Female crushed by a cross bear (6)
I believe the answer is:
afford
'bear' is the definition.
(thesaurus)
'female crushed by a cross' is the wordplay.
'female' becomes 'f' (abbreviation).
'crushed by' is a charade indicator (letters next to each other) (in a down clue, some letters go on top of others).
'cross' becomes 'ford' (to ford a river is to cross it).
'f' after 'a' is 'af'.
'af'+'ford'='AFFORD'
(Other definitions for afford that I've seen before include "Provide; manage to pay for" , "Able to bear the expense" , "Be able to buy" , "Have the financial means" , "Have the means to pay" .)