‘Where must I sleep, then?’ I sobbed—I was beyond regarding self-respect, weighed down by fatigue and wretchedness.
‘Joseph will show you Heathcliff’s chamber,’ said he; ‘open that door—he’s in there.’
I was going to obey, but he suddenly arrested me, and added in the strangest tone—
‘Be so good as to turn your lock, and draw your bolt—don’t omit it!’
‘Well!’ I said. ‘But why, Mr Earnshaw?’ I did not relish the notion of deliberately fastening myself in with Heathcliff.
‘Look here!’ he replied, pulling from his waistcoat a curiously constructed pistol, having a double-edged spring knife attached to the barrel. ‘That’s a great tempter to a desperate man, is it not? I cannot resist going up with this, every night, and trying his door. If once I find it open, he’s done for! I do it invariably, even though the minute before I have been recalling a hundred reasons that should make me refrain—it is some devil that urges me to thwart my own schemes by killing him—you fight against that devil, for love, as long as you may; when the time comes, not all the angels in heaven shall save him!’
I surveyed the weapon inquisitively; a hideous notion struck me. How powerful I should be possessing such an instrument! I took it from his hand, and touched the blade. He looked astonished at the expression my face assumed during a brief second. It was not horror, it was covetousness. He snatched the pistol back, jealously; shut the knife, and returned it to its concealment.
‘I don’t care if you tell him,’ said he. ‘Put him on his guard, and watch for him. You know the terms we are on, I see; his danger does not shock you.’
‘What has Heathcliff done to you?’ I asked. ‘In what has he wronged you to warrant this appalling hatred? Wouldn’t it be wiser to bid him quit the house?’
‘No,’ thundered Earnshaw, ‘should he offer to leave me, he’s a dead man, persuade him to attempt it, and you are a murderess! Am I to loseall, without a chance of retrieval? Is Hareton to be a beggar? Oh, damnation! Iwillhave it back; and I’ll havehisgold too; and then his blood; and hell shall have his soul! It will be ten times blacker with that guest than ever it was before!’
You’ve acquainted me, Ellen, with your old master’s habits. He is clearly on the verge of madness—he was so, last night, at least. I shuddered to be near him, and thought on the servant’s ill-bred moroseness as comparatively agreeable.
He now recommenced his moody walk, and I raised the latch, and escaped into the kitchen.
Joseph was bending over the fire, peering into a large pan that swung above it; and a wooden bowl of oatmeal stood on the settle close by. The contents of the pan began to boil, and he turned to plunge his hand into the bowl; I conjectured that this preparation was probably for our supper, and being hungry, I resolved it should be eatable—so crying out sharply, ‘I’llmake the porridge!’—I removed the vessel out of his reach, and proceeded to take off my hat and riding habit. ‘Mr Earnshaw,’ I continued, ‘directs me to wait on myself—I will—I’m not going to act the lady among you, for fear I should starve.’
‘Gooid Lord!’ he muttered, sitting down, and stroking his ribbed stockings from the knee to the ankle. ‘If they’s tuh be fresh ortherings—just when Aw getten used tuh two maisters, if Aw mun hev amistressset o’er my heead, it’s like time tuh be flitting. Aw niverdidthink tuh say t’ day ut Aw mud lave th’ owld place—but Aw daht it’s nigh at hend!’
This lamentation drew no notice from me; I went briskly to work; sighing to remember a period when it would havebeen all merry fun; but compelled speedily to drive off the remembrance. It racked me to recall past happiness, and the greater peril there was of conjuring up its apparition, the quicker the thible ran round, and the faster the handfuls of meal fell into the water.
Joseph beheld my style of cookery with growing indignation.
‘Thear!’ he ejaculated. ‘Hareton, thah willn’t sup thy porridge tuh neeght; they’ll be nowt bud lumps as big as maw nave. Thear, agean! Aw’d fling in bowl un all, if Aw wer yah! Thear, pale t’ guilp off, un’ then yah’ll hae done wi’t. Bang, bang. It’s a marcy t’bothom isn’t deaved aht!’
It was rather a rough mess, I own, when poured into the basins; four had been provided, and a gallon pitcher of new milk was brought from the dairy, which Hareton seized and commenced drinking and spilling from the expansive lip.
I expostulated, and desired that he should have his in a mug; affirming that I could not taste the liquid treated so dirtily. The old cynic chose to be vastly offended at this nicety; assuring me, repeatedly, that ‘the barn was every bit as gooid’ as I, ‘and every bit as wollsome,’ and wondering how I could fashion to be so conceited; meanwhile, the infant ruffian continued sucking; and glowered up at me defyingly, as he slavered into the jug.
‘I shall have my supper in another room,’ I said. ‘Have you no place you call a parlour?’
‘Parlour!’he echoed, sneeringly, ‘parlour!Nay, we’ve noaparlours.If yah dunnut loike wer company, they’s maister’s; un’ if yah dunnut loike maister, they’s us.’
‘Then I shall go upstairs,’ I answered; ‘shew me a chamber!’
I put my basin on a tray, and went myself to fetch some more milk.
With great grumblings, the fellow rose, and preceded me in my ascent: we mounted to the garrets; he opening a door, now and then, to look into the apartments we passed.
‘Here’s a rahm,’ he said, at last, flinging back a cranky board on hinges. ‘It’s weel eneugh tuh ate a few porridge in.They’s a pack uh corn i’ t’ corner, thear, meeterly clane; if yah’re feared uh muckying yer grand silk cloes, spread yer hankerchir ut t’ top on’t.’
The ‘rahm’ was a kind of lumber-hole smelling strong of malt and grain; various sacks of which articles were piled around, leaving a wide, bare space in the middle.
‘Why, man!’ I exclaimed, facing him angrily, ‘this is not a place to sleep in. I wish to see my bed-room.’
‘Bed-rume!’he repeated, in a tone of mockery. ‘Yah’s see all t’bed-rumesthear is—yon’s mine.’
He pointed into the second garret, only differing from the first in being more naked about the walls, and having a large, low, curtainless bed, with an indigo-coloured quilt, at one end.
‘What do I want with yours?’ I retorted. ‘I suppose Mr Heathcliff does not lodge at the top of the house, does he?’
