Wuthering Heights

minutes.
    »I wish
she
felt as I do,« he replied, »spiteful, cruel thing! Hareton never touches me, he never struck me in his life – And I was better to-day – and there –« his voice died in a whimper.
    »
I
didn't strike you!« muttered Cathy chewing her lip to prevent another burst of emotion.
    He sighed and moaned like one under great suffering; and kept it up for a quarter of an hour, on purpose to distress his cousin, apparently, for whenever he caught a stifled sob from her, he put renewed pain and pathos into the inflexions of his voice.
    »I'm sorry I hurt you, Linton!« she said at length, racked beyond endurance. »But
I
couldn't have been hurt by that little push; and I had no idea that you could, either – you're not much, are you, Linton? Don't let me go home, thinking I've done you harm! answer, speak to me.«
    »I can't speak to you,« he murmured, »you've hurt me so, that I shall lie awake all night, choking with this cough! If you had it you'd know what it was – but
you'll
be comfortably asleep, while I'm in agony – and nobody near me! I wonder how you would like to pass those fearful nights!« And he began to wail aloud for very pity of himself.
    »Since you are in the habit of passing dreadful nights,« I said, »it won't be Miss who spoils your ease; you'd be the same, had she never come – However, she shall not disturb you, again – and perhaps, you'll get quieter when we leave you.«
    »Must I go?« asked Catherine dolefully, bending over him. »Do you want me to go, Linton?«
    »You can't alter what you've done,« he replied pettishly, shrinking from her, »unless you alter it for the worse, by teasing me into a fever!«
    »Well, then I must go?« she repeated.
    »Let me alone, at least,« said he »I can't bear your talking!«
    She lingered, and resisted my persuasions to departure, a tiresome while, but as he neither looked up, nor spoke, she finally made a movement to the door, and I followed.
    We were recalled by a scream – Linton had slid from his seat on to the hearthstone, and lay writhing in the mere perverseness of an indulged plague of a child, determined to be as grievous and harassing as it can.
    I thoroughly guaged his disposition from his behaviour, and saw at once it would be folly to attempt humouring him. Not so my companion, she ran back in terror, knelt down, and cried, and soothed, and entreated, till he grew quiet from lack of breath, by no means from compunction at distressing her.
    »I shall lift him on to the settle,« I said, »and he may roll about as he pleases; we can't stop to watch him – I hope you are satisfied, Miss Cathy, that
you
are not the person to benefit him, and that his condition of health is not occasioned by attachment to you. Now then, there he is! Come away, as soon as he knows there is nobody by to care for his nonsense, he'll be glad to lie still!«
    She placed a cushion under his head, and offered him some water, he rejected the latter, and tossed uneasily on the former, as if it were a stone, or a block of wood.
    She tried to put it more comfortably.
    »I can't do with that,« he said, »it's not high enough!«
    Catherine brought another to lay above it.
    »That's
too
high!« murmured the provoking thing.
    »How must I arrange it, then?« she asked despairingly.
    He twined himself up to her, as she half knelt by the settle, and converted her shoulder into a support.
    »No, that won't do!« I said. »You'll be content with the cushion, Master Heathcliff! Miss has wasted too much time on you, already; we cannot remain five minutes longer.«
    »Yes, yes, we can!« replied Cathy. »He's good and patient, now – He's beginning to think I shall have far greater misery than he will, to-night, if I believe he is the worse for my visit; and then, I dare not come again – Tell the truth about it, Linton – for I mustn't come, if I have hurt you.«
    »You must come, to cure me,« he answered. »You ought to come because you have hurt me – You know you have, extremely! I was not as ill, when you entered, as I am at present – was I?«
    »But you've made yourself ill by crying, and being in a passion.«
    »I didn't do it all,« said his cousin. »However, we'll be friends now. And you want me – you would wish to see me sometimes, really?«
    »I told you, I did!« he replied impatiently. »Sit on the settle and let me lean on your knee – That's as mamma used to do, whole afternoons together – Sit quite still, and don't talk,