CHAPTER 15
Another week over, and I am nearer health, and spring! I have now heard all my neighbour’s history, at different sittings. I’ll continue it in her own words. She is a very fair narrator, and I don’t think I could improve her style.
Mrs. Dean said: In the evening of my visit to the Heights, I knew as well as if I saw him that Mr. Heathcliff was around Thrushcross Grange. I shunned going out, because I still carried his letter in my pocket, and didn’t want to be threatened any more. I had decided not to give it to Catherine till my master went out, as I could not guess how it would affect her.
In consequence, it did not reach her for three days. The fourth day was Sunday, and I brought it to her after the family were gone to church. There was a manservant left in the house with me, and we generally locked the doors; but on that occasion the weather was so warm and pleasant that I set them wide open; and, as I knew who would be coming, I told the servant that the mistress wished for some oranges, and he must run over to the village and get a few. He departed, and I went upstairs.
Mrs. Linton sat in a white dress, with a light shawl over her shoulders, by the open window, as usual. Her thick, long hair had been cut at the beginning of her illness, and now she wore it simply combed over her temples and neck. Her appearance was altered, as I had told Heathcliff; but when she was calm, there seemed unearthly beauty in the change. The flash of her eyes had been succeeded by a dreamy and melancholy softness; they appeared always to gaze beyond this world. Her pale face and peculiar expression stamped her as one doomed to die.
A book lay spread on the sill before her, the wind fluttering its leaves. I believe Linton had laid it there: for he would spend many an hour in trying to interest her in some subject which had formerly amused her. In her better moods she endured his efforts placidly, only now and then suppressing a wearied sigh, and stopping him at last with the saddest of smiles and kisses. At other times, she would turn petulantly away, and hide her face in her hands, or even push him off angrily.
Gimmerton chapel bells were still ringing; and the mellow flow of the beck came soothingly on the ear. At Wuthering Heights it always sounded on quiet days following a great thaw or steady rain. And of Wuthering Heights Catherine was thinking as she listened: that is, if she thought or listened at all; she had a vague, distant look.
‘There’s a letter for you, Mrs. Linton,’ I said, gently putting it in her hand. ‘You must read it immediately, because it wants an answer. Shall I open it?’
‘Yes,’ she answered, without looking at it.
I opened it – it was very short. Then I stood waiting till she should glance down; but she did not, so at last I said, ‘Must I read it, ma’am? It is from Mr. Heathcliff.’
There was a start and a troubled gleam of recollection. She lifted the letter, and seemed to read it; and when she came to the signature she sighed: yet still I found she had not gathered its meaning, for she merely pointed to the name, and gazed at me with mournful and questioning eagerness.
‘Well, he wishes to see you,’ said I. ‘He’s in the garden, and impatient to know your answer.’
As I spoke, I observed a large dog lying outside on the grass raise its ears and wag its tail, announcing that someone approached whom it did not consider a stranger. Mrs. Linton listened breathlessly. A step crossed the hall; the open house was too tempting for Heathcliff to resist walking in.
With straining eagerness Catherine gazed towards the doorway. In a stride or two he was at her side, and had her grasped in his arms.
He neither spoke nor loosed his hold for some five minutes, during which time he bestowed more kisses than ever he gave in his life before, I daresay: but my mistress had kissed him first, and I plainly saw that he could hardly bear, for downright agony, to look into her face! The instant he beheld her, he knew that there was no prospect of recovery – she was fated, sure to die.
‘Oh, Cathy! Oh, my life! how can I bear it?’ was the first sentence he uttered, in a tone of despair. He stared at her earnestly; but his eyes burned with anguish, not with tears.
‘What now?’ said Catherine, leaning back, and returning his look with a clouded brow. ‘You and Edgar have broken my heart, Heathcliff! And you both bewail the deed to me, as if you were the people to be pitied! I shall not pity you. You have killed me – and grown strong on it! How many years do you mean to live after I am gone?’
Heathcliff had knelt to embrace her; he attempted to rise, but she seized his hair, and kept him down.
‘I wish I could hold you,’ she continued bitterly, ‘till we were both dead! I care nothing for your sufferings. Why shouldn’t you suffer? I do! Will you forget me? Will you be happy when I am in the earth? Will you say twenty years hence, “That’s the grave of Catherine Earnshaw – I loved her long ago; but it is past. I’ve loved many others since: my children are dearer to me than she was; and, at death, I shall not rejoice that I am going to her: I shall be sorry that I must leave them!” Will you say so, Heathcliff?’
‘Don’t torture me,’ cried he, wrenching his head free, and grinding his teeth.
They made a strange and fearful picture. Catherine’s face had a wild vindictiveness in its white cheek, and a bloodless lip and glittering eye; and she still held some of his hair in her fingers. Her companion had taken her arm so roughly that on his letting go I saw four distinct impressions left blue in the colourless skin.
‘Are you possessed with a devil,’ he said savagely, ‘to talk in that manner to me when you are dying? Those words will be branded in my memory eternally after you have left me. You know you lie to say I have killed you: and, Catherine, you know that I could as soon forget you as my existence! Is it not sufficient for your infernal selfishness, that while you are at peace I shall writhe in the torments of hell?’
‘I shall not be at peace,’ moaned Catherine, her heart beating visibly in her agitation. She said nothing further till the paroxysm was over; then she continued, more kindly—
‘I’m not wishing you greater torment than I have, Heathcliff. I only wish us never to be parted: and should my words distress you hereafter, think I feel the same distress underground, and forgive me! Come here! You never harmed me in your life. Your anger will be worse to remember than my harsh words! Won’t you come here again? Do!’
Heathcliff went to the back of her chair, his face white with emotion. She bent round to look at him; but turning abruptly, he walked to the fireplace, where he stood silent, his back towards us. Mrs. Linton’s glance followed him suspiciously: after a pause she said to me, with indignant disappointment:—
‘Oh, you see, Nelly, he would not relent a moment to keep me out of the grave. That is how I’m loved! Well, never mind. That is not my Heathcliff. I shall love mine yet; and take him with me: he’s in my soul.’ She added musingly, ‘The thing that irks me most is this shattered prison. I’m tired of being enclosed here. I’m wearying to escape into that glorious world: not seeing it dimly through tears, but to be really in it. Nelly, you are sorry for me – very soon that will be altered. I shall be sorry for you. I shall be far beyond and above you all. I wonder he won’t be near me! Heathcliff, dear! you should not be sullen now. Do come to me, Heathcliff.’
In her eagerness she rose and supported herself on the arm of the chair. He turned to her, looking absolutely desperate. His eyes, wide and wet, flashed fiercely on her; his breast heaved convulsively. An instant they held apart, and then Catherine made a spring, and he caught her, and they were locked in an embrace from which I thought my mistress would never be released alive: in fact, she seemed unconscious.
He flung himself into the nearest seat, and on my approaching to see if she had fainted, he gnashed at me, and foamed like a mad dog, and held her with greedy jealousy. I did not feel as if he were human; so I stood off, in great perplexity.
A movement of Catherine’s relieved me a little: she put up her hand to his cheek; while he, covering her with frantic caresses, said wildly—
‘You’ve been cruel
– cruel and false. Why did you despise me? Why did you betray your own heart, Cathy? You deserve this. You have killed yourself. Yes, you may kiss me, and cry; your tears will damn you. You loved me – what right had you to leave me? Because misery and degradation, and death, and nothing that God or Satan could inflict would have parted us, you, of your own will, did it. I have not broken your heart – you have broken it; and in breaking it, you have broken mine. So much the worse for me that I am strong. Do I want to live? What kind of living will it be when you – oh, God! would you like to live with your soul in the grave?’
‘Let me alone,’ sobbed Catherine. ‘If I’ve done wrong, I’m dying for it. It is enough! You left me too: but I forgive you. Forgive me!’
‘It is hard to forgive, and to look at those eyes, and feel those wasted hands,’ he answered. ‘Kiss me again; and don’t let me see your eyes! I forgive what you have done to me. I love my murderer – but yours! How can I?’
They were silent – their faces hidden against each other, and washed by each other’s tears. At least, I suppose the weeping was on both sides; as it seemed Heathcliff could weep on a great occasion like this.
I grew very uncomfortable, meanwhile; for the afternoon wore fast away, and I could see a crowd outside Gimmerton chapel.
‘Service is over,’ I announced. ‘My master will be here in half an hour.’
Heathcliff groaned a curse, and strained Catherine closer: she never moved.
Soon I perceived a group of the servants approaching. Mr. Linton was not far behind; he sauntered slowly up, probably enjoying the lovely afternoon.
‘Now he is here,’ I exclaimed. ‘For heaven’s sake, hurry down! Do be quick; and stay among the trees till he is inside.’
‘I must go, Cathy,’ said Heathcliff. ‘But I’ll see you again before you are asleep. I won’t stray five yards from your window.’
‘You must not go!’ she answered, holding him as firmly as her strength allowed. ‘You shall not, I tell you.’
‘For one hour,’ he pleaded earnestly.
‘Not for one minute,’ she replied.
‘I must – Linton will be up immediately,’ he persisted, alarmed.
He would have risen – but she clung fast to him, gasping: there was mad resolution in her face.
‘No!’ she shrieked. ‘Oh, don’t go. It is the last time! Edgar will not hurt us. Heathcliff, I shall die!’
‘Damn the fool! There he is,’ cried Heathcliff, sinking back into his seat. ‘Hush, my darling! Hush! I’ll stay. If he shot me so, I’d expire with a blessing on my lips.’
I heard my master mounting the stairs – the cold sweat ran from my forehead: I was horrified.
‘Are you going to listen to her ravings?’ I said, passionately. ‘She does not know what she says. Will you ruin her, because she has not wit to help herself? Get up! That is the most diabolical deed that ever you did. We are all done for.’
I wrung my hands, and cried out; and Mr. Linton hastened his step at the noise. In my agitation, I was glad to observe that Catherine’s arms had fallen limp, and her head hung down.
‘She’s fainted, or dead,’ I thought: ‘so much the better. Far better that she should be dead, than lingering a burden and a misery-maker to all about her.’
Edgar sprang to Heathcliff, pale with astonishment and rage. What he meant to do I cannot tell; Heathcliff at once placed the lifeless-looking form in his arms.
‘Look there!’ he said. ‘Help her first – then you shall speak to me!’
He walked into the parlour, and sat down. Mr. Linton summoned me, and with great difficulty we managed to restore her to sensation; but she was bewildered; she sighed, and moaned, and knew nobody.
Edgar, in his anxiety, forgot her hated friend. I did not. I went, at the earliest opportunity, and begged him to depart; affirming that Catherine was better, and that he should hear from me in the morning how she passed the night.
‘I shall stay in the garden,’ he answered; ‘and, Nelly, mind you keep your word tomorrow. I shall be under those larch-trees.’
With a last glance at the door, he left.