FOR some days after that evening Mr. Heathcliff shunned meeting usat meals; yet he would not consent formally to exclude Hareton andCathy. He had an aversion to yielding so completely to hisfeelings, choosing rather to absent himself; and eating once intwenty-four hours seemed sufficient sustenance for him.

One night, after the family were in bed, I heard him go downstairs,and out at the front door. I did not hear him re-enter, and in themorning I found he was still away. We were in April then: theweather was sweet and warm, the grass as green as showers and suncould make it, and the two dwarf apple-trees near the southern wallin full bloom. After breakfast, Catherine insisted on my bringinga chair and sitting with my work under the fir-trees at the end ofthe house; and she beguiled Hareton, who had perfectly recoveredfrom his accident, to dig and arrange her little garden, which wasshifted to that corner by the influence of Joseph's complaints. Iwas comfortably revelling in the spring fragrance around, and thebeautiful soft blue overhead, when my young lady, who had run downnear the gate to procure some primrose roots for a border, returnedonly half laden, and informed us that Mr. Heathcliff was coming in.'And he spoke to me,' she added, with a perplexed countenance.

'What did he say?' asked Hareton.

'He told me to begone as fast as I could,' she answered. 'But helooked so different from his usual look that I stopped a moment tostare at him.'

'How?' he inquired.

'Why, almost bright and cheerful. No, ALMOST nothing - VERY MUCHexcited, and wild, and glad!' she replied.

'Night-walking amuses him, then,' I remarked, affecting a carelessmanner: in reality as surprised as she was, and anxious toascertain the truth of her statement; for to see the master lookingglad would not be an every-day spectacle. I framed an excuse to goin. Heathcliff stood at the open door; he was pale, and hetrembled: yet, certainly, he had a strange joyful glitter in hiseyes, that altered the aspect of his whole face.

'Will you have some breakfast?' I said. 'You must be hungry,rambling about all night!' I wanted to discover where he had been,but I did not like to ask directly.

'No, I'm not hungry,' he answered, averting his head, and speakingrather contemptuously, as if he guessed I was trying to divine theoccasion of his good humour.

I felt perplexed: I didn't know whether it were not a properopportunity to offer a bit of admonition.

'I don't think it right to wander out of doors,' I observed,'instead of being in bed: it is not wise, at any rate this moistseason. I daresay you'll catch a bad cold or a fever: you havesomething the matter with you now!'

'Nothing but what I can bear,' he replied; 'and with the greatestpleasure, provided you'll leave me alone: get in, and don't annoyme.'

I obeyed: and, in passing, I noticed he breathed as fast as a cat.

'Yes!' I reflected to myself, 'we shall have a fit of illness. Icannot conceive what he has been doing.'

That noon he sat down to dinner with us, and received a heaped-upplate from my hands, as if he intended to make amends for previousfasting.

'I've neither cold nor fever, Nelly,' he remarked, in allusion tomy morning's speech; 'and I'm ready to do justice to the food yougive me.'

He took his knife and fork, and was going to commence eating, whenthe inclination appeared to become suddenly extinct. He laid themon the table, looked eagerly towards the window, then rose and wentout. We saw him walking to and fro in the garden while weconcluded our meal, and Earnshaw said he'd go and ask why he wouldnot dine: he thought we had grieved him some way.

'Well, is he coming?' cried Catherine, when her cousin returned.

'Nay,' he answered; 'but he's not angry: he seemed rarely pleasedindeed; only I made him impatient by speaking to him twice; andthen he bid me be off to you: he wondered how I could want thecompany of anybody else.'

I set his plate to keep warm on the fender; and after an hour ortwo he re-entered, when the room was clear, in no degree calmer:the same unnatural - it was unnatural - appearance of joy under hisblack brows; the same bloodless hue, and his teeth visible, now andthen, in a kind of smile; his frame shivering, not as one shiverswith chill or weakness, but as a tight-stretched cord vibrates - astrong thrilling, rather than trembling.

I will ask what is the matter, I thought; or who should? And Iexclaimed - 'Have you heard any good news, Mr. Heathcliff? Youlook uncommonly animated.'

'Where should good news come from to me?' he said. 'I'm animatedwith hunger; and, seemingly, I must not eat.'

'Your dinner is here,' I returned; 'why won't you get it?'

'I don't want it now,' he muttered, hastily: 'I'll wait tillsupper. And, Nelly, once for all, let me beg you to warn Haretonand the other away from me. I wish to be troubled by nobody: Iwish to have this place to myself.'

'Is there some new reason for this banishment?' I inquired. 'Tellme why you are so queer, Mr. Heathcliff? Where were you lastnight? I'm not putting the question through idle curiosity, but -'

'You are putting the question through very idle curiosity,' heinterrupted, with a laugh. 'Yet I'll answer it. Last night I wason the threshold of hell. To-day, I am within sight of my heaven.I have my eyes on it: hardly three feet to sever me! And nowyou'd better go! You'll neither see nor hear anything to frightenyou, if you refrain from prying.'

Having swept the hearth and wiped the table, I departed; moreperplexed than ever.

He did not quit the house again that afternoon, and no one intrudedon his solitude; till, at eight o'clock, I deemed it proper, thoughunsummoned, to carry a candle and his supper to him. He wasleaning against the ledge of an open lattice, but not looking out:his face was turned to the interior gloom. The fire had smoulderedto ashes; the room was filled with the damp, mild air of the cloudyevening; and so still, that not only the murmur of the beck downGimmerton was distinguishable, but its ripples and its gurglingover the pebbles, or through the large stones which it could notcover. I uttered an ejaculation of discontent at seeing the dismalgrate, and commenced shutting the casements, one after another,till I came to his.

'Must I close this?' I asked, in order to rouse him; for he wouldnot stir.

The light flashed on his features as I spoke. Oh, Mr. Lockwood, Icannot express what a terrible start I got by the momentary view!Those deep black eyes! That smile, and ghastly paleness! Itappeared to me, not Mr. Heathcliff, but a goblin; and, in myterror, I let the candle bend towards the wall, and it left me indarkness.

'Yes, close it,' he replied, in his familiar voice. 'There, thatis pure awkwardness! Why did you hold the candle horizontally? Bequick, and bring another.'

I hurried out in a foolish state of dread, and said to Joseph -'The master wishes you to take him a light and rekindle the fire.'For I dared not go in myself again just then.

Joseph rattled some fire into the shovel, and went: but he broughtit back immediately, with the supper-tray in his other hand,explaining that Mr. Heathcliff was going to bed, and he wantednothing to eat till morning. We heard him mount the stairsdirectly; he did not proceed to his ordinary chamber, but turnedinto that with the panelled bed: its window, as I mentionedbefore, is wide enough for anybody to get through; and it struck methat he plotted another midnight excursion, of which he had ratherwe had no suspicion.

'Is he a ghoul or a vampire?' I mused. I had read of such hideousincarnate demons. And then I set myself to reflect how I hadtended him in infancy, and watched him grow to youth, and followedhim almost through his whole course; and what absurd nonsense itwas to yield to that sense of horror. 'But where did he come from,the little dark thing, harboured by a good man to his bane?'muttered Superstition, as I dozed into unconsciousness. And Ibegan, half dreaming, to weary myself with imagining some fitparentage for him; and, repeating my waking meditations, I trackedhis existence over again, with grim variations; at last, picturinghis death and funeral: of which, all I can remember is, beingexceedingly vexed at having the task of dictating an inscriptionfor his monument, and consulting the sexton about it; and, as hehad no surname, and we could not tell his age, we were obliged tocontent ourselves with the single word, 'Heathcliff.' That cametrue: we were. If you enter the kirkyard, you'll read, on hisheadstone, only that, and the date of his death.

Dawn restored me to common sense. I rose, and went into thegarden, as soon as I could see, to ascertain if there were anyfootmarks under his window. There were none. 'He has stayed athome,' I thought, 'and he'll be all right to-day.' I preparedbreakfast for the household, as was my usual custom, but toldHareton and Catherine to get theirs ere the master came down, forhe lay late. They preferred taking it out of doors, under thetrees, and I set a little table to accommodate them.

On my re-entrance, I found Mr. Heathcliff below. He and Josephwere conversing about some farming business; he gave clear, minutedirections concerning the matter discussed, but he spoke rapidly,and turned his head continually aside, and had the same excitedexpression, even more exaggerated. When Joseph quitted the room hetook his seat in the place he generally chose, and I put a basin ofcoffee before him. He drew it nearer, and then rested his arms onthe table, and looked at the opposite wall, as I supposed,surveying one particular portion, up and down, with glittering,restless eyes, and with such eager interest that he stoppedbreathing during half a minute together.

'Come now,' I exclaimed, pushing some bread against his hand, 'eatand drink that, while it is hot: it has been waiting near anhour.'

He didn't notice me, and yet he smiled. I'd rather have seen himgnash his teeth than smile so.

'Mr. Heathcliff! master!' I cried, 'don't, for God's sake, stare asif you saw an unearthly vision.'

'Don't, for God's sake, shout so loud,' he replied. 'Turn round,and tell me, are we by ourselves?'

'Of course,' was my answer; 'of course we are.'

Still, I involuntarily obeyed him, as if I was not quite sure.With a sweep of his hand he cleared a vacant space in front amongthe breakfast things, and leant forward to gaze more at his ease.

Now, I perceived he was not looking at the wall; for when Iregarded him alone, it seemed exactly that he gazed at somethingwithin two yards' distance. And whatever it was, it communicated,apparently, both pleasure and pain in exquisite extremes: at leastthe anguished, yet raptured, expression of his countenancesuggested that idea. The fancied object was not fixed, either:his eyes pursued it with unwearied diligence, and, even in speakingto me, were never weaned away. I vainly reminded him of hisprotracted abstinence from food: if he stirred to touch anythingin compliance with my entreaties, if he stretched his hand out toget a piece of bread, his fingers clenched before they reached it,and remained on the table, forgetful of their aim.

I sat, a model of patience, trying to attract his absorbedattention from its engrossing speculation; till he grew irritable,and got up, asking why I would not allow him to have his own timein taking his meals? and saying that on the next occasion I needn'twait: I might set the things down and go. Having uttered thesewords he left the house, slowly sauntered down the garden path, anddisappeared through the gate.

The hours crept anxiously by: another evening came. I did notretire to rest till late, and when I did, I could not sleep. Hereturned after midnight, and, instead of going to bed, shut himselfinto the room beneath. I listened, and tossed about, and, finally,dressed and descended. It was too irksome to lie there, harassingmy brain with a hundred idle misgivings.

I distinguished Mr. Heathcliff's step, restlessly measuring thefloor, and he frequently broke the silence by a deep inspiration,resembling a groan. He muttered detached words also; the only oneI could catch was the name of Catherine, coupled with some wildterm of endearment or suffering; and spoken as one would speak to aperson present; low and earnest, and wrung from the depth of hissoul. I had not courage to walk straight into the apartment; but Idesired to divert him from his reverie, and therefore fell foul ofthe kitchen fire, stirred it, and began to scrape the cinders. Itdrew him forth sooner than I expected. He opened the doorimmediately, and said - 'Nelly, come here - is it morning? Come inwith your light.'

'It is striking four,' I answered. 'You want a candle to take up-stairs: you might have lit one at this fire.'

'No, I don't wish to go up-stairs,' he said. 'Come in, and kindleME a fire, and do anything there is to do about the room.'

'I must blow the coals red first, before I can carry any,' Ireplied, getting a chair and the bellows

He roamed to and fro, meantime, in a state approaching distraction;his heavy sighs succeeding each other so thick as to leave no spacefor common breathing between.

'When day breaks I'll send for Green,' he said; 'I wish to makesome legal inquiries of him while I can bestow a thought on thosematters, and while I can act calmly. I have not written my willyet; and how to leave my property I cannot determine. I wish Icould annihilate it from the face of the earth.'

'I would not talk so, Mr. Heathcliff,' I interposed. 'Let yourwill be a while: you'll be spared to repent of your manyinjustices yet! I never expected that your nerves would bedisordered: they are, at present, marvellously so, however; andalmost entirely through your own fault. The way you've passedthese three last days might knock up a Titan. Do take some food,and some repose. You need only look at yourself in a glass to seehow you require both. Your cheeks are hollow, and your eyes blood-shot, like a person starving with hunger and going blind with lossof sleep.'

'It is not my fault that I cannot eat or rest,' he replied. 'Iassure you it is through no settled designs. I'll do both, as soonas I possibly can. But you might as well bid a man struggling inthe water rest within arms' length of the shore! I must reach itfirst, and then I'll rest. Well, never mind Mr. Green: as torepenting of my injustices, I've done no injustice, and I repent ofnothing. I'm too happy; and yet I'm not happy enough. My soul'sbliss kills my body, but does not satisfy itself.'

'Happy, master?' I cried. 'Strange happiness! If you would hearme without being angry, I might offer some advice that would makeyou happier.'

'What is that?' he asked. 'Give it.'

'You are aware, Mr. Heathcliff,' I said, 'that from the time youwere thirteen years old you have lived a selfish, unchristian life;and probably hardly had a Bible in your hands during all thatperiod. You must have forgotten the contents of the book, and youmay not have space to search it now. Could it be hurtful to sendfor some one - some minister of any denomination, it does notmatter which - to explain it, and show you how very far you haveerred from its precepts; and how unfit you will be for its heaven,unless a change takes place before you die?'

'I'm rather obliged than angry, Nelly,' he said, 'for you remind meof the manner in which I desire to be buried. It is to be carriedto the churchyard in the evening. You and Hareton may, if youplease, accompany me: and mind, particularly, to notice that thesexton obeys my directions concerning the two coffins! No ministerneed come; nor need anything be said over me. - I tell you I havenearly attained MY heaven; and that of others is altogetherunvalued and uncovered by me.'

'And supposing you persevered in your obstinate fast, and died bythat means, and they refused to bury you in the precincts of thekirk?' I said, shocked at his godless indifference. 'How would youlike it?'

'They won't do that,' he replied: 'if they did, you must have meremoved secretly; and if you neglect it you shall prove,practically, that the dead are not annihilated!'

As soon as he heard the other members of the family stirring heretired to his den, and I breathed freer. But in the afternoon,while Joseph and Hareton were at their work, he came into thekitchen again, and, with a wild look, bid me come and sit in thehouse: he wanted somebody with him. I declined; telling himplainly that his strange talk and manner frightened me, and I hadneither the nerve nor the will to be his companion alone.

'I believe you think me a fiend,' he said, with his dismal laugh:'something too horrible to live under a decent roof.' Then turningto Catherine, who was there, and who drew behind me at hisapproach, he added, half sneeringly, - 'Will YOU come, chuck? I'llnot hurt you. No! to you I've made myself worse than the devil.Well, there is ONE who won't shrink from my company! By God! she'srelentless. Oh, damn it! It's unutterably too much for flesh andblood to bear - even mine.'

He solicited the society of no one more. At dusk he went into hischamber. Through the whole night, and far into the morning, weheard him groaning and murmuring to himself. Hareton was anxiousto enter; but I bid him fetch Mr. Kenneth, and he should go in andsee him. When he came, and I requested admittance and tried toopen the door, I found it locked; and Heathcliff bid us be damned.He was better, and would be left alone; so the doctor went away.

The following evening was very wet: indeed, it poured down tillday-dawn; and, as I took my morning walk round the house, Iobserved the master's window swinging open, and the rain drivingstraight in. He cannot be in bed, I thought: those showers woulddrench him through. He must either be up or out. But I'll make nomore ado, I'll go boldly and look.'

Having succeeded in obtaining entrance with another key, I ran tounclose the panels, for the chamber was vacant; quickly pushingthem aside, I peeped in. Mr. Heathcliff was there - laid on hisback. His eyes met mine so keen and fierce, I started; and then heseemed to smile. I could not think him dead: but his face andthroat were washed with rain; the bed-clothes dripped, and he wasperfectly still. The lattice, flapping to and fro, had grazed onehand that rested on the sill; no blood trickled from the brokenskin, and when I put my fingers to it, I could doubt no more: hewas dead and stark!

I hasped the window; I combed his black long hair from hisforehead; I tried to close his eyes: to extinguish, if possible,that frightful, life-like gaze of exultation before any one elsebeheld it. They would not shut: they seemed to sneer at myattempts; and his parted lips and sharp white teeth sneered too!Taken with another fit of cowardice, I cried out for Joseph.Joseph shuffled up and made a noise, but resolutely refused tomeddle with him.

'Th' divil's harried off his soul,' he cried, 'and he may hev' hiscarcass into t' bargin, for aught I care! Ech! what a wicked 'unhe looks, girning at death!' and the old sinner grinned in mockery.I thought he intended to cut a caper round the bed; but suddenlycomposing himself, he fell on his knees, and raised his hands, andreturned thanks that the lawful master and the ancient stock wererestored to their rights.

I felt stunned by the awful event; and my memory unavoidablyrecurred to former times with a sort of oppressive sadness. Butpoor Hareton, the most wronged, was the only one who reallysuffered much. He sat by the corpse all night, weeping in bitterearnest. He pressed its hand, and kissed the sarcastic, savageface that every one else shrank from contemplating; and bemoanedhim with that strong grief which springs naturally from a generousheart, though it be tough as tempered steel.

Mr. Kenneth was perplexed to pronounce of what disorder the masterdied. I concealed the fact of his having swallowed nothing forfour days, fearing it might lead to trouble, and then, I ampersuaded, he did not abstain on purpose: it was the consequenceof his strange illness, not the cause.

We buried him, to the scandal of the whole neighbourhood, as hewished. Earnshaw and I, the sexton, and six men to carry thecoffin, comprehended the whole attendance. The six men departedwhen they had let it down into the grave: we stayed to see itcovered. Hareton, with a streaming face, dug green sods, and laidthem over the brown mould himself: at present it is as smooth andverdant as its companion mounds - and I hope its tenant sleeps assoundly. But the country folks, if you ask them, would swear onthe Bible that he WALKS: there are those who speak to having methim near the church, and on the moor, and even within this house.Idle tales, you'll say, and so say I. Yet that old man by thekitchen fire affirms he has seen two on 'em looking out of hischamber window on every rainy night since his death:- and an oddthing happened to me about a month ago. I was going to the Grangeone evening - a dark evening, threatening thunder - and, just atthe turn of the Heights, I encountered a little boy with a sheepand two lambs before him; he was crying terribly; and I supposedthe lambs were skittish, and would not be guided.

'What is the matter, my little man?' I asked.

'There's Heathcliff and a woman yonder, under t' nab,' heblubbered, 'un' I darnut pass 'em.'

I saw nothing; but neither the sheep nor he would go on so I bidhim take the road lower down. He probably raised the phantoms fromthinking, as he traversed the moors alone, on the nonsense he hadheard his parents and companions repeat. Yet, still, I don't likebeing out in the dark now; and I don't like being left by myself inthis grim house: I cannot help it; I shall be glad when they leaveit, and shift to the Grange.

'They are going to the Grange, then?' I said.

'Yes,' answered Mrs. Dean, 'as soon as they are married, and thatwill be on New Year's Day.'

'And who will live here then?'

'Why, Joseph will take care of the house, and, perhaps, a lad tokeep him company. They will live in the kitchen, and the rest willbe shut up.'

'For the use of such ghosts as choose to inhabit it?' I observed.

'No, Mr. Lockwood,' said Nelly, shaking her head. 'I believe thedead are at peace: but it is not right to speak of them withlevity.'

At that moment the garden gate swung to; the ramblers werereturning.

'THEY are afraid of nothing,' I grumbled, watching their approachthrough the window. 'Together, they would brave Satan and all hislegions.'

As they stepped on to the door-stones, and halted to take a lastlook at the moon - or, more correctly, at each other by her light -I felt irresistibly impelled to escape them again; and, pressing aremembrance into the hand of Mrs. Dean, and disregarding herexpostulations at my rudeness, I vanished through the kitchen asthey opened the house-door; and so should have confirmed Joseph inhis opinion of his fellow-servant's gay indiscretions, had he notfortunately recognised me for a respectable character by the sweetring of a sovereign at his feet.

My walk home was lengthened by a diversion in the direction of thekirk. When beneath its walls, I perceived decay had made progress,even in seven months: many a window showed black gaps deprived ofglass; and slates jutted off here and there, beyond the right lineof the roof, to be gradually worked off in coming autumn storms.

I sought, and soon discovered, the three headstones on the slopenext the moor: on middle one grey, and half buried in the heath;Edgar Linton's only harmonized by the turf and moss creeping up itsfoot; Heathcliff's still bare.

I lingered round them, under that benign sky: watched the mothsfluttering among the heath and harebells, listened to the soft windbreathing through the grass, and wondered how any one could everimagine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth.

End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Wuthering Heights by Emily Bronte