| ascertain |
to learn without question; determine. |
| canny |
difficult to fool or take advantage of; shrewd; wary; clever. |
| collateral |
property or other security put forward to guarantee repayment of a loan. |
| deify |
to raise to the rank of a god; consider to be a god. |
| desiccate |
to remove the moisture in (food) so as to preserve it. |
| dilatory |
used to cause a delay. |
| epistolary |
established or continued through letters. |
| equivocal |
having at least two plausible alternative meanings, often intentionally so in order to deceive or avoid commitment; ambiguous. |
| eruct |
to belch forth. |
| glean |
to gather or discover (facts, information, or the like) a little at a time. |
| maverick |
a person who thinks and behaves independently, especially one who refuses to adhere to the orthodoxy of the group to which he or she belongs. |
| obfuscate |
to make (something) seem or be difficult to understand; obscure or darken. |
| regicide |
the murderer of a king. |
| reprise |
repetition of a musical phrase or theme in an identical or slightly altered way. |
| solipsism |
the self-centered habit of interpreting and judging all things exclusively according to one's own concepts of meaning and value. |