Wuthering Heights
companion, while raising himself with one hand, he had taken her arm
with the other; and so inadequate was his stock of gentleness to the
requirements of her condition, that on his letting go I saw four
distinct impressions left blue in the colourless skin.
“Are you possessed with a devil,” he pursued, savagely, “to talk in
that manner to me when you are dying? Do you reflect that all those
words will be branded in my memory, and eating deeper 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, recalled to a sense of
physical weakness by the violent, unequal throbbing of her heart, which
beat visibly and audibly under this excess of 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 a word of mine distress you
hereafter, think I feel the same distress underground, and for my own
sake, forgive me! Come here and kneel down again! You never harmed me
in your life. Nay, if you nurse anger, that will be worse to remember
than my harsh words! Won’t you come here again? Do!”
Heathcliff went to the back of her chair, and leant over, but not so
far as to let her see his face, which was livid with emotion. She bent
round to look at him; he would not permit it: turning abruptly, he
walked to the fireplace, where he stood, silent, with his back towards
us. Mrs. Linton’s glance followed him suspiciously: every movement woke
a new sentiment in her. After a pause and a prolonged gaze, she
resumed; addressing me in accents of 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. And,” added she musingly, “the thing that irks me most is this
shattered prison, after all. I’m tired of being enclosed here. I’m
wearying to escape into that glorious world, and to be always there:
not seeing it dimly through tears, and yearning for it through the
walls of an aching heart: but really with it, and in it. Nelly, you
think you are better and more fortunate than I; in full health and
strength: you are sorry for me—very soon that will be altered. I shall
be sorry for _you_. I shall be incomparably beyond and above you all. I
_wonder_ he won’t be near me!” She went on to herself. “I thought he
wished it. 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. At that earnest appeal he turned to her, looking absolutely
desperate. His eyes, wide and wet, at last flashed fiercely on her; his
breast heaved convulsively. An instant they held asunder, and then how
they met I hardly saw, but 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, to my eyes, she seemed directly
insensible. He flung himself into the nearest seat, and on my
approaching hurriedly to ascertain if she had fainted, he gnashed at
me, and foamed like a mad dog, and gathered her to him with greedy
jealousy. I did not feel as if I were in the company of a creature of
my own species: it appeared that he would not understand, though I
spoke to him; so I stood off, and held my tongue, in great perplexity.
A movement of Catherine’s relieved me a little presently: she put up
her hand to clasp his neck, and bring her cheek to his as he held her;
while he, in return, covering her with frantic caresses, said wildly—
“You teach me now how cruel you’ve been—cruel and false. _Why_ did you
despise me? _Why_ did you betray your own heart, Cathy? I have not one
word of comfort. You deserve this. You have killed yourself. Yes, you
may kiss me, and cry; and wring out my kisses and tears: they’ll blight
you—they’ll damn you. You loved me—then what _right_ had you to leave
me? What right—answer me—for the poor fancy you felt for Linton?
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. Let me alone,” sobbed Catherine. “If I’ve done wrong,
I’m dying for it. It is enough! You left me too: but I won’t upbraid
you! 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 hid 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,
the man whom I had sent off returned from his errand, and I could
distinguish, by the shine of the western sun up the valley, a concourse
thickening outside Gimmerton chapel porch.
“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.
Ere long I perceived a group of the servants passing up the road
towards the kitchen wing. Mr. Linton was not far behind; he opened the
gate himself and sauntered slowly up, probably enjoying the lovely
afternoon that breathed as soft as summer.
“Now he is here,” I exclaimed. “For heaven’s sake, hurry down! You’ll
not meet any one on the front stairs. Do be quick; and stay among the
trees till he is fairly in.”
“I must go, Cathy,” said Heathcliff, seeking to extricate himself from
his companion’s arms. “But if I live, 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,” persisted the alarmed
intruder.
He would have risen, and unfixed her fingers by the act—she clung fast,
gasping: there was mad resolution in her face.
“No!” she shrieked. “Oh, don’t, don’t go. It is the last time! Edgar
will not hurt us. Heathcliff, I shall die! I shall die!”
“Damn the fool! There he is,” cried Heathcliff, sinking back into his
seat. “Hush, my darling! Hush, hush, Catherine! I’ll stay. If he shot
me so, I’d expire with a blessing on my lips.”
And there they were fast again. 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! You could be free instantly. That is the most
diabolical deed that ever you did. We are all done for—master,
mistress, and servant.”
I wrung my hands, and cried out; and Mr. Linton hastened his step at
the noise. In the midst of my agitation, I was sincerely glad to
observe that Catherine’s arms had fallen relaxed, 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 his unbidden guest, blanched with astonishment and
rage. What he meant to do I cannot tell; however, the other stopped all
demonstrations, at once, by placing the lifeless-looking form in his
arms.
“Look there!” he said. “Unless you be a fiend, 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, and after resorting to many means, we managed to
restore her to sensation; but she was all bewildered; she sighed, and
moaned, and knew nobody. Edgar, in his anxiety for her, forgot her
hated friend. I did not. I went, at the earliest opportunity, and
besought him to depart; affirming that Catherine was better, and he
should hear from me in the morning how she passed the night.
“I shall not refuse to go out of doors,” he answered; “but I shall stay
in the garden: and, Nelly, mind you keep your word to-morrow. I shall
be under those larch-trees. Mind! or I pay another visit, whether
Linton be in or not.”
He sent a rapid glance through the half-open door of the chamber, and,
ascertaining that what I stated was apparently true, delivered the
house of his luckless presence.
CHAPTER XVI
About twelve o’clock that night was born the Catherine you saw at
Wuthering Heights: a puny, seven-months’ child; and two hours after the
mother died, having never recovered sufficient consciousness to miss
Heathcliff, or know Edgar. The latter’s distraction at his bereavement
is a subject too painful to be dwelt on; its after-effects showed how
deep the sorrow sunk. A great addition, in my eyes, was his being left
without an heir. I bemoaned that, as I gazed on the feeble orphan; and
I mentally abused old Linton for (what was only natural partiality) the
securing his estate to his own daughter, instead of his son’s. An
unwelcomed infant it was, poor thing! It might have wailed out of life,
and nobody cared a morsel, during those first hours of existence. We
redeemed the neglect afterwards; but its beginning was as friendless as
its end is likely to be.
Next morning—bright and cheerful out of doors—stole softened in through
the blinds of the silent room, and suffused the couch and its occupant
with a mellow, tender glow. Edgar Linton had his head laid on the
pillow, and his eyes shut. His young and fair features were almost as
deathlike as those of the form beside him, and almost as fixed: but
_his_ was the hush of exhausted anguish, and _hers_ of perfect peace.
Her brow smooth, her lids closed, her lips wearing the expression of a
smile; no angel in heaven could be more beautiful than she appeared.
And I partook of the infinite calm in which she lay: my mind was never
in a holier frame than while I gazed on that untroubled image of Divine
rest. I instinctively echoed the words she had uttered a few hours
before: “Incomparably beyond and above us all! Whether still on earth
or now in heaven, her spirit is at home with God!”
I don’t know if it be a peculiarity in me, but I am seldom otherwise
than happy while watching in the chamber of death, should no frenzied
or despairing mourner share the duty with me. I see a repose that
neither earth nor hell can break, and I feel an assurance of the
endless and shadowless hereafter—the Eternity they have entered—where
life is boundless in its duration, and love in its sympathy, and joy in
its fulness. I noticed on that occasion how much selfishness there is
even in a love like Mr. Linton’s, when he so regretted Catherine’s
blessed release! To be sure, one might have doubted, after the wayward
and impatient existence she had led, whether she merited a haven of
peace at last. One might doubt in seasons of cold reflection; but not
then, in the presence of her corpse. It asserted its own tranquillity,
which seemed a pledge of equal quiet to its former inhabitant.
Do you believe such people _are_ happy in the other world, sir? I’d