第18章

`Probably not,' I responded.`They are good children, no doubt, and don't deserve the treatment you receive, for your bad conduct.'

`Don't you cant, Nelly,' he said: `nonsense! We ran from the top of the Heights to the park, without stopping--Catherine completely beaten in the race, because she was barefoot.You'll have to seek for her shoes in the bog tomorrow.We crept through a broken hedge, groped our way up the path, and planted ourselves on a flower plot under the drawing-room window.The light came from thence; they had not put up the shutters, and the curtains were only half closed.Both of us were able to look in by standing on the basement, and clinging to the ledge, and we saw--ah! it was beautiful--a splendid place carpeted with crimson, and crimson-covered chairs and tables, and a pure white ceiling bordered by gold, a shower of glass drops hanging in silver chains from the centre, and shimmering with little soft tapers.Old Mr and Mrs Linton were not there; Edgar and his sister had it entirely to themselves.Shouldn't they have been happy?

We should have thought ourselves in heaven! And now, guess what your good children were doing? Isabella--I believe she is eleven, a year younger than Cathy--lay screaming at the farther end of the room, shrieking as if witches were running red-hot needles into her.Edgar stood on the hearth weeping silently, and in the middle of the table sat a little dog, shaking its paw and yelping; which, from their mutual accusations, we understood they had nearly pulled in two between them.The idiots! That was their pleasure! to quarrel who should hold a heap of warm hair, and each begin to cry because both, after struggling to get it, refused to take it.We laughed outright at the petted things; we did despise them! When would you catch me wishing to have what Catherine wanted? or find us by ourselves, seeking entertainment in yelling, and sobbing, and rolling on the ground, divided by the whole room? I'd not exchange, for a thousand lives, my condition here, for Edgar Linton's at Thrushcross Grange--not if I might have the privilege of flinging--Joseph off the highest gable, and painting the house-front with Hindley's blood!'

`Hush, hush!' I interrupted.`Still you have not told me, Heathcliff, how Catherine is left behind?'

`I told you we laughed,' he answered.`The Lintons heard us, and with one accord, they shot like arrows to the door; there was silence, and then a cry, "Oh, mamma, mamma! Oh, papa! Oh, mamma, come here.Oh, papa, oh!" They really did howl out something in that way.We made frightful noises to terrify them still more, and then we dropped off the ledge, because somebody was drawing the bars, and we felt we had better flee.I had Cathy by the hand, and was urging her on, when all at once she fell down."Run, Heathcliff, run!" she whispered."They have let the bulldog loose, and he holds me!" The devil had seized her ankle, Nelly: I heard his abominable snorting.She did not yell out--no! she would have scorned to do it, if she had been spitted on the horns of a mad cow.I did, though! I vociferated curses enough to annihilate any fiend in Christendom; and I got a store and thrust it between his jaws, and tried with all my might to cram it down his throat.A beast of a servant came up with a lantern, at last, shouting--"Keep fast, Skulker, keep fast!" He changed his note, however--when he saw Skulker's game.The dog was throttled off; his huge, purple tongue hanging half a foot out of his mouth, and his pendent lips streaming with bloody slaver.The man took Cathy up: she was sick: not from fear, I'm certain, but from pain.He carried her in; I followed, grumbling execrations and vengeance."What prey, Robert?" hallooed Linton from the entrance.