CHAPTER XXXIII
ON THE MORROW
of that Monday, Earnshaw being still unable to
follow his ordinary employments, and therefore remaining about the
house, I speedily found it would be impracticable to retain my
charge beside me, as heretofore. She got downstairs before me, and
out into the garden, where she had seen her cousin performing some
easy work; and when I went to bid them come to breakfast, I saw she
had persuaded him to clear a large space of ground from currant and
gooseberry bushes, and they were busy planning together an
importation of plants from the Grange.
I was terrified at the devastation which had been accomplished in a
brief half-hour; the black-currant trees were the apple of Joseph's
eye, and she had just fixed her choice of a flower-bed in the midst
of them. 'There! That will be all shown to the master,' I
exclaimed, 'the minute it is discovered. And what excuse have you
to offer for taking such liberties with the garden? We shall have a
fine explosion on the head of it: see if we don't! Mr. Hareton, I
wonder you should have no more wit than to go and make that mess at
her bidding!' 'I'd forgotten they were Joseph's,' answered
Earnshaw, rather puzzled; 'but I'll tell him I did it.' We always
ate our meals with Mr. Heathcliff. I held the mistress's post in
making tea and carving; so I was indispensable at table. Catherine
usually sat by me, but to-day she stole nearer to Hareton; and I
presently saw she would have no more discretion in her friendship
than she had in her hostility. 'Now, mind you don't talk with and
notice your cousin too much,' were my whispered instructions as we
entered the room. 'It will certainly annoy Mr. Heathcliff, and
he'll be mad at you both.' 'I'm not going to,' she answered. The
minute after, she had sidled to him, and was sticking primroses in
his plate of porridge. He dared not speak to her there: he dared
hardly look; and yet she went on teasing, till he was twice on the
point of being provoked to laugh. I frowned, and then she glanced
towards the master: whose mind was occupied on other subjects than
his company, as his countenance evinced; and she grew serious for
an instant, scrutinizing him with deep gravity. Afterwards she
turned, and recommenced her nonsense; at last, Hareton uttered a
smothered laugh. Mr. Heathcliff started; his eye rapidly surveyed
our faces, Catherine met it with her accustomed look of nervousness
and yet defiance, which he abhorred. 'It is well you are out of my
reach,' he exclaimed. 'What fiend possesses you to stare back at
me, continually, with those infernal eyes? Down with them! and
don't remind me of your existence again. I thought I had cured you
of laughing.' 'It was me,' muttered Hareton. 'What do you say?'
demanded the master. Hareton looked at his plate, and did not
repeat the confession. Mr. Heathcliff looked at him a bit, and then
silently resumed his breakfast and his interrupted musing. We had
nearly finished, and the two young people prudently shifted wider
asunder, so I anticipated no further disturbance during that
sitting: when Joseph appeared at the door, revealing by his
quivering lip and furious eyes that the outrage committed on his
precious shrubs was detected. He must have seen Cathy and her
cousin about the spot before he examined it, for while his jaws
worked like those of a cow chewing its cud, and rendered his speech
difficult to understand, he began:-
'I mun hev' my wage, and I mun
goa! I hed aimed to dee wheare I'd sarved
fur sixty year; and I thowt I'd lug my books up into t' garret, and
all my bits o' stuff, and they sud hev' t' kitchen to theirseln;
for t' sake o' quietness. It wur hard to gie up my awn hearthstun,
but I thowt I could do that! But nah,
shoo's taan my garden fro' me, and by th' heart, maister, I cannot
stand it! Yah may bend to th' yoak an ye will—I noan used to 't,
and an old man doesn't sooin get used to new barthens. I'd rayther
arn my bite an' my sup wi' a hammer in th' road!'
'Now, now, idiot!' interrupted Heathcliff, 'cut it short! What's
your grievance? I'll interfere in no quarrels between you and
Nelly. She may thrust you into the coal-hole for anything I care.'
'It's noan Nelly!' answered
Joseph. 'I sudn't shift for Nelly -nasty ill nowt as shoo is. Thank
God! Shoo cannot stale t' sowl o' nob'dy!
Shoo wer niver soa handsome, but what a body mud look at her 'bout
winking. It's yon flaysome, graceless quean, that's witched our
lad, wi' her bold een and her forrard ways—till -Nay! it fair
brusts my heart! He's forgotten all I've done for him, and made on
him, and goan and riven up a whole row o' t' grandest currant-trees
i' t' garden!' and here he lamented outright; unmanned by a sense
of his bitter injuries, and Earnshaw's ingratitude and dangerous
condition.
'Is the fool drunk?' asked Mr. Heathcliff. 'Hareton, is it you he's
finding fault with?' 'I've pulled up two or three bushes,' replied
the young man; 'but I'm going to set 'em again.' 'And why have you
pulled them up?' said the master. Catherine wisely put in her
tongue. 'We wanted to plant some flowers there,' she cried. 'I'm
the only person to blame, for I wished him to do it.'
'And who the devil gave you leave to touch a stick about the place?'
demanded her father-in-law, much surprised. 'And who ordered
you to obey her?' he added, turning to
Hareton.
The latter was speechless; his cousin replied—'You shouldn't grudge
a few yards of earth for me to ornament, when you have taken all my
land!' 'Your land, insolent slut! You never had any,' said
Heathcliff. 'And my money,' she continued; returning his angry
glare, and meantime biting a piece of crust, the remnant of her
breakfast. 'Silence!' he exclaimed. 'Get done, and begone!' 'And
Hareton's land, and his money,' pursued the reckless thing.
'Hareton and I are friends now; and I shall tell him all about
you!' The master seemed confounded a moment: he grew pale, and rose
up, eyeing her all the while, with an expression of mortal hate.
'If you strike me, Hareton will strike you,' she said; 'so you may
as well sit down.' 'If Hareton does not turn you out of the room,
I'll strike him to hell,' thundered Heathcliff. 'Damnable witch!
dare you pretend to rouse him against me? Off with her! Do you
hear? Fling her into the kitchen! I'll kill her, Ellen Dean, if you
let her come into my sight again!' Hareton tried, under his breath,
to persuade her to go. 'Drag her away!' he cried, savagely. 'Are
you staying to talk?' And he approached to execute his own command.
'He'll not obey you, wicked man, any more,' said Catherine; 'and
he'll soon detest you as much as I do.' 'Wisht! wisht!' muttered
the young man, reproachfully; 'I will not hear you speak so to him.
Have done.' 'But you won't let him strike me?' she cried. 'Come,
then,' he whispered earnestly. It was too late: Heathcliff had
caught hold of her.
'Now, you
go!' he said to Earnshaw. 'Accursed witch! this time she has
provoked me when I could not bear it; and I'll make her repent it
for ever!'
He had his hand in her hair; Hareton attempted to release her
looks, entreating him not to hurt her that once. Heathcliff's black
eyes flashed; he seemed ready to tear Catherine in pieces, and I
was just worked up to risk coming to the rescue, when of a sudden
his fingers relaxed; he shifted his grasp from her head to her arm,
and gazed intently in her face. Then he drew his hand over his
eyes, stood a moment to collect himself apparently, and turning
anew to Catherine, said, with assumed calmness—'You must learn to
avoid putting me in a passion, or I shall really murder you some
time! Go with Mrs. Dean, and keep with her; and confine your
insolence to her ears. As to Hareton Earnshaw, if I see him listen
to you, I'll send him seeking his bread where he can get it! Your
love will make him an outcast and a beggar. Nelly, take her; and
leave me, all of you! Leave me!' I led my young lady out: she was
too glad of her escape to resist; the other followed, and Mr.
Heathcliff had the room to himself till dinner. I had counselled
Catherine to dine up-stairs; but, as soon as he perceived her
vacant seat, he sent me to call her. He spoke to none of us, ate
very little, and went out directly afterwards, intimating that he
should not return before evening.
The two new friends established
themselves in the house during his absence; where I heard Hareton
sternly cheek his cousin, on her offering a revelation of her
father-in-law's conduct to his father. He said he wouldn't suffer a
word to be uttered in his disparagement: if he were the devil, it
didn't signify; he would stand by him; and he'd rather she would
abuse himself, as she used to, than begin on Mr. Heathcliff.
Catherine was waxing cross at this; but he found means to make her
hold her tongue, by asking how she would like him to speak ill of her father? Then she
comprehended that Earnshaw took the master's reputation home to
himself; and was attached by ties stronger than reason could
break—chains, forged by habit, which it would be cruel to attempt
to loosen. She showed a good heart, thenceforth, in avoiding both
complaints and expressions of antipathy concerning Heathcliff; and
confessed to me her sorrow that she had endeavoured to raise a bad
spirit between him and Hareton: indeed, I don't believe she has
ever breathed a syllable, in the latter's hearing, against her
oppressor since.
When this slight disagreement was over, they were friends again,
and as busy as possible in their several occupations of pupil and
teacher. I came in to sit with them, after I had done my work; and
I felt so soothed and comforted to watch them, that I did not
notice how time got on. You know, they both appeared in a measure
my children: I had long been proud of one; and now, I was sure, the
other would be a source of equal satisfaction. His honest, warm,
and intelligent nature shook off rapidly the clouds of ignorance
and degradation in which it had been bred; and Catherine's sincere
commendations acted as a spur to his industry. His brightening mind
brightened his features, and added spirit and nobility to their
aspect: I could hardly fancy it the same individual I had beheld on
the day I discovered my little lady at Wuthering Heights, after her
expedition to the Crags. While I admired and they laboured, dusk
drew on, and with it returned the master. He came upon us quite
unexpectedly, entering by the front way, and had a full view of the
whole three, ere we could raise our heads to glance at him. Well, I
reflected, there was never a pleasanter, or more harmless sight;
and it will be a burning shame to scold them. The red fire-light
glowed on their two bonny heads, and revealed their faces animated
with the eager interest of children; for, though he was
twenty-three and she eighteen, each had so much of novelty to feel
and learn, that neither experienced nor evinced the sentiments of
sober disenchanted maturity.
They lifted their eyes together,
to encounter Mr. Heathcliff: perhaps you have never remarked that
their eyes are precisely similar, and they are those of Catherine
Earnshaw. The present Catherine has no other likeness to her,
except a breadth of forehead, and a certain arch of the nostril
that makes her appear rather haughty, whether she will or not. With
Hareton the resemblance is carried farther: it is singular at all
times, then it was particularly striking;
because his senses were alert, and his mental faculties wakened to
unwonted activity. I suppose this resemblance disarmed Mr.
Heathcliff: he walked to the hearth in evident agitation; but it
quickly subsided as he looked at the young man: or, I should say,
altered its character; for it was there yet. He took the book from
his hand, and glanced at the open page, then returned it without
any observation; merely signing Catherine away: her companion
lingered very little behind her, and I was about to depart also,
but he bid me sit still.
'It is a poor conclusion, is it not?' he observed, having brooded
awhile on the scene he had just witnessed: 'an absurd termination
to my violent exertions? I get levers and mattocks to demolish the
two houses, and train myself to be capable of working like
Hercules, and when everything is ready and in my power, I find the
will to lift a slate off either roof has vanished! My old enemies
have not beaten me; now would be the precise time to revenge myself
on their representatives: I could do it; and none could hinder me.
But where is the use? I don't care for striking: I can't take the
trouble to raise my hand! That sounds as if I had been labouring
the whole time only to exhibit a fine trait of magnanimity. It is
far from being the case: I have lost the faculty of enjoying their
de struction, and I am too idle to destroy for nothing.
'Nelly, there is a strange change
approaching; I'm in its shadow at present. I take so little
interest in my daily life that I hardly remember to eat and drink.
Those two who have left the room are the only objects which retain
a distinct material appearance to me; and that appearance causes me
pain, amounting to agony. About her I won't
speak; and I don't desire to think; but I earnestly wish she were
invisible: her presence invokes only maddening sensations.
He moves me differently: and yet if I could
do it without seeming insane, I'd never see him again! You'll
perhaps think me rather inclined to become so,' he added, making an
effort to smile, 'if I try to describe the thousand forms of past
associations and ideas he awakens or embodies. But you'll not talk
of what I tell you; and my mind is so eternally secluded in itself,
it is tempting at last to turn it out to another.
'Five minutes ago Hareton seemed a personification of my youth, not
a human being; I felt to him in such a variety of ways, that it
would have been impossible to have accosted him rationally. In the
first place, his startling likeness to Catherine connected him
fearfully with her. That, however, which you may suppose the most
potent to arrest my imagination, is actually the least: for what is
not connected with her to me? and what does not recall her? I
cannot look down to this floor, but her features are shaped in the
flags! In every cloud, in every tree—filling the air at night, and
caught by glimpses in every object by day—I am surrounded with her
image! The most ordinary faces of men and women—my own
features—mock me with a resemblance. The entire world is a dreadful
collection of memoranda that she did exist, and that I have lost
her! Well, Hareton's aspect was the ghost of my immortal love; of
my wild endeavours to hold my right; my degradation, my pride, my
happiness, and my anguish - 'But it is frenzy to repeat these
thoughts to you: only it will let you know why, with a reluctance
to be always alone, his society is no benefit; rather an
aggravation of the constant torment I suffer: and it partly
contributes to render me regardless how he and his cousin go on
together. I can give them no attention any more.'
'But what do you mean by a
change, Mr. Heathcliff?' I said, alarmed at
his manner: though he was neither in danger of losing his senses,
nor dying, according to my judgment: he was quite strong and
healthy; and, as to his reason, from childhood he had a delight in
dwelling on dark things, and entertaining odd fancies. He might
have had a monomania on the subject of his departed idol; but on
every other point his wits were as sound as mine.
'I shall not know that till it comes,' he said; 'I'm only half
conscious of it now.' 'You have no feeling of illness, have you?' I
asked. 'No, Nelly, I have not,' he answered. 'Then you are not
afraid of death?' I pursued.
'Afraid? No!' he replied. 'I have
neither a fear, nor a presentiment, nor a hope of death. Why should
I? With my hard constitution and temperate mode of living, and
unperilous occupations, I ought to, and probably shall, remain above ground till there is scarcely a
black hair on my head. And yet I cannot continue in this condition!
I have to remind myself to breathe—almost to remind my heart to
beat! And it is like bending back a stiff spring: it is by
compulsion that I do the slightest act not prompted by one thought;
and by compulsion that I notice anything alive or dead, which is
not associated with one universal idea. I have a single wish, and
my whole being and faculties are yearning to attain it. They have
yearned towards it so long, and so unwaveringly, that I'm convinced
it will be reached—and soon -because it has devoured my existence:
I am swallowed up in the anticipation of its fulfilment. My
confessions have not relieved me; but they may account for some
otherwise unaccountable phases of humour which I show. O God! It is
a long fight; I wish it were over!'
He began to pace the room, muttering terrible things to himself,
till I was inclined to believe, as he said Joseph did, that
conscience had turned his heart to an earthly hell. I wondered
greatly how it would end. Though he seldom before had revealed this
state of mind, even by looks, it was his habitual mood, I had no
doubt: he asserted it himself; but not a soul, from his general
bearing, would have conjectured the fact. You did not when you saw
him, Mr. Lockwood: and at the period of which I speak, he was just
the same as then; only fonder of continued solitude, and perhaps
still more laconic in company.