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_ MR. HINDLEY came home to the funeral; and - a thing that amazed us,
and set the neighbours gossiping right and left - he brought a wife
with him. What she was, and where she was born, he never informed
us: probably, she had neither money nor name to recommend her, or
he would scarcely have kept the union from his father.
She was not one that would have disturbed the house much on her own
account. Every object she saw, the moment she crossed the
threshold, appeared to delight her; and every circumstance that
took place about her: except the preparing for the burial, and the
presence of the mourners. I thought she was half silly, from her
behaviour while that went on: she ran into her chamber, and made
me come with her, though I should have been dressing the children:
and there she sat shivering and clasping her hands, and asking
repeatedly - 'Are they gone yet?' Then she began describing with
hysterical emotion the effect it produced on her to see black; and
started, and trembled, and, at last, fell a-weeping - and when I
asked what was the matter, answered, she didn't know; but she felt
so afraid of dying! I imagined her as little likely to die as
myself. She was rather thin, but young, and fresh-complexioned,
and her eyes sparkled as bright as diamonds. I did remark, to be
sure, that mounting the stairs made her breathe very quick; that
the least sudden noise set her all in a quiver, and that she
coughed troublesomely sometimes: but I knew nothing of what these
symptoms portended, and had no impulse to sympathise with her. We
don't in general take to foreigners here, Mr. Lockwood, unless they
take to us first.
Young Earnshaw was altered considerably in the three years of his
absence. He had grown sparer, and lost his colour, and spoke and
dressed quite differently; and, on the very day of his return, he
told Joseph and me we must thenceforth quarter ourselves in the
back-kitchen, and leave the house for him. Indeed, he would have
carpeted and papered a small spare room for a parlour; but his wife
expressed such pleasure at the white floor and huge glowing
fireplace, at the pewter dishes and delf-case, and dog-kennel, and
the wide space there was to move about in where they usually sat,
that he thought it unnecessary to her comfort, and so dropped the
intention.
She expressed pleasure, too, at finding a sister among her new
acquaintance; and she prattled to Catherine, and kissed her, and
ran about with her, and gave her quantities of presents, at the
beginning. Her affection tired very soon, however, and when she
grew peevish, Hindley became tyrannical. A few words from her,
evincing a dislike to Heathcliff, were enough to rouse in him all
his old hatred of the boy. He drove him from their company to the
servants, deprived him of the instructions of the curate, and
insisted that he should labour out of doors instead; compelling him
to do so as hard as any other lad on the farm.
Heathcliff bore his degradation pretty well at first, because Cathy
taught him what she learnt, and worked or played with him in the
fields. They both promised fair to grow up as rude as savages; the
young master being entirely negligent how they behaved, and what
they did, so they kept clear of him. He would not even have seen
after their going to church on Sundays, only Joseph and the curate
reprimanded his carelessness when they absented themselves; and
that reminded him to order Heathcliff a flogging, and Catherine a
fast from dinner or supper. But it was one of their chief
amusements to run away to the moors in the morning and remain there
all day, and the after punishment grew a mere thing to laugh at.
The curate might set as many chapters as he pleased for Catherine
to get by heart, and Joseph might thrash Heathcliff till his arm
ached; they forgot everything the minute they were together again:
at least the minute they had contrived some naughty plan of
revenge; and many a time I've cried to myself to watch them growing
more reckless daily, and I not daring to speak a syllable, for fear
of losing the small power I still retained over the unfriended
creatures. One Sunday evening, it chanced that they were banished
from the sitting-room, for making a noise, or a light offence of
the kind; and when I went to call them to supper, I could discover
them nowhere. We searched the house, above and below, and the yard
and stables; they were invisible: and, at last, Hindley in a
passion told us to bolt the doors, and swore nobody should let them
in that night. The household went to bed; and I, too, anxious to
lie down, opened my lattice and put my head out to hearken, though
it rained: determined to admit them in spite of the prohibition,
should they return. In a while, I distinguished steps coming up
the road, and the light of a lantern glimmered through the gate. I
threw a shawl over my head and ran to prevent them from waking Mr.
Earnshaw by knocking. There was Heathcliff, by himself: it gave
me a start to see him alone.
'Where is Miss Catherine?' I cried hurriedly. 'No accident, I
hope?' 'At Thrushcross Grange,' he answered; 'and I would have
been there too, but they had not the manners to ask me to stay.'
'Well, you will catch it!' I said: 'you'll never be content till
you're sent about your business. What in the world led you
wandering to Thrushcross Grange?' 'Let me get off my wet clothes,
and I'll tell you all about it, Nelly,' he replied. I bid him
beware of rousing the master, and while he undressed and I waited
to put out the candle, he continued - 'Cathy and I escaped from the
wash-house to have a ramble at liberty, and getting a glimpse of
the Grange lights, we thought we would just go and see whether the
Lintons passed their Sunday evenings standing shivering in corners,
while their father and mother sat eating and drinking, and singing
and laughing, and burning their eyes out before the fire. Do you
think they do? Or reading sermons, and being catechised by their
manservant, and set to learn a column of Scripture names, if they
don't answer properly?' 'Probably not,' I responded. 'They are
good children, no doubt, and don't deserve the treatment you
receive, for your bad conduct.' 'Don't cant, Nelly,' he said:
'nonsense! We ran from the top of the Heights to the park, without
stopping - Catherine completely beaten in the race, because she was
barefoot. You'll have to seek for her shoes in the bog to-morrow.
We crept through a broken hedge, groped our way up the path, and
planted ourselves on a flower-plot under the drawing-room window.
The light came from thence; they had not put up the shutters, and
the curtains were only half closed. Both of us were able to look
in by standing on the basement, and clinging to the ledge, and we
saw - ah! it was beautiful - a splendid place carpeted with
crimson, and crimson-covered chairs and tables, and a pure white
ceiling bordered by gold, a shower of glass-drops hanging in silver
chains from the centre, and shimmering with little soft tapers.
Old Mr. and Mrs. Linton were not there; Edgar and his sisters had
it entirely to themselves. Shouldn't they have been happy? We
should have thought ourselves in heaven! And now, guess what your
good children were doing? Isabella - I believe she is eleven, a
year younger than Cathy - lay screaming at the farther end of the
room, shrieking as if witches were running red-hot needles into
her. Edgar stood on the hearth weeping silently, and in the middle
of the table sat a little dog, shaking its paw and yelping; which,
from their mutual accusations, we understood they had nearly pulled
in two between them. The idiots! That was their pleasure! to
quarrel who should hold a heap of warm hair, and each begin to cry
because both, after struggling to get it, refused to take it. We
laughed outright at the petted things; we did despise them! When
would you catch me wishing to have what Catherine wanted? or find
us by ourselves, seeking entertainment in yelling, and sobbing, and
rolling on the ground, divided by the whole room? I'd not
exchange, for a thousand lives, my condition here, for Edgar
Linton's at Thrushcross Grange - not if I might have the privilege
of flinging Joseph off the highest gable, and painting the house-
front with Hindley's blood!'
'Hush, hush!' I interrupted. 'Still you have not told me,
Heathcliff, how Catherine is left behind?'
'I told you we laughed,' he answered. 'The Lintons heard us, and
with one accord they shot like arrows to the door; there was
silence, and then a cry, "Oh, mamma, mamma! Oh, papa! Oh, mamma,
come here. Oh, papa, oh!" They really did howl out something in
that way. We made frightful noises to terrify them still more, and
then we dropped off the ledge, because somebody was drawing the
bars, and we felt we had better flee. I had Cathy by the hand, and
was urging her on, when all at once she fell down. "Run,
Heathcliff, run!" she whispered. "They have let the bull-dog
loose, and he holds me!" The devil had seized her ankle, Nelly: I
heard his abominable snorting. She did not yell out - no! she
would have scorned to do it, if she had been spitted on the horns
of a mad cow. I did, though: I vociferated curses enough to
annihilate any fiend in Christendom; and I got a stone and thrust
it between his jaws, and tried with all my might to cram it down
his throat. A beast of a servant came up with a lantern, at last,
shouting - "Keep fast, Skulker, keep fast!" He changed his note,
however, when he saw Skulker's game. The dog was throttled off;
his huge, purple tongue hanging half a foot out of his mouth, and
his pendent lips streaming with bloody slaver. The man took Cathy
up; she was sick: not from fear, I'm certain, but from pain. He
carried her in; I followed, grumbling execrations and vengeance.
"What prey, Robert?" hallooed Linton from the entrance. "Skulker
has caught a little girl, sir," he replied; "and there's a lad
here," he added, making a clutch at me, "who looks an out-and-
outer! Very like the robbers were for putting them through the
window to open the doors to the gang after all were asleep, that
they might murder us at their ease. Hold your tongue, you foul-
mouthed thief, you! you shall go to the gallows for this. Mr.
Linton, sir, don't lay by your gun." "No, no, Robert," said the
old fool. "The rascals knew that yesterday was my rent-day: they
thought to have me cleverly. Come in; I'll furnish them a
reception. There, John, fasten the chain. Give Skulker some
water, Jenny. To beard a magistrate in his stronghold, and on the
Sabbath, too! Where will their insolence stop? Oh, my dear Mary,
look here! Don't be afraid, it is but a boy - yet the villain
scowls so plainly in his face; would it not be a kindness to the
country to hang him at once, before he shows his nature in acts as
well as features?" He pulled me under the chandelier, and Mrs.
Linton placed her spectacles on her nose and raised her hands in
horror. The cowardly children crept nearer also, Isabella lisping
- "Frightful thing! Put him in the cellar, papa. He's exactly
like the son of the fortune-teller that stole my tame pheasant.
Isn't he, Edgar?"
'While they examined me, Cathy came round; she heard the last
speech, and laughed. Edgar Linton, after an inquisitive stare,
collected sufficient wit to recognise her. They see us at church,
you know, though we seldom meet them elsewhere. "That's Miss
Earnshaw?" he whispered to his mother, "and look how Skulker has
bitten her - how her foot bleeds!"
'"Miss Earnshaw? Nonsense!" cried the dame; "Miss Earnshaw
scouring the country with a gipsy! And yet, my dear, the child is
in mourning - surely it is - and she may be lamed for life!"
'"What culpable carelessness in her brother!" exclaimed Mr. Linton,
turning from me to Catherine. "I've understood from Shielders"'
(that was the curate, sir) '"that he lets her grow up in absolute
heathenism. But who is this? Where did she pick up this
companion? Oho! I declare he is that strange acquisition my late
neighbour made, in his journey to Liverpool - a little Lascar, or
an American or Spanish castaway."
'"A wicked boy, at all events," remarked the old lady, "and quite
unfit for a decent house! Did you notice his language, Linton?
I'm shocked that my children should have heard it."
'I recommenced cursing - don't be angry, Nelly - and so Robert was
ordered to take me off. I refused to go without Cathy; he dragged
me into the garden, pushed the lantern into my hand, assured me
that Mr. Earnshaw should be informed of my behaviour, and, bidding
me march directly, secured the door again. The curtains were still
looped up at one corner, and I resumed my station as spy; because,
if Catherine had wished to return, I intended shattering their
great glass panes to a million of fragments, unless they let her
out. She sat on the sofa quietly. Mrs. Linton took off the grey
cloak of the dairy-maid which we had borrowed for our excursion,
shaking her head and expostulating with her, I suppose: she was a
young lady, and they made a distinction between her treatment and
mine. Then the woman-servant brought a basin of warm water, and
washed her feet; and Mr. Linton mixed a tumbler of negus, and
Isabella emptied a plateful of cakes into her lap, and Edgar stood
gaping at a distance. Afterwards, they dried and combed her
beautiful hair, and gave her a pair of enormous slippers, and
wheeled her to the fire; and I left her, as merry as she could be,
dividing her food between the little dog and Skulker, whose nose
she pinched as he ate; and kindling a spark of spirit in the vacant
blue eyes of the Lintons - a dim reflection from her own enchanting
face. I saw they were full of stupid admiration; she is so
immeasurably superior to them - to everybody on earth, is she not,
Nelly?'
'There will more come of this business than you reckon on,' I
answered, covering him up and extinguishing the light. 'You are
incurable, Heathcliff; and Mr. Hindley will have to proceed to
extremities, see if he won't.' My words came truer than I desired.
The luckless adventure made Earnshaw furious. And then Mr. Linton,
to mend matters, paid us a visit himself on the morrow, and read
the young master such a lecture on the road he guided his family,
that he was stirred to look about him, in earnest. Heathcliff
received no flogging, but he was told that the first word he spoke
to Miss Catherine should ensure a dismissal; and Mrs. Earnshaw
undertook to keep her sister-in-law in due restraint when she
returned home; employing art, not force: with force she would have
found it impossible. _
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