by Alison Case
‘How could you?’ he hissed at me as I passed, but I was too exhausted to face him just then, so I turned away without answering, and let Bodkin lead me to my room and put me into my bed, where I fell instantly into a deep sleep that lasted the whole of that day and the following night.
*
I awoke at dawn, as usual, but with a vague sense that everything was changed, as if a whole new world had taken shape around me while I slept, so that I was startled to see the same old familiar surroundings. As I dressed, memories came back to account for this feeling: my efforts for Heathcliff, and their success, and the praise I had received for them, but most of all, Mr Earnshaw’s heartfelt blessing, and his promise that I should always have a home at Wuthering Heights. I had thought that I had long since put away the bitter memory of my earlier expulsion, but somewhere in the back of my mind it must have still rankled. Now that pain was gone, as if the pressure of the master’s hands on my head had been a baptism that washed away all my old sins, and made me a new person – one who belonged at Wuthering Heights, and had claims there.
About Heathcliff, too, I had new and warmer feelings. I had employed all my wits and all my strength to save his life, and I had saved it. So the doctor told me, so I believed myself, and so, I was sure, Heathcliff knew too. How could I not now value more greatly the life I had saved? And Heathcliff’s need had touched me. As I had nursed him through that horrible night, I had kept up a steady gentle patter of reassurance and affection, such as a mother uses to her child. The words came naturally to my lips, and I believe I would have said the like for anyone I nursed so, but once spoken, they seemed to bring their own truth with them, and Heathcliff became no longer the troublesome brat I had always thought him, but my poor bairn, my good little laddie, my darling boy. And I saw, too, their effect on him: through the night, each time I returned to his bedside, his eyes would seek out mine and his lips move to say my name, and I saw in his face what I had never seen there for me before: trust, and gratitude, and love.
Hindley I tried not to think about, only telling myself that he could not really wish me to have let Heathcliff die, and that he would come round in time.
By the time I had thus taken stock of my mental world, I was washed and dressed. The terrible heat, I noticed, had broken at last, and all nature seemed to be celebrating it. At any rate, it was a beautiful day, of that crystalline sunny clearness we see so rarely here, that makes the very lungs leap to take in the fresh air, carries the sounds of birds for miles around, and gives the edges of objects the sharpness of a knife-blade. I went downstairs. Joseph was back in his old place – Dr Kenneth must have declared the house free of infection – but no one else was up yet. His was not the face I would have chosen to see first that morning, but my mood was too buoyant to let him affect it.
‘Good morning, Joseph. I hope you slept well?’ I asked cheerfully.
‘Not as well as you did, spending the whole of yesterday lazing in your bed, from what I hear.’
‘Doctor’s orders. Same as kept you from having to lift a finger in here while I was run off my feet the whole of last week. Not that I’m complaining,’ I added brightly, ‘for I managed very well on my own. Dr Kenneth said I saved Heathcliff’s life, and the master gave me his blessing, and told me I was born to be the salvation of the family.’ This had the desired effect – Joseph scowled and turned away, but could not think of a word to say in response that would not appear to disparage these two authorities.
‘Now that you’re here,’ I went on, ‘can you tell me what happened yesterday while I was asleep? Is the mistress up from her bed yet? Or any of the children? And what of the master? He looked worn to a ravelling when last I saw him.’
‘Hindley and Cathy are out of their beds, but they’re to keep themselves quiet and not goo out a’doors, and t’ doctor says Heathcliff’s past the wust of it, but he still needs a few days rest a-bed. T’ mistress is still ill, and t’ master still gies all his time to nursing her. If ye want to make yeself useful, ye’ll bring up a tray for both on them – thin milk porridge for t’ mistress an’ summat more hearty for t’ master.’
‘I know what they need,’ I said, ‘haven’t I been bringing trays for them all week?’ I hastened to put together the tray, adding a pot of tea and a small pitcher of milk before carrying it upstairs. Outside their room, I knocked softly at the door, as I had been instructed to do. The master opened the door, but, instead of taking the tray inside, he stepped out with me into the hall.
‘She’s sleeping now,’ he whispered. ‘Let’s not disturb her. I’ll eat downstairs.’
‘Please, sir,’ I ventured, as we went down the hall together, ‘how is Mrs Earnshaw now? What did the doctor say?’
‘Never mind what the doctor said. Mrs Earnshaw is still weak, but mending. Her measles are clearing up – it just took a little longer with her than with the children because she is older. She needs time to rest, and no disturbances. Trouble between the children especially frets her, and that will slow her recovery. I have arranged with the curate to take over their lessons, but apart from that I am counting on you to keep the peace, Nelly, for they are all fond of you. Do you think you can do that?’
‘I – I will try, sir,’ I stammered. I was flattered that he should speak to me of ‘the children’ as if I were not one of them, and it did not occur to me, then, that he was asking of me something I had not the authority to accomplish.
Since the master was heading downstairs for his breakfast, I decided to take the tray in to Hindley instead. True, Heathcliff was the only one of the children not yet strong enough to come downstairs for his meals, but I thought the indulgence of breakfast in his room might serve as a peace offering from me to Hindley, and allow us to make up in privacy. I knocked gently at his door.
‘Who’s there?’
‘It’s I, Nelly, with your breakfast on a tray. Are you decent?’
‘I suppose so.’ I opened the door and slipped in.
‘Why are you bringing me a tray?’ he asked sullenly, ‘Dr Kenneth said I was well enough to be up.’
‘I brought it up for your parents, but your mother is sleeping, and your father preferred to eat downstairs, so I thought I would bring it to you instead.’
‘You should have brought it to Heathcliff. He is your favourite now.’
‘He is nothing of the kind. I was responsible for his care, so of course I did all I could for him. But I will always love you best, Hindley. You know that.’
‘I don’t know that at all! It’s all very well to say you were only doing your duty, Nelly, but I heard what Dr Kenneth said – you half killed yourself to save him. If you had been content to do no more than your duty, that brat would be dead now, and think how much better all our lives would be.’
‘I would not be better off, with his death on my conscience.’
‘My conscience would not be so queasy. If I’d been awake, I could have smothered him with a pillow, while you were off fetching more water, and no one would have been the wiser – even you. But you never think of such things.’
‘And neither should you! For mercy’s sake, Hindley, think of your eternal soul, and banish such thoughts from your head!’
‘I’d be content to go to Hell, if I could only be sure of sending him there before me.’
‘And then you’d get to spend eternity with the person you hate most on earth – some triumph that would be! Can’t you see that the best way to get Heathcliff out of your life is to banish him from your consciousness? Ignore him, and he and Cathy will stay out of your way, you may be sure. And we will all be the happier for it, especially your mother. This conflict is a strain on her, the master told me, and will hinder her recovery.’
‘How can you accuse me of making her ill! I love her better than any of you! Father foisted this child upon her, when her hands were already full with the rest of us, and now she frets that she cannot love him, and that he makes Cathy so wild she will never learn to be a lady, and even yo
u, you take your orders from everybody but her.’
I flushed, and spoke before I had the sense to think of my words: ‘I haven’t seen you making any effort to obey her – didn’t she tell you day after day to just do your lessons and leave Heathcliff alone? But you never would, for all you say you love her best. You dare to be angry at me for not letting Heathcliff die. You don’t know what it’s like to have the responsibility for all of you on my shoulders. You think only about yourself. You are selfish, selfish, selfish!’ I stormed out of the room, only remembering in the nick of time not to slam the door.
I was so angry that I dared not stop in the kitchen for breakfast, but continued straight past and out of the door, only composing myself enough to look as if I were merely in a hurry. Once outside, I turned my steps towards the emptiest segment of the moors, and walked. For the first half-mile or so I was fuelled entirely by outrage at Hindley, as a steam engine is by coal, and whenever my legs began to slow I would stoke the fire by remembering his wish to smother poor Heathcliff with a pillow. But the day was fine and sunny, as I said before, and the air on the moors was breezy, and lightly scented with blooming flowers, and these things soon began to have their usual effect. With each lungful I drew in, I seemed to take in some of the freshness of the day, while each out-breath exhaled with it some of the strain and worry of the household I left behind. With greater distance – in mind as well as body – I began to see that a good deal of my anger ought rightfully to be directed at myself. Why had I allowed myself to be provoked by Hindley so easily, when I knew he was still peevish with illness, and agitated by worry for his mother? And more deeply, how remiss must I have been in indulging Hindley’s disparagement of Heathcliff, that he could even think of murdering the lad outright, and imagine me a likely partner in the enterprise?
You might not think it, Mr Lockwood, but this taking of blame onto myself was actually a comfort to me, for if my troubles had been of my own making, then might it not be in my own power to fix them? I was about three miles from Wuthering Heights by the time I reached this point in my reflections, and I had slowed to an amble and begun to look about me a bit more. At length I spied a copious stand of beautiful blackberries, fat and ripe, which I decided would make a good excuse for my expedition. So I took my large kerchief from my neck and tied it into a sort of basket, which in short order I filled with the ripe fruit. I filled my mouth, too, while I was at it, for I had had no breakfast. Then I headed back to Wuthering Heights, with my mind already busy with plans. It was perhaps just as well, I reflected, that I had expressed myself so strongly to Hindley about his violent wishes towards Heathcliff – it would not do for him to continue to think me an ally in such things. But I might still make him a heartfelt apology for my vehemence, and for appearing to disparage his love for his mother, which I knew to be most devoted. And for the rest, my future conduct towards him, I vowed to myself, should be affectionate and encouraging of any good impulses, and calmly repressive of the bad.
And that, Mr Lockwood, is a fair sample of many such walks that I took, before and since, that began in anger or grief, and ended in plans for the benevolent improvement of all about me, myself included. They were not bad plans, in themselves. Their main flaw was that they required the cooperation of others in the carrying-out.
SEVEN
I was going to write how we all fared during that time: how I contrived and pleaded and stormed to try to keep Heathcliff and Cathy in good behaviour, and to appease and restrain Hindley, and how little effect it all had. But I find I have not the heart for it, after all. At the time, it seemed so important to me that I keep my promise to the master, and aid Mrs Earnshaw in her recovery, but now I see that it would have made little difference, either way. Death had marked her with his finger, and nothing we did or refrained from doing could erase that mark. We did not see it, though, but remained hopeful, clinging to each small and temporary upturn in her condition, as a sure sign of returning health.
It was Bodkin who opened my eyes to the true state of affairs. Dr Kenneth had again become a regular visitor at our house, coming every week or two to look in on the mistress and make adjustments in her treatment. He rarely brought Bodkin, though, as he said there was little new for him to learn from the case. So when, some three months after the measles, I saw them both arrive together, I was pleased, and hastened to make a pot of tea and butter some oatcakes, anticipating a comfortable chat in the kitchen with my old friend. He entered smiling, and took my hands in his.
‘Nelly, my girl, you are looking very hale and rosy, as usual. We needn’t worry about your health, anyway.’
‘Oh, I am always well. And so are you, from the looks of you.’
‘Yes, it took some time, but I am well toughened now, against rough weather and fevers both.’
‘Safe from all the hazards of your profession, then?’
‘Well, not all. The other day I was bitten by a child of three, as I tried to stitch a cut in his hand. See here?’ He pulled up his left sleeve to reveal a nasty-looking wound. ‘Father says I will bear the scar to my grave.’
‘Don’t you wish now you’d been a cavalry officer, after all?’
‘Well, I begin to suspect they have the more comfortable life, having only the cannons and swords of battle to fear, instead of sharp-toothed brats, who may turn up anywhere.’
‘Ah, but they measure their success by the number they kill, whereas you will measure yours by the number you save.’
‘We’d do better by the former reckoning. If doctors were accorded respect for the number of their patients who died instead of for those who lived, we would all be national heroes – for, to be sure, our patients all die in the end.’
I laughed. ‘Well, but in what other profession can you get folk to pay you so handsomely and gratefully merely for delaying the inevitable?’
‘Not so handsomely, nor so gratefully as you might think.’
‘Well, I don’t know what we are paying you, but we are certainly grateful here, for all you are doing to help the mistress recover.’ The laughter died from his face.
‘Recover? Nelly, in all seriousness, you can’t think that is likely, can you?’
‘But why not? Today she sat up to take tea and toast, and stayed up to write some letters, for the first time in a week. Surely that means she’s getting stronger?’
‘Yet a month ago, she was sitting up every day,’ he said gently, ‘and a month before that, she would now and then come downstairs for an hour or two. She may have better days and worse days, Nelly, but on the whole she has been declining steadily, and nothing you or my father can do is like to change that.’
‘Who are you to be the judge of that?’ I asked angrily. ‘I thought you weren’t supposed to give out your father’s medical opinions behind his back! Have you received your qualification since I last saw you, and set up practice on your own?’
‘This is no professional opinion, Nelly, neither my own nor my father’s, but simply common sense. You are all too close to Mrs Earnshaw, and love her too dearly, to see what is clear to a more distanced eye. I am not saying it is impossible for her to get better: I have seen cases no more hopeful than hers that ended in nearly a full recovery. There are miracles – God’s and Nature’s – and we can always hope for one here. But the more likely event is that she will continue to weaken. Her hold on life is loosening – can you not see that? She is preparing to bid it farewell. And you must prepare too.’
‘Wise advice!’ I said sarcastically. ‘I suppose you think I should be stitching her shroud while I sit with her of an evening – and maybe we should have the carpenter in to start building her coffin in the house – or better yet, in her room! That will save us the trouble of carrying it up the stairs when it’s finished, and if the sawing and hammering disturb her rest, what matter? The sooner she goes, the sooner we’ll be free of the trouble of nursing her! Is that what you think? A fine doctor you’ll be, with the same recommendation in every case: “Pray for a miracle
, and set to work on the coffin!”’
I was breathless with outrage, and just sharpening my wits for a deeper thrust, when he put his hands on my shoulders and gave a little squeeze.
‘Nelly,’ he said calmly, ‘I am very sorry if I spoke too strongly, and too soon. I meant to help, but I see I have done more harm than good, and that is the worst thing a doctor – or a doctor manqué, as I confess I am – can do. Will you forgive me?’
I wriggled out of his grasp and turned aside so I wouldn’t have to look at him.
‘Go away,’ I said brusquely, then grabbed some onions and a knife, and commenced peeling. ‘I have work to do.’
‘We are still friends?’
‘Oh, of course we are,’ I said quickly. ‘Just go away, please.’ I feared I would begin sobbing if he stayed, and that was too humiliating. But Bodkin came round in front of me and pushed up his right sleeve to the shoulder.
‘Would you care to take a bite?’ he asked.
‘What?’
‘Take a bite out of my arm. My other patients find it relieves their feelings. And I should rather like to have matching scars.’
‘Oh, damn you!’ I said. I could not help laughing, and of course that released the tears as well, and between that and the onions I soon had my handkerchief soaked. Bodkin said nothing more, just sat down opposite me again, poured a fresh mug of tea, and pushed it over to me as soon as I looked up.