Malleable, and thus accepts short measure (4)
I believe the answer is:
soft
'malleable' is the definition.
(similar in meaning)
'thus accepts short measure' is the wordplay.
I cannot quite understand how this works, but
'thus' could be 'so' (synonyms) and 'so' is found in the answer.
'measure' could be 'ft' (ft is a kind of measure) and 'ft' is located in the answer.
No letters remain.
This explanation may well be incorrect...
'and' is the link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for soft that I've seen before include "(Of drink) non-alcoholic" , "Easy to mould or cut" , "Gentle - malleable" , "Yielding; quiet" , "firm? On the contrary" .)