Chapter 29 Chapter Twenty-Five

"These things happened last winter, sir," said Mrs. Dean, "not more than a year ago. Last winter I had no idea that twelve months later I would be telling the family about these things." A stranger amuses me! But who knows how long you'll be a visitor? You're too young to stay contented, all alone; Can't help loving her. You laugh. But why do you look so gay and interested when I talk about her? Why do you want me to hang her picture over your mantelpiece? Why—?" "Shut up, my good friend!" I cried. "As far as I'm in love with her, it might be possible; but will she love me? I'm too skeptical of that to risk my peace, and my home isn't in Here. I come from that bustling world, and I have to return to its embrace.

Let's go on.Does Catherine obey her father's orders? " "She obeyed," continued the butler. "Her love for him still dominated her feelings; and he spoke without fire: he spoke with the deep tenderness of a man whom he cherishes when he is about to fall into peril and into the hands of enemies." She spoke, and that was the only help to guide her, so long as she remembered his words. A few days later, he said to me: I wish my nephew would write or call, Ellen. Yes I'll be honest, what do you think of him: Is he getting better, or is there any hope of getting better when he grows up?"

"He is very delicate, sir," I answered, "and does not seem to be grown up: but one thing I may say, he is not like his father; and if Miss Catherine were unfortunate enough to marry him, he would not disobey her. of: unless she pampers him in the utmost folly. But, master, you'll have plenty of time to get acquainted with him, and see if he's worthy of her: more than four years before he comes of age?" Edgar sighed; going to the window, looking out at Gimmerton Abbey.It was a foggy afternoon, but the February sun was still shining faintly, and we could still make out the two fir trees in the cemetery, and the scattered tombstones.

"I used to pray," he said, half to himself, "that whatever would come would come; The bridegroom's scene would have been sweeter if I hadn't been expected to be in months, or possibly weeks, when I was uplifted into that desolate pit! Ellen, me and my little Katie We were so happy together, how many winter nights and summer days we passed together, she was a living hope beside me. But I was just as happy, among those tombstones, under that old church, I Meditating to myself: Lying on her mother's green mound on those long June nights, wishing - longing for me to lie there too. What can I do for Katie? What must I To be able to do her duty? I don't care a bit that Linton is Heathcliff's son; nor that he should take her from me, so long as he can comfort her for her loss. I don't care Heathcliff has attained his purpose, and rejoices in depriving me of the last of my happiness! But if Linton is no good--only a weak instrument of his father--I cannot leave her in his hands Although it is cruel to extinguish her enthusiasm, I will not give in. Let her be sad when I am alive, and let her be lonely after I die. My dear, I would rather give her to you before I die. God, bury her in the earth."

"As it is now, leave her to God, sir," I answered, "and if Providence we have to lose you—God forbid—I'll be her friend and counselor all my life. Miss Catherine is a good girl: I am not afraid that she will do wrong on purpose: there is always reward in the end for those who do their duty." Spring was near; but my master did not recover, though he resumed his walks in the fields with his daughter again.To her inexperienced eyes the ability to go out for a walk was a sign of recovery; and his cheeks were often flushed and his eyes bright; she was quite convinced that he was recovered.

On her seventeenth birthday, he didn't go to the cemetery, and it was raining, so I said: "You must not go out to-night, sir?" He replied: "I won't go out, I will postpone it this year." He wrote to Linton again, expressing his desire to see him; and if the sick man could be seen, I have no doubt that his father would allow him to come.But being unable to come under the circumstances, he complied with a letter, implying that Mr. Heathcliff would not allow him to come to the Grange; Sometimes met him on walks, in order to beg him face to face not to cut off his cousin for so long.

This part of his letter is written very simply, probably in his own words.Heathcliff knew that he could beg for Catherine's company with eloquence. "I don't ask her to come here," said he, "but shall I never see her, just because my father won't let me go to her house and you won't let her come to mine? Please take her to ride up to the hills once in a while." Come on; let us say a few words in your presence! We have done nothing to deserve this isolation; and you are not angry with me: you have no reason not to like me, and you admit it yourself. Dear Uncle! Write me a kind letter to-morrow, and ask me to meet you wherever you please, except at Thrushcross Grange. I trust a meeting will convince you that my father's character is not mine: he certainly Said I was more your nephew than his son; though I had some faults which made me unworthy of Catherine, yet she forgave me, and you must for her sake. You asked about my health. —that's better. But how can I be happy and healthy when I'm always cut off from all hope, doomed to solitude, or to the company of people who never and never will like me?"

Edgar, though sympathetic to the boy, could not grant his request; for he could not accompany Catherine.He said that they might see each other in the summer; at the same time, he hoped that he would be free to write, and try to give him advice and comfort in letters; for he was well aware of his difficult position in the family.Linton complied; and if he had been free, he would probably have filled his letters with complaints and lamentations, and would have spoiled everything in consequence: but his father watched him closely; and of course my master sent letters every A line was obliged to be shown to him; so instead of writing about his characteristic personal pain and sorrow, which was the first subject that occurred to his mind, he expressed only the difficulty of separating him from his friends and lovers. and he hinted slowly to Mr. Linton that the interview must have been permitted earlier, lest he fear that Mr. Linton was deliberately prevaricating him with empty words.

Kitty was a strong ally in the house; and their echoes within and without won at last my master's heart, under my protection, on the moors near the Grange, to consent to their riding or walking together once a week or so: for in In June he found that he was still weakening.Although he set aside a portion of his income each year as my lady's property, he naturally hoped that she would keep her ancestral house--or at least return to it for a short time; He did not expect that this heir would decline nearly as rapidly as himself; nor did any one, I believe: no doctor ever went to the Heights, nor did any one see Master Heathcliff come among us. report on his condition.For my part, I began to suspect that I had been wrong in my predictions, and that he must have really recovered when he mentioned riding and walking in the moors, and seemed so earnest to achieve his purpose.I could not imagine a father treating his dying son with such tyranny and viciousness as I later learned of Heathcliff, who was threatened with death at the very thought of his greedy and ruthless plans. Failed, his efforts were all the more urgent.