| 1 |
WHILE Miss Linton moped about the park and garden,
always silent, and almost always in tears; and her brother shut
himself up among books that he never opened; wearying, I guessed,
with a continual vague expectation that Catherine, repenting her
conduct, would come of her own accord to ask pardon, and seek a
reconciliation; and she fasted pertinaciously, under the
idea, probably, that at every meal, Edgar was ready to choke for
her absence, and pride alone held him from running to cast himself
at her feet; I went about my household duties, convinced that the
Grange had but one sensible soul in its walls, and that lodged in
my body.
| 2 |
I wasted no condolences on miss, nor any expostulations on my
mistress, nor did I pay attention to the sighs of my master, who
yearned to hear his lady's name, since he might not hear her voice.
| | 3 |
I determined they should come about as they pleased for me; and
though it was a tiresomely slow process, I began to rejoice at
length in a faint dawn of its progress, as I thought at first.
| | 4 |
Mrs Linton, on the third day, unbarred her door; and having
finished the water in her pitcher and decanter, desired a renewed
supply, and a basin of gruel, for she believed she was dying.
That I set down as a speech meant for Edgar's ears; I believed no
such thing, so I kept it to myself, and brought her some tea and
dry toast.
| | 5 |
She eat and drank eagerly; and sank back on her pillow again
clenching her hands and groaning.
| | 6 |
"Oh, I will die," she exclaimed, "since no one cares anything about
me.
Then a good while after I heard her murmur,
| | 7 |
"No, I'll not die -- he'd be glad -- he does not love me at all --
he would never miss me!"
| | 8 |
"Did you want anything, ma'am?" I inquired, still preserving my
external composure, in spite of her ghastly countenance, and
strange exaggerated manner.
| | 9 |
"What is that apathetic being doing?" she demanded, pushing the
thick entangled locks from her wasted face.
"Has he fallen into a lethargy, or is he dead?"
| | 10 |
"Neither," replied I; "if you mean Mr Linton.
He's tolerably well, I think, though his studies occupy him rather
more than they ought; he is continually among his books, since he
has no other society."
| | 11 |
I should not have spoken so, if I had known her true condition, but
I could not get rid of the notion that she acted a part of her
disorder.
| | 12 |
"Among his books!" she cried, confounded.
"And I dying!
I on the brink of the grave!
My God! does he know how I'm altered?" continued she, staring at
her reflection in a mirror, hanging against the opposite wall.
"Is that Catherine Linton?
He imagines me in a pet -- in play, perhaps.
Cannot you inform him that it is frightful earnest?
Nelly, if it be not too late, as soon as I learn how he feels, I'll
choose between these two -- either to starve, at once, that would
be no punishment unless he had a heart -- or to recover and leave
the country.
Are you speaking the truth about him now?
Take care.
Is he actually so utterly indifferent for my life?"
| | 13 |
"Why, ma'am," I answered, "the master has no idea of your being
deranged; and, of course, he does not fear that you will let
yourself die of hunger."
| | 14 |
"You think not?
Cannot you tell him I will?" she returned; "persuade him -- speak
of your own mind -- say you are certain I will!"
| | 15 |
"No, you forget, Mrs Linton," I suggested, "that you
tomorrow you will perceive its good effects."
| | 16 |
"If I were only sure it would kill him," she interrupted, "I'd kill
myself directly!
These three awful nights, I've never closed my lids -- and oh, I've
been tormented!
I've been haunted, Nelly!
But I begin to fancy you don't like me.
How strange!
I thought, though everybody hated and despised each other, they
could not avoid loving me -- and they have all turned to enemies in
a few hours.
They have, I'm positive; the people here.
How dreary to meet death, surrounded by their cold faces!
Isabella, terrified and repelled, afraid to enter the room, it
would be so dreadful to watch Catherine go.
And Edgar standing solemnly by to see it over; then offering
prayers of thanks to God for restoring peace to his house, and
going back to his books!
What in the name of all that feels, has he to do with books
, when I am dying?"
| | 17 |
She could not bear the notion which I had put into her head of Mr
Linton's philosophical resignation.
Tossing about, she increased her feverish bewilderment to madness,
and tore the pillow with her teeth, then raising herself up all
burning, desired that I would open the window.
We were in the middle of winter, the wind blew strong from the
north-east, and I objected.
| | 18 |
Both the expressions flitting over her face, and the changes of her
moods, began to alarm me terribly; and brought to my recollection
her former illness, and the doctor's injunction that she should not
be crossed.
| | 19 |
A minute previously she was violent; now, supported on one arm, and
not noticing my refusal to obey her, she seemed to find childish
diversion in pulling the feathers from the rents she had just made,
and ranging them on the sheet according to their different species:
her mind had strayed to other associations.
| | 20 |
"That's a turkey's," she murmured to herself; "and this
Ah, they put pigeons' feathers in the pillows -- no wonder I
couldn't die!
Let me take care to throw it on the floor when I lie down.
And here's a moor-cock's; and this -- I should know it among a
thousand -- it's a lapwing's.
Bonny bird; wheeling over our heads in the middle of the moor.
It wanted to get to its nest, for the clouds touched the swells,
and it felt rain coming.
This feather was picked up from the heath, the bird was not shot --
we saw its nest in the winter, full of little skeletons.
Heathcliff set a trap over it, and the old ones dare not come.
I made him promise he'd never shoot a lapwing, after that, and he
didn't.
Yes, here are more!
Did he shoot my lapwings, Nelly?
Are they red, any of them?
Let me look."
| | 21 |
"Give over with that baby-work!" I interrupted, dragging the pillow
away, and turning the holes towards the mattress, for she was
removing its contents by handfuls.
"Lie down and shut your eyes, you're wandering.
There's a mess!
The down is flying about like snow!"
| | 22 |
I went here and there collecting it.
| | 23 |
"I see in you, Nelly," she continued, dreamily, "an aged woman --
you have grey hair, and bent shoulders.
This bed is the fairy cave under Peniston Crag, and you are
gathering elf-bolts to hurt our heifers; pretending, while I am
near, that they are only locks of wool.
That's what you'll come to fifty years hence; I know you are not so
now.
I'm not wandering, you are mistaken, or else I should believe you
really were that withered hag, and I should think I
was under Peniston Crag, and I'm conscious it's night, and
there are two candles on the table making the black press shine
like jet."
| | 24 |
"The black press? where is that?" I asked.
"You are talking in your sleep!"
| | 25 |
"It's against the wall, as it always is," she replied.
"It does appear odd -- I see a face in it!"
| | 26 |
"There's no press in the room, and never was," said I,
watch her.
| | 27 |
"Don't you see that face?" she enquired, gazing earnestly
at the mirror.
| | 28 |
And say what I could, I was incapable of making her comprehend it
to be her own; so I rose and covered it with a shawl.
| | 29 |
"It's behind there still!" she pursued, anxiously.
"And it stirred.
Who is it?
I hope it will not come out when you are gone!
Oh!
Nelly, the room is haunted!
I'm afraid of being alone!"
| | 30 |
I took her hand in mine, and bid her be composed, for a succession
of shudders convulsed her frame, and she would keep
straining her gaze towards the glass.
| | 31 |
"There's nobody here!" I insisted.
"It was yourself, Mrs Linton; you knew it a while since."
| | 32 |
"Myself!" she gasped, "and the clock is striking twelve!
It's true, then, that's dreadful!"
| | 33 |
Her fingers clutched the clothes, and gathered them over her eyes.
I attempted to steal to the door with an intention of calling her
husband; but I was summoned back by a piercing shriek.
The shawl had dropped from the frame.
| | 34 |
"Why what is the matter?" cried I.
"Who is coward now?
Wake up!
That is the glass -- the mirror, Mrs Linton; and you see yourself
in it, and there am I too by your side."
| | 35 |
Trembling and bewildered, she held me fast, but the horror
gradually passed from her countenance; its paleness gave place to a
glow of shame.
| | 36 |
"Oh, dear!
I thought I was at home," she sighed.
"I thought I was lying in my chamber at Wuthering Heights.
Because I'm weak, my brain got confused, and I screamed
unconsciously.
Don't say anything; but stay with me.
I dread sleeping, my dreams appal me."
| | 37 |
"A sound sleep would do you good, ma'am," I answered;
starving again."
| | 38 |
"Oh, if I were but in my own bed in the old house!" she went on
bitterly, wringing her hands.
"And that wind sounding in the firs by the lattice.
Do let me feel it -- it comes straight down the moor -- do let me
have one breath!"
| | 39 |
To pacify her, I held the casement ajar, a few seconds.
A cold blast rushed through, I closed it, and returned to my post.
| | 40 |
She lay still now: her face bathed in tears -- Exhaustion of body
had entirely subdued her spirit; our fiery Catherine was no better
than a wailing child!
| | 41 |
"How long is it since I shut myself in here?" she asked suddenly
reviving.
| | 42 |
"It was Monday evening," I replied, "and this is Thursday night, or
rather Friday morning, at present."
| | 43 |
"What! of the same week?" she exclaimed.
"Only that brief time?"
| | 44 |
"Long enough to live on nothing but cold water, and ill temper,"
observed I.
| | 45 |
"Well, it seems a weary number of hours," she muttered doubtfully,
"it must be more -- I remember being in the parlour, after they had
quarrelled; and Edgar being cruelly provoking, and me running into
this room desperate -- As soon as ever I had barred the door, utter
blackness overwhelmed me, and I fell on the floor -- I couldn't
explain to Edgar how certain I felt of having a fit, or going
raging mad, if he persisted in teasing me!
I had no command of tongue, or brain, and he did not guess my
agony, perhaps; it barely left me sense to try to escape from him
and his voice -- Before I recovered sufficiently to see, and hear,
it began to be dawn; and Nelly, I'll tell you what I thought, and
what has kept recurring and recurring till I feared for my reason -
- I thought as I lay there, with my head against that table leg,
window, that I was enclosed in the oak-panelled bed at home; and my
heart ached with some great grief which, just waking, I could not
recollect -- I pondered, and worried myself to discover what it
could be; and most strangely, the whole last seven years of my life
grew a blank!
I did not recall that they had been at all.
I was a child; my father was just buried, and my misery arose from
the separation that Hindley had ordered between me, and Heathcliff
-- I was laid alone, for the first time, and, rousing from a dismal
dose, after a night of weeping -- I lifted my hand to push the
panels aside, it struck the table-top!
I swept it along the carpet, and then, memory burst in -- my late
anguish was swallowed in a paroxysm of despair -- I cannot say why
I felt so wildly wretched -- it must have been temporary
derangement for there is scarcely cause -- But, supposing at twelve
years old, I had been wrenched from the Heights, and every early
association, and my all in all, as Heathcliff was at that time, and
been converted, at a stroke into Mrs Linton, the lady of
Thrushcross Grange, and the wife of a stranger; an exile, and
outcast, thenceforth, from what had been my world -- You may fancy
a glimpse of the abyss where I grovelled!
Shake your head, as you will, Nelly, you have helped to
unsettle me!
You should have spoken to Edgar, indeed you should, and compelled
him to leave me quiet!
Oh, I'm burning!
I wish I were out of doors -- I wish I were a girl again, half
savage and hardy, and free... and laughing at injuries, not
maddening under them!
Why am I so changed? why does my blood rush into a hell of tumult
at a few words?
I'm sure I should be myself were I once among the heather on those
hills...
Open the window again wide, fasten it open!
Quick, why don't you move?"
| | 46 |
"Because, I won't give you your death of cold," I answered.
| | 47 |
"You won't give me a chance of life, you mean," she added sullenly.
"However, I'm not helpless yet, I'll open it myself."
| | 48 |
And sliding from the bed before I could hinder her, she crossed the
room, walking very uncertainly, threw it back, and bent out,
careless of the frosty air that cut about her shoulders as keen as
a knife.
| | 49 |
I entreated, and finally attempted to force her to retire.
But I soon found her delirious strength much surpassed mine; (she
was delirious, I became convinced by her subsequent
actions, and ravings.)
| | 50 |
There was no moon, and everything beneath lay in misty darkness;
not a light gleamed from any house, far or near; all had been
extinguished long ago; and those at Wuthering Heights were never
visible... still she asserted she caught their shining.
| | 51 |
"Look!" she cried eagerly, "that's my room, with the candle in it,
and the trees swaying before it... and the other candle is in
Joseph's garret...
Joseph sits up late, doesn't he?
He's waiting till I come home that he may lock the gate.
Well, he'll wait a while yet.
It's a rough journey, and a sad heart to travel it; and we must
pass by Gimmerton Kirk, to go that journey!
We've braved its ghosts often together, and dared each other to
stand among the graves and ask them to come...
But Heathcliff, if I dare you now, will you venture?
If you do, I'll keep you.
I'll not lie there by myself: they may bury me twelve feet deep,
and throw the church down over me; but I won't rest till you are
with me...
I never will!"
| | 52 |
She paused, and resumed with a strange smile.
"He's considering... he'd rather I'd come to him!
Find a way, then! not through that Kirkyard...
You are slow!
| | 53 |
Perceiving it vain to argue against her insanity, I was planning
how I could reach something to wrap about her, without quitting my
hold of herself, for I could not trust her alone by the gaping
lattice, when, to my consternation, I heard the rattle of the door-
handle, and Mr Linton entered.
He had only then come from the library; and, in passing through the
lobby, had noticed our talking and been attracted by curiosity, or
fear, to examine what it signified, at that late hour.
| | 54 |
"Oh, sir!" I cried, checking the exclamation risen to his lips at
the sight which met him, and the bleak atmosphere of the chamber.
"My poor Mistress is ill, and she quite masters me; I cannot manage
her at all, pray, come and persuade her to go to bed.
Forget your anger, for she's hard to guide any way but her own."
| | 55 |
"Catherine ill?" he said, hastening to us.
"Shut the window, Ellen!
Catherine! why... "
| | 56 |
He was silent; the haggardness of Mrs Linton's appearance smote him
speechless, and he could only glance from her to me in horrified
astonishment.
| | 57 |
"She's been fretting here," I continued, "and eating scarcely
anything, and never complaining, she would admit none of us till
this evening, and so we couldn't inform you of her state, as we
were not aware of it ourselves, but it is nothing."
| | 58 |
I felt I uttered my explanations awkwardly; the master frowned.
"It is nothing is it, Ellen Dean?" he said sternly.
"You shall account more clearly for keeping me ignorant of this!"
And he took his wife in his arms, and looked at her with anguish.
| | 59 |
At first she gave him no glance of recognition... he was invisible
to her abstracted gaze.
her eyes from contemplating the outer darkness; by degrees, she
centred her attention on him, and discovered who it was that held
her.
| | 60 |
"Ah! you are come, are you, Edgar Linton?" she said, with angry
animation...
"You are one of those things that are ever found when least wanted,
and when you are wanted, never!
I suppose we shall have plenty of lamentations, now...
I see we shall... but they can't keep me from my narrow home out
yonder -- My resting place where I'm bound before Spring is over!
There it is, not among the Lintons, mind, under the chapel-roof;
but in the open air with a head-stone, and you may please yourself,
whether you go to them, or come to me!"
| | 61 |
"Catherine, what have you done?" commenced the master.
"Am I nothing to you, any more?
Do you love that wretch, Heath -- -- "
| | 62 |
"Hush!" cried Mrs Linton.
"Hush, this moment!
You mention that name, |&| I end the matter, instantly by, a spring
from the window!
What you touch at present, you may have; but my soul will be on
that hill-top before you lay hands on me again.
I don't want you, Edgar; I'm past wanting you...
Return to your books...
I'm glad you possess a consolation, for all you had in me is gone."
| | 63 |
"Her mind wanders, sir," I interposed.
"She has been talking nonsense the whole evening; but let her have
quiet and proper attendance, and she'll rally...
Hereafter, we must be cautious how we vex her."
| | 64 |
"I desire no further advice from you," answered Mr Linton.
"You knew your mistress's nature, and you encouraged me to harass
her.
And not to give me one hint of how she has been these three days!
It was heartless! months of sickness could not cause such a
change!"
| | 65 |
I began to defend myself, thinking it too bad to be blamed for
| | 66 |
"I knew Mrs Linton's nature to be headstrong and domineering,"
cried I; "but I didn't know that you wished to foster her fierce
temper!
I didn't know that, to humour her, I should wink at Mr Heathcliff.
I performed the duty of a faithful servant in telling you, and I
have got a faithful servant's wages!
Well, it will teach me to be careful next time.
Next time you may gather intelligence for yourself!"
| | 67 |
"The next time you bring a tale to me, you shall quit my service,
Ellen Dean," he replied.
| | 68 |
"You'd rather hear nothing about it, I suppose, then, Mr Linton?"
said I.
"Heathcliff has your permission to come a courting to Miss, and to
drop in at every opportunity your absence offers, on purpose to
poison the mistress against you?"
| | 69 |
Confused as Catherine was, her wits were alert at applying our
conversation.
| | 70 |
"Ah!
Nelly has played traitor," she exclaimed, passionately.
"Nelly is my hidden enemy -- you witch!
So you do seek elf-bolts to hurt us!
Let me go, and I'll make her rue!
I'll make her howl a recantation!"
| | 71 |
A maniac's fury kindled under her brows; she struggled desperately
to disengage herself from Linton's arms.
I felt no inclination to tarry the event; and resolving to seek
medical aid on my own responsibility, I quitted the chamber.
| | 72 |
In passing the garden to reach the road, at a place where a bridle
hook is driven into the wall, I saw something white moved
irregularly, evidently by another agent than the wind.
Notwithstanding my hurry, I stayed to examine it, lest ever after I
should have the conviction impressed on my imagination that it was
a creature of the other world.
| | 73 |
My surprise and perplexity were great to discover, by touch more
than vision, Miss Isabella's springer Fanny, suspended to a
| | 74 |
I quickly released the animal, and lifted it into the garden.
I had seen it follow its mistress up-stairs, when she went to bed,
and wondered much how it could have got out there, and what
mischievous person had treated it so.
| | 75 |
While untying the knot round the hook, it seemed to me that I
repeatedly caught the beat of horses' feet galloping at some
distance; but there was such a number of things to occupy my
reflections that I hardly gave the circumstance a thought, though
it was a strange sound, in that place, at two o'clock in the
morning.
| | 76 |
Mr Kenneth was fortunately just issuing from his house to see a
patient in the village as I came up the street; and my account of
Catherine Linton's malady induced him to accompany me back
immediately.
| | 77 |
He was a plain rough man; and he made no scruple to speak his
doubts of her surviving this second attack; unless she were more
submissive to his directions than she had shown herself before.
| | 78 |
"Nelly Dean," said he, "I can't help fancying there's an extra
cause for this.
What has there been to do at the Grange?
We've odd reports up here.
A stout, hearty lass like Catherine does not fall ill for a trifle;
and that sort of people should not either.
It's hard work bringing them through fevers, and such things.
How did it begin?"
| | 79 |
"The master will inform you," I answered; "but you are acquainted
with the Earnshaws' violent dispositions, and Mrs Linton caps them
all.
I may say this; it commenced in a quarrel.
She was struck during a tempest of passion with a kind of fit.
That's her account, at least; for she flew off in the height of it,
and locked herself up.
Afterwards, she refused to eat, and now she alternately raves, and
remains in a half dream, knowing those about her, but having her
mind filled with all sorts of strange ideas and illusions."
| | 80 |
"Mr Linton will be sorry?" observed Kenneth interrogatively.
| | 81 |
"Sorry? he'll break his heart should anything happen!" I replied.
"Don't alarm him more than necessary."
| | 82 |
"Well, I told him to beware," said my companion, "and he must bide
the consequences of neglecting my warning!
Hasn't he been thick with Mr Heathcliff lately?"
| | 83 |
"Heathcliff frequently visits at the Grange," answered I, "though
more on the strength of the mistress having known him when a boy,
than because the master likes his company.
At present, he's discharged from the trouble of calling; owing to
some presumptuous aspirations after Miss Linton which he
manifested.
I hardly think he'll be taken in again."
| | 84 |
"And does Miss Linton turn a cold shoulder on him?" was the
doctor's next question.
| | 85 |
"I'm not in her confidence," returned I, reluctant to continue the
subject.
| | 86 |
"No, she's a sly one," he remarked, shaking his head.
"She keeps her own counsel!
But she's a real little fool.
I have it from good authority, that, last night, and a pretty night
it was! she and Heathcliff were walking in the plantation at the
back of your house, above two hours; and he pressed her not to go
in again, but just mount his horse and away with him!
My informant said she could only put him off by pledging her word
of honour to be prepared on their first meeting after that, when it
was to be, he didn't hear, but you urge Mr Linton to look sharp!"
| | 87 |
This news filled me with fresh fears; I outstripped Kenneth, and
ran most of the way back.
The little dog was yelping in the garden yet.
I spared a minute to open the gate for it, but instead of going to
the house door, it coursed up and down snuffing the grass, and
would have escaped to the road, had I not seized and conveyed it in
| | 88 |
On ascending to Isabella's room, my suspicions were confirmed; it
was empty.
Had I been a few hours sooner, Mrs Linton's illness might have
arrested her rash step.
But what could be done now?
There was a bare possibility of overtaking them if pursued
instantly.
I could not pursue them, however; and I dare not rouse
the family, and fill the place with confusion; still less unfold
the business to my master, absorbed as he was in his present
calamity, and having no heart to spare for a second grief!
I saw nothing for it, but to hold my tongue, and suffer matters to
take their course: and Kenneth being arrived, I went with a badly
composed countenance to announce him.
| | 89 |
Catherine lay in a troubled sleep; her husband had succeeded in
soothing the access of frenzy; he now hung over her pillow,
watching every shade, and every change of her painfully expressive
features.
| | 90 |
The doctor, on examining the case for himself, spoke hopefully to
him of its having a favourable termination, if we could only
preserve around her perfect and constant tranquillity.
To me, he signified the threatening danger was, not so much death,
as permanent alienation of intellect.
| | 91 |
I did not close my eyes that night, nor did Mr Linton; indeed, we
never went to bed: and the servants were all up long before the
usual hour, moving through the house with stealthy tread, and
exchanging whispers as they encountered each other in their
vocations.
Every one was active, but Miss Isabella; and they began to remark
how sound she slept -- her brother too asked if she had risen, and
seemed impatient for her presence, and hurt that she showed so
little anxiety for her sisterin-law.
| | 92 |
I trembled lest he should send me to call her; but I was spared the
pain of being the first proclaimant of her flight.
One of the maids, a thoughtless girl, who had been on an early
errand to Gimmerton, came panting up stairs, open mouthed, and
| | 93 |
"Oh, dear, dear!
What mun we have next?
Master, master, our young lady -- --"
| | 94 |
"Hold your noise!" cried I hastily, enraged at her clamorous
manner.
| | 95 |
"Speak lower, Mary -- What is the matter?" said Mr Linton.
"What ails your young lady?"
| | 96 |
"She's gone, she's gone!
Yon' Heathcliff's run off wi' her!" gasped the girl.
| | 97 |
"That is not true!" exclaimed Linton, rising in agitation.
"It cannot be -- how has the idea entered your head?
Ellen Dean, go and seek her -- it is incredible -- it cannot be."
| | 98 |
As he spoke he took the servant to the door, and, then, repeated
his demand to know her reasons for such an assertion.
| | 99 |
"Why, I met on the road a lad that fetches milk here," she
stammered, "and he asked whether we wern't in trouble at the Grange
-- I thought he meant for Missis's sickness, so I answered, yes.
Then says he, 'They's some body gone after 'em, I guess?' I stared.
He saw I knew naught about it, and he told how a gentleman and lady
had stopped to have a horse's shoe fastened at a blacksmith's shop,
two miles out of Gimmerton, not very long after midnight! and how
the blacksmith's lass had got up to spy who they were: she knew
them both directly -- And she noticed the man, Heathcliff it was,
she felt certain, nob'dy could mistake him, besides -- put a
sovereign in her father's hand for payment.
The lady had a cloak about her face; but having desired a sup of
water, while she drank, it fell back, and she saw her very plain --
Heathcliff held both bridles as they rode on, and they set their
faces from the village, and went as fast as the rough roads would
let them.
The lass said nothing to her father, but she told it all over
Gimmerton this morning."
| | 100 |
I ran and peeped, for form's sake into Isabella's room: confirming,
when I returned, the servant's statement -- Mr Linton had resumed
eyes, read the meaning of my blank aspect, and dropped them without
giving an order, or uttering a word.
| | 101 |
"Are we to try any measures for overtaking and bringing her back?"
I inquired.
"How should we do?"
| | 102 |
"She went of her own accord," answered the master; "she had a right
to go if she pleased -- Trouble me no more about her -- Hereafter
she is only my sister in name; not because I disown her, but
because she has disowned me."
| | 103 |
And that was all he said on the subject; he did not make a single
inquiry further, or mention her in any way, except directing me to
send what property she had in the house to her fresh home, wherever
it was, when I knew it.
| |
