llowed. Mrs. Heathcliff was seated by the bedside, with her hands
folded on her knees. Her father-in-law went up, held the light to
Linton's face, looked at him, and touched him; afterwards he turned to
her.

'"Now--Catherine," he said, "how do you feel?"

'She was dumb.

'"How do you feel, Catherine?" he repeated.

'"He's safe, and I'm free," she answered: "I should feel well--but," she
continued, with a bitterness she couldn't conceal, "you have left me so
long to struggle against death alone, that I feel and see only death! I
feel like death!"

'And she looked like it, too! I gave her a little wine. Hareton and
Joseph, who had been wakened by the ringing and the sound of feet, and
heard our talk from outside, now entered. Joseph was fain, I believe, of
the lad's removal; Hareton seemed a thought bothered: though he was more
taken up with staring at Catherine than thinking of Linton. But the
master bid him get off to bed again: we didn't want his help. He
afterwards made Joseph remove the body to his chamber, and told me to
return to mine, and Mrs. Heathcliff remained by herself.

'In the morning, he sent me to tell her she must come down to breakfast:
she had undressed, and appeared going to sleep, and said she was ill; at
which I hardly wondered. I informed Mr. Heathcliff, and he
replied,--"Well, let her be till after the funeral; and go up now and
then to get her what is needful; and, as soon as she seems better, tell
me."'

Cathy stayed upstairs a fortnight, according to Zillah; who visited her
twice a day, and would have been rather more friendly, but her attempts
at increasing kindness were proudly and promptly repelled.

Heathcliff went up once, to show her Linton's will. He had bequeathed
the whole of his, and what had been her, moveable property, to his
father: the poor creature was threatened, or coaxed, into that act during
her week's absence, when his uncle died. The lands, being a minor, he
could not meddle with. However, Mr. Heathcliff has claimed and kept them
in his wife's right and his also: I suppose legally; at any rate,
Catherine, destitute of cash and friends, cannot disturb his possession.

'Nobody,' said Zillah, 'ever approached her door, except that once, but
I; and nobody asked anything about her. The first occasion of her coming
down into the house was on a Sunday afternoon. She had cried out, when I
carried up her dinner, that she couldn't bear any longer being in the