Speak after cover up or disappear? (9)
I believe the answer is:
evaporate
'disappear?' is the definition.
(I know that disappear can be written as evaporate)
'speak after cover up' is the wordplay.
'speak' becomes 'orate' (orating is a kind of speaking).
'after' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'cover up' becomes 'evap' (I can't justify this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'orate' put after 'evap' is 'EVAPORATE'.
'or' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for evaporate that I've seen before include "Vaporise" , "vanish" , "(Of abstract thing) cease to exist" , "let off steam" , "Turn into vapour, lose moisture" .)