Part 19 (1/2)
The whole tree and terrible har cadence, soft as a sigh of peace only just conscious after pain
”I sought, and soon discovered, the three headstones on the slope next the ar Linton's only har up its foot; Heathcliff's still bare
”I lingered round the the heath and harebells, listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass, and wondered how anyone could ever iine unquiet slumbers for the sleepers in that quiet earth”
But that is not the real end, any inning It is only Lockwood recovering hi of the supernatural
For it was not conceivable that the more than human love of Heathcliff and Catherine should cease with the dissolution of their bodies It was not conceivable that Catherine, byin the fifteenth chapter, should pass out of the tale As a matter of fact, she never does pass out of it She is edy is entirely on the invisible and i to death of an earthly creature by an unearthly passion You are host of the child Catherine is heard and felt by Lockwood; though it is Heathcliff that she haunts It begins in the hour after Catherine's death, upon Heathcliff's passionate invocation: ”'Catherine Earnshaw, ! You said I killed you--haunt me, then! The hosts _have_ wandered on earth Be with me always--take any form--drive me mad! Only _do_ not leave me in this abyss, where I cannot find you! Oh God! it is unbearable! I _cannot_ live without ins and is continued through eighteen years He cannot see her, but he is aware of her He is first aware on the evening of the day she is buried He goes to the graveyard and breaks open the new-ain! If she be cold, I'll think it is the north wind that chills _, twice repeated, stops hi the sleet-laden wind
I knew no living thing in flesh and blood was by; but as certainly as you perceive the approach to soh it cannot be discerned, so certainly I felt Cathy was there; not under me, but on the earth Her presence ith rave, and led h to him completely, because of the fleshly body that he wears
He goes up to his room, his room and hers ”'I looked round impatiently--I felt her by me--I could _almost_ see her, and yet I _could not_! She showed herself, as she often was in life, a devil to me! And since then, sometimes more and sometimes less, I've been the sport of that intolerable torture! When I sat in the house with Hareton, it see out I shouldin When I went from hohts, I was certain! And when I slept in her chamber--I was beaten out of that I couldn't lie there; for the moment I closedback the panels, or entering the roo head on the same pillow as she did when a child; and I must open my lids to see And so I opened and closed theht--to be always disappointed! It racked : not by inches, but by fractions of hair-breadths, to beguile hteen years!'”
In all Catherine's appearances you feel the impulse towards satisfaction of a soul frustrated of its passion, avenging itself on the body that betrayed it It has killed Catherine's body It will kill Heathcliff's; for it _h to him And he knows it
Heathcliff's brutalities, his cruelties, the long-drawn accoe, are subordinate to this supre down of the flesh by the lust of a remorseless spirit
Here are the last scenes of the final act Heathcliff is failing
”'Nelly,' he says, 'there's a strange change approaching: I'm in its shadow at present I take so little interest in my daily life, that I hardly remember to eat or drink Those tho have left the room'”
(Catherine Linton and Hareton) ”'are the only objects which retain a distinct o, Hareton see: I felt to him in such a variety of ways that it would have been impossible to have accosted hi likeness to Catherine connected him fearfully with her That, however, which you ination, is actually the least: for what is not connected with her to me? and what does not recall her? I cannot look down to this floor, but her features are shaped in the flags? In every cloud, in every tree--filling the air at night, and caught by glie!
The most ordinary faces of men and women--my own features--mock me with a resemblance The entire world is a dreadful collection of memoranda that she did exist, and that I have lost her'
”'But what do you e_, Mr Heathcliff?' I said, alarmed at his manner
”'I shall not know till it comes,' he said, 'I'm only half conscious of it now'”
A few days pass He growsNelly Dean finds him downstairs, risen late
”I put a basin of coffee before him He drew it nearer, and then rested his arms on the table, and looked at the opposite wall, as I supposed, surveying one particular portion, up and doith glittering, restless eyes, and with such eager interest that he stopped breathing during half a ether
”'Mr Heathcliff! master!' I cried, 'don't, for God's sake stare as if you saw an unearthly vision'
”'Don't, for God's sake, shout so loud,' he replied 'Turn round, and tell me, are we by ourselves?'
”'Of course,' was my answer, 'of course we are'
”Still, I involuntarily obeyed him, as if I were not quite sure With a sweep of his hand he cleared a space in front of the breakfast-things, and leant forward more at his ease
”Now I perceived that he was not looking at the wall; for, when I regarded hi within two yards' distance And, whatever it was, it communicated, apparently, both pleasure and pain in exquisite extreuished, yet raptured, expression of his countenance suggested that idea The fancied object was not fixed: either his eyes pursued it with unwearied diligence, and, even in speaking to me, were never weaned away I vainly reminded him of his protracted abstinence fro in coet a piece of bread, his fingers clenched before they reached it, and reetful of their aim”
He cannot sleep; and at dawn of the next day he comes to the door of his room--Cathy's room--and calls Nelly to hilect of his body's health, and of his soul's
”'Your cheeks are hollow, and your eyes bloodshot, like a person starving with hunger, and going blind with loss of sleep'