I distinguished Mr. Heathcliff's step, restlessly measuring the floor; and he frequently broke the silence by a deep inspiration, resembling a groan. He muttered detached words also; the only one I could catch was the name of Catherine, coupled with some wild term of endearment or suffering, and spoken as one would speak to a person present--low and earnest, and wrung from the depth of his soul.
I had not courage to walk straight into the apartment; but I desired to divert him from his revery, and therefore fell foul of the kitchen fire; stirred it and began to scrape the cinders. It drew him forth sooner than I expected. He opened the door immediately, and said:--
"Nelly, come here--is it morning? Come in with your light."
"It is striking four," I answered; "you want a candle to take upstairs--you might have lighted one at this fire."
"No, I don't wish to go upstairs," he said. "Come in, and kindle me a fire, and do anything there is to do about the room."
"I must blow the coals red first, before I can carry any," I replied, getting a chair and the bellows.
He roamed to and fro, meantime, in a state approaching distraction, his heavy sighs succeeding each other so thick as to leave no space for common breathing between.
"When day breaks, I'll send for Green," he said; "I wish to make some legal inquiries of him, while I can bestow a thought on those matters, and while I can act calmly. I have not written my will yet, and how to leave my property I cannot determine! I wish I could annihilate it from the face of the earth."
"I would not talk so, Mr. Heathcliff," I interposed. "Let your will be a while--you'll be spared to repent of your many injustices yet! I never expected that your nerves would be disordered--they are, at present, marvelously so, however; and almost entirely through your own fault. The way you've passed these last three days might knock up a Titan. Do take some food and some repose. You need only look at yourself in a glass to see how you require both. Your cheeks are hollow and your eyes bloodshot, like a person starving with hunger and going blind with loss of sleep."
"It is not my fault that I cannot eat or rest," he replied. "I assure you it is through no settled designs. I'll do both as soon as I possibly can. But you might as well bid a man struggling in the water rest within arm's-length of the shore! I must reach it first, and then I'll rest. Well, never mind Mr. Green; as to repenting of my injustices, I've done no injustice, and I repent of nothing. I'm too happy, and yet I'm not happy enough. My soul's bliss kills my body, but does not satisfy itself."