The first is to make a futile attempt to plug into the island's glamorous past.

Dom rubbed his hand across his lips in a futile attempt to clean the bad taste from his mouth.

I crawled out into the daylight and jogged round the cemetery in a futile attempt to warm myself up.

His worst fears assuaged, Cazaril abandoned his futile attempt at invisibility, and nerved himself to ask Lady Betriz for one roundel.