Wuthering Heights

»Zillah is constantly gadding off to Gimmerton since papa went. It's miserable! And I'm obliged to come down here – they resolved never to hear me up stairs.«
    »Is your father attentive to you, Master Heathcliff?« I asked, perceiving Catherine to be checked in her friendly advances.
    »Attentive? He makes
them
a little more attentive, at least,« he cried. »The wretches! Do you know, Miss Linton, that brute Hareton laughs at me – I hate him – indeed, I hate them all – they are odious beings.«
    Cathy began searching for some water; she lighted on a pitcher in the dresser; filled a tumbler, and brought it. He bid her add a spoonful of wine from a bottle on the table; and having swallowed a small portion, appeared more tranquil, and said she was very kind.
    »And are you glad to see me?« asked she, reiterating her former question, and pleased to detect the faint dawn of a smile.
    »Yes, I am – It's something new to hear a voice like yours!« he replied, »But I
have
been vexed, because you wouldn't come – And papa swore it was owing to me; he called me a pitiful, shuffling, worthless thing; and said you despised me; and if he had been in my place, he would be more the master of the Grange than your father, by this time. But you don't despise me, do you Miss –«
    »I wish you would say Catherine, or Cathy!« interrupted my young lady. »Despise you? No! Next to papa, and Ellen, I love you better than anybody living. I don't love Mr. Heathcliff, though; and I dare not come when he returns; will he stay away many days?«
    »Not many:« answered Linton, »but he goes onto the moors frequently, since the shooting season commenced, and you might spend an hour or two with me, in his absence – Do! say you will! I think I should not be peevish with you; you'd not provoke me, and you'd always be ready to help me, wouldn't you?«
    »Yes,« said Catherine, stroking his long soft hair, »if I could only get papa's consent, I'd spend half my time with you – Pretty Linton! I wish you were my brother!«
    »And then you would like me as well as your father?« observed he more cheerfully. »But papa says you would love me better than him, and all the world, if you were my wife – so I'd rather you were that!«
    »No! I should never love anybody better than papa,« she returned gravely. »And people hate their wives, sometimes; but not their sisters and brothers, and if you were the latter, you would live with us, and papa would be as fond of you, as he is of me.«
    Linton denied that people ever hated their wives; but Cathy affirmed they did, and in her wisdom, instanced his own father's aversion to her aunt.
    I endeavoured to stop her thoughtless tongue – I couldn't succeed, till everything she knew was out. Master Heathcliff, much irritated, asserted her relation was false.
    »Papa told me; and papa does not tell falsehoods!« she answered pertly.
    »
My
papa scorns yours!« cried Linton. »He calls him a sneaking fool!«
    »Yours is a wicked man,« retorted Catherine, »and you are very naughty to dare to repeat what he says – He must be wicked, to have made Aunt Isabella leave him as she did!«
    »She didn't leave him,« said the boy, »you shan't contradict me!«
    »She did!« cried my young lady.
    »Well, I'll tell
you
something!« said Linton. »Your mother hated your father, now then.«
    »Oh!« exclaimed Catherine, too enraged to continue.
    »And she loved mine!« added he.
    »You little liar! I hate you now,« she panted, and her face grew red with passion.
    »She did! she did!« sang Linton sinking into the recess of his chair, and leaning back his head to enjoy the agitation of the other disputant who stood behind.
    »Hush, Master Heathcliff!« I said, »that's your father's tale too, I suppose.«
    »It isn't – you hold your tongue!« he answered, »she did, she did, Catherine, she did, she did!«
    Cathy, beside herself, gave the chair a violent push, and caused him to fall against one arm. He was immediately seized by a suffocating cough that soon ended his triumph.
    It lasted so long, that it frightened even me. As to his cousin, she wept with all her might, aghast at the mischief she had done, though she said nothing.
    I held him, till the fit exhausted itself. Then he thrust me away; and leant his head down, silently – Catherine quelled her lamentations also, took a seat opposite, and looked solemnly into the fire.
    »How do you feel now, Master Heathcliff,« I inquired after waiting ten