my %dict ;
my $dict = "d:/perl/words.short" ;
open (my $wds, "<", $dict)
    or die("Can't open wordlist: $!\n") ;
my $words = 0 ;
foreach my $wd (<$wds>)
{   $dict{$wd} = 1 ; }
say scalar keys(%dict) ;
say "got apple" if exists $dict{apple} ;

##</code><code>##

D:\Perl>dictest.pl
66384

D:\Perl>