else" in the following sentence? The day before he left for Mississippi, he studied the deal for the last time, said to hell with everything...
What is the meaning of "In the thick of things" in the following sentences? "Yeah, I saw him once. I sneaked over one night and picked a new casino, hell they got fifteen now, and while I was playin'...
What is the meaning of "with the best of them" and "circle the wagons" in the following sentences? Word spread fast that he was back, and throughout the morning the same colleagues dropped by...
What is the meaning of "come in", "up to snuff" and "a piece of the back end" in the following sentences? And how come these words have such meaning? "Where, exactly, do you come in,...
What is the meaning of "talking linebackers" in the following sentences? "Ever heard of Benalatofix?" "No." "Me neither. The nickname is Skinny Ben. Ring a bell?" "No, sorry." "It's a diet...
What is the meaning of "Gimme a ballpark" and "on the high side" in the following sentences? "Now we're getting somewhere. And you have possession of the family heirloom?" "That's right." ...
What is the meaning of "unseemly traffic" and "a bookie who worked the college crowd" in the following sentences? Crawford's office was above a bar his brother owned near the campus. It was a...
What is the meaning of The meaning of "things could slip through, heads could be turned, wheels greased" in the following sentences? Riding in a cab back to the airport, Ray did the math on his...
What is the meaning of 'docket' and 'bust' in the following sentences? Talbert had a story about a judge in Chicago who was skimming from the lawyers, small sums, five hundred and a thousand bucks a...
I have something to say in regard to my questions(so many, so boring). I am Korean and I am studying English as a second language. In doing so, I have to grasp meanings of words and phrases. I use my...
What is the meaning of "bobbing and jerking" in the following sentence? He could see Kaley in a slinky black dress with no back at all, slits up past her thighs, very low V-neck, drop-dead...
What is the meaning of "cajoled him into a feature with the ruse of chatting about the Civil War ", "There was the hint of a book in the works" in the following sentences? The Ford County Times...
What is the meaning of the underlined/colored phrases? 1. AT 9 A.M., the phone woke him. It was Harry Rex. "Wake your ass up, boy," he growled. 2. Ray swung to the edge of his bed and...
What is the meaning of "dumb question", "far into foul territory", "let it pass" in the following sentences? "What's in the bag?" the cop asked. It was a dumb question, far into foul...
What is the meaning of "stumbled by" and "stoned out of his wasted mind" in the following sentences? Nonchalance was what he desperately wanted, but there was nothing fluid about his steps and...
I know that "manage" usually means "to succeed in doing something, especially something that needs a lot of effort or skill" but in the following sentence it seems to have somewhat...
What is the meaning of "without missing a stride" in the following sentence? Dell dashed by and somehow managed to refill both coffee cups and pat Ray on the shoulder without missing a stride.