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Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXIX

“Good-bye, Ellen!” whispered my dear little mistress. As she kissed me, her lips felt like ice. “Come and see me, Ellen; don’t forget.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXIX

“Take care you do no such thing, Mrs. Dean!” said her new father. “When I wish to speak to you I’ll come here. I want none of your prying at my house!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXIX

He signed her to precede him; and casting back a look that cut my heart, she obeyed. I watched them, from the window, walk down the garden. Heathcliff fixed Catherine’s arm under his: though she disputed the act at first evidently; and with rapid strides he hurried her into the alley, whose trees concealed them.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

I have paid a visit to the Heights, but I have not seen her since she left: Joseph held the door in his hand when I called to ask after her, and wouldn’t let me pass. He said Mrs. Linton was “thrang,” and the master was not in. Zillah has told me something of the way they go on, otherwise I should hardly know who was dead and who living. She thinks Catherine haughty, and does not like her, I can guess by her talk. My young lady asked some aid of her when she first came; but Mr. Heathcliff told her to follow her own business, and let his daughter-in-law look after herself; and Zillah willingly acquiesced, being a narrow-minded, selfish woman. Catherine evinced a child’s annoyance at this neglect; repaid it with contempt, and thus enlisted my informant among her enemies, as securely as if she had done her some great wrong. I had a long talk with Zillah about six weeks ago, a little before you came, one day when we foregathered on the moor; and this is what she told me.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“The first thing Mrs. Linton did,” she said, “on her arrival at the Heights, was to run upstairs, without even wishing good-evening to me and Joseph; she shut herself into Linton’s room, and remained till morning. Then, while the master and Earnshaw were at breakfast, she entered the house, and asked all in a quiver if the doctor might be sent for? her cousin was very ill.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘We know that!’ answered Heathcliff; ‘but his life is not worth a farthing, and I won’t spend a farthing on him.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘But I cannot tell how to do,’ she said; ‘and if nobody will help me, he’ll die!’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Walk out of the room,’ cried the master, ‘and let me never hear a word more about him! None here care what becomes of him; if you do, act the nurse; if you do not, lock him up and leave him.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Then she began to bother me, and I said I’d had enough plague with the tiresome thing; we each had our tasks, and hers was to wait on Linton: Mr. Heathcliff bid me leave that labour to her.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“How they managed together, I can’t tell. I fancy he fretted a great deal, and moaned hisseln night and day; and she had precious little rest: one could guess by her white face and heavy eyes. She sometimes came into the kitchen all wildered like, and looked as if she would fain beg assistance; but I was not going to disobey the master: I never dare disobey him, Mrs. Dean; and, though I thought it wrong that Kenneth should not be sent for, it was no concern of mine either to advise or complain, and I always refused to meddle. Once or twice, after we had gone to bed, I’ve happened to open my door again and seen her sitting crying on the stairs’-top; and then I’ve shut myself in quick, for fear of being moved to interfere. I did pity her then, I’m sure: still I didn’t wish to lose my place, you know.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“At last, one night she came boldly into my chamber, and frightened me out of my wits, by saying, ‘Tell Mr. Heathcliff that his son is dying—I’m sure he is, this time. Get up, instantly, and tell him.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Having uttered this speech, she vanished again. I lay a quarter of an hour listening and trembling. Nothing stirred—the house was quiet.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“She’s mistaken, I said to myself. He’s got over it. I needn’t disturb them; and I began to doze. But my sleep was marred a second time by a sharp ringing of the bell—the only bell we have, put up on purpose for Linton; and the master called to me to see what was the matter, and inform them that he wouldn’t have that noise repeated.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“I delivered Catherine’s message. He cursed to himself, and in a few minutes came out with a lighted candle, and proceeded to their room. I followed. Mrs. Heathcliff was seated by the bedside, with her hands folded on her knees. Her father-in-law went up, held the light to Linton’s face, looked at him, and touched him; afterwards he turned to her.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Now—Catherine,’ he said, ‘how do you feel?’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“She was dumb.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘How do you feel, Catherine?’ he repeated.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘He’s safe, and I’m free,’ she answered: ‘I should feel well—but,’ she continued, with a bitterness she couldn’t conceal, ‘you have left me so long to struggle against death alone, that I feel and see only death! I feel like death!’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“And she looked like it, too! I gave her a little wine. Hareton and Joseph, who had been wakened by the ringing and the sound of feet, and heard our talk from outside, now entered. Joseph was fain, I believe, of the lad’s removal; Hareton seemed a thought bothered: though he was more taken up with staring at Catherine than thinking of Linton. But the master bid him get off to bed again: we didn’t want his help. He afterwards made Joseph remove the body to his chamber, and told me to return to mine, and Mrs. Heathcliff remained by herself.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“In the morning, he sent me to tell her she must come down to breakfast: she had undressed, and appeared going to sleep, and said she was ill; at which I hardly wondered. I informed Mr. Heathcliff, and he replied,—‘Well, let her be till after the funeral; and go up now and then to get her what is needful; and, as soon as she seems better, tell me.’”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

Cathy stayed upstairs a fortnight, according to Zillah; who visited her twice a day, and would have been rather more friendly, but her attempts at increasing kindness were proudly and promptly repelled.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

Heathcliff went up once, to show her Linton’s will. He had bequeathed the whole of his, and what had been her, moveable property, to his father: the poor creature was threatened, or coaxed, into that act during her week’s absence, when his uncle died. The lands, being a minor, he could not meddle with. However, Mr. Heathcliff has claimed and kept them in his wife’s right and his also: I suppose legally; at any rate, Catherine, destitute of cash and friends, cannot disturb his possession.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Nobody,” said Zillah, “ever approached her door, except that once, but I; and nobody asked anything about her. The first occasion of her coming down into the house was on a Sunday afternoon. She had cried out, when I carried up her dinner, that she couldn’t bear any longer being in the cold; and I told her the master was going to Thrushcross Grange, and Earnshaw and I needn’t hinder her from descending; so, as soon as she heard Heathcliff’s horse trot off, she made her appearance, donned in black, and her yellow curls combed back behind her ears as plain as a Quaker: she couldn’t comb them out.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Joseph and I generally go to chapel on Sundays:” the kirk, (you know, has no minister now, explained Mrs. Dean; and they call the Methodists’ or Baptists’ place, I can’t say which it is, at Gimmerton, a chapel.) “Joseph had gone,” she continued, “but I thought proper to bide at home. Young folks are always the better for an elder’s over-looking; and Hareton, with all his bashfulness, isn’t a model of nice behaviour. I let him know that his cousin would very likely sit with us, and she had been always used to see the Sabbath respected; so he had as good leave his guns and bits of indoor work alone, while she stayed. He coloured up at the news, and cast his eyes over his hands and clothes. The train-oil and gunpowder were shoved out of sight in a minute. I saw he meant to give her his company; and I guessed, by his way, he wanted to be presentable; so, laughing, as I durst not laugh when the master is by, I offered to help him, if he would, and joked at his confusion. He grew sullen, and began to swear.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Now, Mrs. Dean,” Zillah went on, seeing me not pleased by her manner, “you happen think your young lady too fine for Mr. Hareton; and happen you’re right: but I own I should love well to bring her pride a peg lower. And what will all her learning and her daintiness do for her, now? She’s as poor as you or I: poorer, I’ll be bound: you’re saving, and I’m doing my little all that road.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

Hareton allowed Zillah to give him her aid; and she flattered him into a good humour; so, when Catherine came, half forgetting her former insults, he tried to make himself agreeable, by the housekeeper’s account.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Missis walked in,” she said, “as chill as an icicle, and as high as a princess. I got up and offered her my seat in the arm-chair. No, she turned up her nose at my civility. Earnshaw rose, too, and bid her come to the settle, and sit close by the fire: he was sure she was starved.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘I’ve been starved a month and more,’ she answered, resting on the word as scornful as she could.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“And she got a chair for herself, and placed it at a distance from both of us. Having sat till she was warm, she began to look round, and discovered a number of books on the dresser; she was instantly upon her feet again, stretching to reach them: but they were too high up. Her cousin, after watching her endeavours a while, at last summoned courage to help her; she held her frock, and he filled it with the first that came to hand.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“That was a great advance for the lad. She didn’t thank him; still, he felt gratified that she had accepted his assistance, and ventured to stand behind as she examined them, and even to stoop and point out what struck his fancy in certain old pictures which they contained; nor was he daunted by the saucy style in which she jerked the page from his finger: he contented himself with going a bit farther back and looking at her instead of the book. She continued reading, or seeking for something to read. His attention became, by degrees, quite centred in the study of her thick silky curls: her face he couldn’t see, and she couldn’t see him. And, perhaps, not quite awake to what he did, but attracted like a child to a candle, at last he proceeded from staring to touching; he put out his hand and stroked one curl, as gently as if it were a bird. He might have stuck a knife into her neck, she started round in such a taking.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Get away this moment! How dare you touch me? Why are you stopping there?’ she cried, in a tone of disgust. ‘I can’t endure you! I’ll go upstairs again, if you come near me.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Mr. Hareton recoiled, looking as foolish as he could do: he sat down in the settle very quiet, and she continued turning over her volumes another half hour; finally, Earnshaw crossed over, and whispered to me.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Will you ask her to read to us, Zillah? I’m stalled of doing naught; and I do like—I could like to hear her! Dunnot say I wanted it, but ask of yourseln.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Mr. Hareton wishes you would read to us, ma’am,’ I said, immediately. ‘He’d take it very kind—he’d be much obliged.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“She frowned; and looking up, answered—

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Mr. Hareton, and the whole set of you, will be good enough to understand that I reject any pretence at kindness you have the hypocrisy to offer! I despise you, and will have nothing to say to any of you! When I would have given my life for one kind word, even to see one of your faces, you all kept off. But I won’t complain to you! I’m driven down here by the cold; not either to amuse you or enjoy your society.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘What could I ha’ done?’ began Earnshaw. ‘How was I to blame?’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Oh! you are an exception,’ answered Mrs. Heathcliff. ‘I never missed such a concern as you.’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘But I offered more than once, and asked,’ he said, kindling up at her pertness, ‘I asked Mr. Heathcliff to let me wake for you—’

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“‘Be silent! I’ll go out of doors, or anywhere, rather than have your disagreeable voice in my ear!’ said my lady.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

“Hareton muttered she might go to hell, for him! and unslinging his gun, restrained himself from his Sunday occupations no longer. He talked now, freely enough; and she presently saw fit to retreat to her solitude: but the frost had set in, and, in spite of her pride, she was forced to condescend to our company, more and more. However, I took care there should be no further scorning at my good nature: ever since, I’ve been as stiff as herself; and she has no lover or liker among us: and she does not deserve one; for, let them say the least word to her, and she’ll curl back without respect of any one. She’ll snap at the master himself, and as good as dares him to thrash her; and the more hurt she gets, the more venomous she grows.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

At first, on hearing this account from Zillah, I determined to leave my situation, take a cottage, and get Catherine to come and live with me: but Mr. Heathcliff would as soon permit that as he would set up Hareton in an independent house; and I can see no remedy, at present, unless she could marry again; and that scheme it does not come within my province to arrange.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXX

Thus ended Mrs. Dean’s story. Notwithstanding the doctor’s prophecy, I am rapidly recovering strength; and though it be only the second week in January, I propose getting out on horseback in a day or two, and riding over to Wuthering Heights, to inform my landlord that I shall spend the next six months in London; and, if he likes, he may look out for another tenant to take the place after October. I would not pass another winter here for much.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Yesterday was bright, calm, and frosty. I went to the Heights as I proposed: my housekeeper entreated me to bear a little note from her to her young lady, and I did not refuse, for the worthy woman was not conscious of anything odd in her request. The front door stood open, but the jealous gate was fastened, as at my last visit; I knocked and invoked Earnshaw from among the garden-beds; he unchained it, and I entered. The fellow is as handsome a rustic as need be seen. I took particular notice of him this time; but then he does his best apparently to make the least of his advantages.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

I asked if Mr. Heathcliff were at home? He answered, No; but he would be in at dinner-time. It was eleven o’clock, and I announced my intention of going in and waiting for him; at which he immediately flung down his tools and accompanied me, in the office of watchdog, not as a substitute for the host.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

We entered together; Catherine was there, making herself useful in preparing some vegetables for the approaching meal; she looked more sulky and less spirited than when I had seen her first. She hardly raised her eyes to notice me, and continued her employment with the same disregard to common forms of politeness as before; never returning my bow and good-morning by the slightest acknowledgment.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“She does not seem so amiable,” I thought, “as Mrs. Dean would persuade me to believe. She’s a beauty, it is true; but not an angel.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Earnshaw surlily bid her remove her things to the kitchen. “Remove them yourself,” she said, pushing them from her as soon as she had done; and retiring to a stool by the window, where she began to carve figures of birds and beasts out of the turnip-parings in her lap. I approached her, pretending to desire a view of the garden; and, as I fancied, adroitly dropped Mrs. Dean’s note on to her knee, unnoticed by Hareton—but she asked aloud, “What is that?” And chucked it off.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“A letter from your old acquaintance, the housekeeper at the Grange,” I answered; annoyed at her exposing my kind deed, and fearful lest it should be imagined a missive of my own. She would gladly have gathered it up at this information, but Hareton beat her; he seized and put it in his waistcoat, saying Mr. Heathcliff should look at it first. Thereat, Catherine silently turned her face from us, and, very stealthily, drew out her pocket-handkerchief and applied it to her eyes; and her cousin, after struggling awhile to keep down his softer feelings, pulled out the letter and flung it on the floor beside her, as ungraciously as he could. Catherine caught and perused it eagerly; then she put a few questions to me concerning the inmates, rational and irrational, of her former home; and gazing towards the hills, murmured in soliloquy:

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“I should like to be riding Minny down there! I should like to be climbing up there! Oh! I’m tired—I’m stalled, Hareton!” And she leant her pretty head back against the sill, with half a yawn and half a sigh, and lapsed into an aspect of abstracted sadness: neither caring nor knowing whether we remarked her.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Mrs. Heathcliff,” I said, after sitting some time mute, “you are not aware that I am an acquaintance of yours? so intimate that I think it strange you won’t come and speak to me. My housekeeper never wearies of talking about and praising you; and she’ll be greatly disappointed if I return with no news of or from you, except that you received her letter and said nothing!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

She appeared to wonder at this speech, and asked,—

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Does Ellen like you?”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Yes, very well,” I replied, hesitatingly.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“You must tell her,” she continued, “that I would answer her letter, but I have no materials for writing: not even a book from which I might tear a leaf.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“No books!” I exclaimed. “How do you contrive to live here without them? if I may take the liberty to inquire. Though provided with a large library, I’m frequently very dull at the Grange; take my books away, and I should be desperate!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“I was always reading, when I had them,” said Catherine; “and Mr. Heathcliff never reads; so he took it into his head to destroy my books. I have not had a glimpse of one for weeks. Only once, I searched through Joseph’s store of theology, to his great irritation; and once, Hareton, I came upon a secret stock in your room—some Latin and Greek, and some tales and poetry: all old friends. I brought the last here—and you gathered them, as a magpie gathers silver spoons, for the mere love of stealing! They are of no use to you; or else you concealed them in the bad spirit that, as you cannot enjoy them, nobody else shall. Perhaps your envy counselled Mr. Heathcliff to rob me of my treasures? But I’ve most of them written on my brain and printed in my heart, and you cannot deprive me of those!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Earnshaw blushed crimson when his cousin made this revelation of his private literary accumulations, and stammered an indignant denial of her accusations.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Mr. Hareton is desirous of increasing his amount of knowledge,” I said, coming to his rescue. “He is not envious, but emulous of your attainments. He’ll be a clever scholar in a few years.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“And he wants me to sink into a dunce, meantime,” answered Catherine. “Yes, I hear him trying to spell and read to himself, and pretty blunders he makes! I wish you would repeat Chevy Chase as you did yesterday: it was extremely funny. I heard you; and I heard you turning over the dictionary to seek out the hard words, and then cursing because you couldn’t read their explanations!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

The young man evidently thought it too bad that he should be laughed at for his ignorance, and then laughed at for trying to remove it. I had a similar notion; and, remembering Mrs. Dean’s anecdote of his first attempt at enlightening the darkness in which he had been reared, I observed,—“But, Mrs. Heathcliff, we have each had a commencement, and each stumbled and tottered on the threshold; had our teachers scorned instead of aiding us, we should stumble and totter yet.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Oh!” she replied, “I don’t wish to limit his acquirements: still, he has no right to appropriate what is mine, and make it ridiculous to me with his vile mistakes and mispronunciations! Those books, both prose and verse, are consecrated to me by other associations; and I hate to have them debased and profaned in his mouth! Besides, of all, he has selected my favourite pieces that I love the most to repeat, as if out of deliberate malice.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Hareton’s chest heaved in silence a minute: he laboured under a severe sense of mortification and wrath, which it was no easy task to suppress. I rose, and, from a gentlemanly idea of relieving his embarrassment, took up my station in the doorway, surveying the external prospect as I stood. He followed my example, and left the room; but presently reappeared, bearing half a dozen volumes in his hands, which he threw into Catherine’s lap, exclaiming,—“Take them! I never want to hear, or read, or think of them again!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“I won’t have them now,” she answered. “I shall connect them with you, and hate them.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

She opened one that had obviously been often turned over, and read a portion in the drawling tone of a beginner; then laughed, and threw it from her. “And listen,” she continued, provokingly, commencing a verse of an old ballad in the same fashion.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

But his self-love would endure no further torment: I heard, and not altogether disapprovingly, a manual check given to her saucy tongue. The little wretch had done her utmost to hurt her cousin’s sensitive though uncultivated feelings, and a physical argument was the only mode he had of balancing the account, and repaying its effects on the inflictor. He afterwards gathered the books and hurled them on the fire. I read in his countenance what anguish it was to offer that sacrifice to spleen. I fancied that as they consumed, he recalled the pleasure they had already imparted, and the triumph and ever-increasing pleasure he had anticipated from them; and I fancied I guessed the incitement to his secret studies also. He had been content with daily labour and rough animal enjoyments, till Catherine crossed his path. Shame at her scorn, and hope of her approval, were his first prompters to higher pursuits; and instead of guarding him from one and winning him to the other, his endeavours to raise himself had produced just the contrary result.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Yes, that’s all the good that such a brute as you can get from them!” cried Catherine, sucking her damaged lip, and watching the conflagration with indignant eyes.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“You’d better hold your tongue, now,” he answered fiercely.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

And his agitation precluded further speech; he advanced hastily to the entrance, where I made way for him to pass. But ere he had crossed the door-stones, Mr. Heathcliff, coming up the causeway, encountered him, and laying hold of his shoulder asked,—“What’s to do now, my lad?”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Naught, naught,” he said, and broke away to enjoy his grief and anger in solitude.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Heathcliff gazed after him, and sighed.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“It will be odd if I thwart myself,” he muttered, unconscious that I was behind him. “But when I look for his father in his face, I find her every day more! How the devil is he so like? I can hardly bear to see him.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

He bent his eyes to the ground, and walked moodily in. There was a restless, anxious expression in his countenance, I had never remarked there before; and he looked sparer in person. His daughter-in-law, on perceiving him through the window, immediately escaped to the kitchen, so that I remained alone.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“I’m glad to see you out of doors again, Mr. Lockwood,” he said, in reply to my greeting; “from selfish motives partly: I don’t think I could readily supply your loss in this desolation. I’ve wondered more than once what brought you here.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“An idle whim, I fear, sir,” was my answer; “or else an idle whim is going to spirit me away. I shall set out for London next week; and I must give you warning that I feel no disposition to retain Thrushcross Grange beyond the twelve months I agreed to rent it. I believe I shall not live there any more.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“Oh, indeed; you’re tired of being banished from the world, are you?” he said. “But if you be coming to plead off paying for a place you won’t occupy, your journey is useless: I never relent in exacting my due from any one.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“I’m coming to plead off nothing about it,” I exclaimed, considerably irritated. “Should you wish it, I’ll settle with you now,” and I drew my note-book from my pocket.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“No, no,” he replied, coolly; “you’ll leave sufficient behind to cover your debts, if you fail to return: I’m not in such a hurry. Sit down and take your dinner with us; a guest that is safe from repeating his visit can generally be made welcome. Catherine! bring the things in: where are you?”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

Catherine reappeared, bearing a tray of knives and forks.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“You may get your dinner with Joseph,” muttered Heathcliff, aside, “and remain in the kitchen till he is gone.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

She obeyed his directions very punctually: perhaps she had no temptation to transgress. Living among clowns and misanthropists, she probably cannot appreciate a better class of people when she meets them.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

With Mr. Heathcliff, grim and saturnine, on the one hand, and Hareton, absolutely dumb, on the other, I made a somewhat cheerless meal, and bade adieu early. I would have departed by the back way, to get a last glimpse of Catherine and annoy old Joseph; but Hareton received orders to lead up my horse, and my host himself escorted me to the door, so I could not fulfil my wish.

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXI

“How dreary life gets over in that house!” I reflected, while riding down the road. “What a realisation of something more romantic than a fairy tale it would have been for Mrs. Linton Heathcliff, had she and I struck up an attachment, as her good nurse desired, and migrated together into the stirring atmosphere of the town!”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXII

1802.—This September I was invited to devastate the moors of a friend in the north, and on my journey to his abode, I unexpectedly came within fifteen miles of Gimmerton. The ostler at a roadside public-house was holding a pail of water to refresh my horses, when a cart of very green oats, newly reaped, passed by, and he remarked,—“Yon’s frough Gimmerton, nah! They’re allas three wick’ after other folk wi’ ther harvest.”

Wuthering_Heights_-_Emily_Bronte

CHAPTER XXXII

“Gimmerton?” I repeated—my residence in that locality had already grown dim and dreamy. “Ah! I know. How far is it from this?”

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“Happen fourteen mile o’er th’ hills; and a rough road,” he answered.

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A sudden impulse seized me to visit Thrushcross Grange. It was scarcely noon, and I conceived that I might as well pass the night under my own roof as in an inn. Besides, I could spare a day easily to arrange matters with my landlord, and thus save myself the trouble of invading the neighbourhood again. Having rested awhile, I directed my servant to inquire the way to the village; and, with great fatigue to our beasts, we managed the distance in some three hours.

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I left him there, and proceeded down the valley alone. The grey church looked greyer, and the lonely churchyard lonelier. I distinguished a moor-sheep cropping the short turf on the graves. It was sweet, warm weather—too warm for travelling; but the heat did not hinder me from enjoying the delightful scenery above and below: had I seen it nearer August, I’m sure it would have tempted me to waste a month among its solitudes. In winter nothing more dreary, in summer nothing more divine, than those glens shut in by hills, and those bluff, bold swells of heath.

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I reached the Grange before sunset, and knocked for admittance; but the family had retreated into the back premises, I judged, by one thin, blue wreath, curling from the kitchen chimney, and they did not hear. I rode into the court. Under the porch, a girl of nine or ten sat knitting, and an old woman reclined on the housesteps, smoking a meditative pipe.

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“Is Mrs. Dean within?” I demanded of the dame.

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“Mistress Dean? Nay!” she answered, “she doesn’t bide here: shoo’s up at th’ Heights.”

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“Are you the housekeeper, then?” I continued.

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“Eea, Aw keep th’ hause,” she replied.

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“Well, I’m Mr. Lockwood, the master. Are there any rooms to lodge me in, I wonder? I wish to stay all night.”

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“T’ maister!” she cried in astonishment. “Whet, whoiver knew yah wur coming? Yah sud ha’ send word. They’s nowt norther dry nor mensful abaht t’ place: nowt there isn’t!”

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She threw down her pipe and bustled in, the girl followed, and I entered too; soon perceiving that her report was true, and, moreover, that I had almost upset her wits by my unwelcome apparition, I bade her be composed. I would go out for a walk; and, meantime she must try to prepare a corner of a sitting-room for me to sup in, and a bedroom to sleep in. No sweeping and dusting, only good fire and dry sheets were necessary. She seemed willing to do her best; though she thrust the hearth-brush into the grates in mistake for the poker, and malappropriated several other articles of her craft: but I retired, confiding in her energy for a resting-place against my return. Wuthering Heights was the goal of my proposed excursion. An after-thought brought me back, when I had quitted the court.

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“All well at the Heights?” I inquired of the woman.

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“Eea, f’r owt ee knaw!” she answered, skurrying away with a pan of hot cinders.

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I would have asked why Mrs. Dean had deserted the Grange, but it was impossible to delay her at such a crisis, so I turned away and made my exit, rambling leisurely along, with the glow of a sinking sun behind, and the mild glory of a rising moon in front—one fading, and the other brightening—as I quitted the park, and climbed the stony by-road branching off to Mr. Heathcliff’s dwelling. Before I arrived in sight of it, all that remained of day was a beamless amber light along the west: but I could see every pebble on the path, and every blade of grass, by that splendid moon. I had neither to climb the gate nor to knock—it yielded to my hand. That is an improvement, I thought. And I noticed another, by the aid of my nostrils; a fragrance of stocks and wallflowers wafted on the air from amongst the homely fruit-trees.

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Both doors and lattices were open; and yet, as is usually the case in a coal-district, a fine red fire illumined the chimney: the comfort which the eye derives from it renders the extra heat endurable. But the house of Wuthering Heights is so large that the inmates have plenty of space for withdrawing out of its influence; and accordingly what inmates there were had stationed themselves not far from one of the windows. I could both see them and hear them talk before I entered, and looked and listened in consequence; being moved thereto by a mingled sense of curiosity and envy, that grew as I lingered.