14 Wuthering Heights -Read And Abridged By Stephanie Poppins

Hello.

Welcome to Sleep Stories with Steph,

Your go-to romantic podcast that guarantees you a calm and entertaining transition into a great night's sleep.

Come with me as we immerse ourselves in a romantic journey to a time long since forgotten.

Emily Bronte was born in Yorkshire in 1818 and along with her brother and sisters Anne and Charlotte wrote from childhood onwards.

Wuthering Heights is the story she is best remembered for.

But before we begin let's take a moment to focus on where we are now.

Take a deep breath in through your nose and let it out with a long sigh.

That's it.

Now close your eyes and feel yourself sink deeper into the support beneath you.

It is time to relax and fully let go.

There is nothing you need to be doing now and nowhere you need to go.

Happy listening.

Chapter 14 As soon as I perused this epistle,

Continued Nellie,

I went to the master and informed him his sister had arrived at the Heights and sent me a letter expressing her sorrow for Mrs Linton's situation and her ardent desire to see him with a wish she would transmit to her as early as possible some token of forgiveness by me.

Forgiveness?

Said Linton.

I have nothing to forgive her Ellen.

You may call it Wuthering Heights this afternoon but if you like you can say I'm not angry but I'm sorry to have lost her especially as I can never think she'll be happy.

It is out of the question my going to see her however.

We are eternally divided and should she really wish to oblige me let her persuade the villain she's married to leave the country.

And you won't write her a little note sir?

I asked imploringly.

No,

He answered.

It is needless.

My communication with Heathcliff's family shall be as sparing as his with mine.

It shall not exist.

Mr Edgar's coldness depressed me exceedingly and all the way from the Grange I puzzled my brains how to put more heart into what he said when I repeated it and how to soften his refusal of even a few lines to console Isabella.

I dare say she'd been on the watch for me since morning.

I saw her looking through the lattice as I came up the garden path and I nodded to her but she drew back as if afraid of being observed.

I entered without knocking and there never was such a dreary dismal scene as the formerly cheerful house presented.

I must confess that if I'd have been in the young lady's place I would at least have swept the hearth and wiped the tables with a duster but she already partook of the pervading spirit of neglect which encompassed her.

Her pretty face was wan and listless,

Her hair uncurled,

Some locks hanging lanky down and some carelessly twisted round her head.

Probably she'd not touched her dress since yesterday evening.

Hindy was not there.

Mr Heathcliff sat at a table turning over some papers in his pocketbook but he rose when I appeared,

Asked me how I did,

Quite friendly like,

And offered me a chair.

It was the only thing there that seemed decent.

I thought he never looked better.

So much of the circumstances altered their positions.

He would certainly have struck a stranger as a born and bred gentleman and his wife as a thorough little slatten.

She came forward eagerly to greet me and held out one hand to take the expected letter.

I shook my head.

She wouldn't understand the hint but followed me to a sideboard where I went to lay my bonnet and improtuned me in a whisper to give her directly what I'd brought.

Heathcliff guessed the meaning of her manoeuvres and said if you have got anything for Isabella as no doubt you have Nellie,

Give it to her.

You needn't make a secret of it.

We have no secrets between us.

Oh,

I have nothing,

I replied,

Thinking it best to speak the truth at once.

My master bid me tell his sister she must not expect either a letter or a visit from him at present.

He sends his love ma'am and his wishes for your happiness and his pardon for the grief you've occasioned but he thinks after this time his household and the household here should drop into communication as nothing could come of keeping it up.

Mrs Heathcliff's lips quivered slightly and she returned to her seat in the window.

Her husband took his stand on the hearthstone near me and began to put questions concerning Catherine.

I told him as much as I thought proper of her illness.

I blamed her as she deserved for bringing it all on herself and ended by hoping he'd follow Mr Linton's example and avoid further interference with his family for good or evil.

Mrs Linton is just now recovering,

I said.

She'll never be like she was but her life is spared and if you really have a regard for her you'll shun crossing her way again,

Heathcliff.

Now you'll move out of this country entirely and that you may not regret it.

I'll inform you Catherine Linton is as different now from your old friend as that young lady is different from me.

Her appearance has changed greatly,

Her character much more so and the person who's compelled of necessity to be her companion will only sustain his affection hereafter by the remembrance of what she once was,

By common humanity and a sense of duty.

That is quite possible,

Remarked Heathcliff,

Forcing himself to seem calm.

Quite possible your master should have nothing but common humanity and a sense of duty to fall back upon.

But do you imagine I shall leave Catherine to duty and humanity?

Can you compare my feelings respecting Catherine to his?

Before you leave this house I must exact a promise from you.

You'll get me an interview with her.

Consent or refuse I will see her.

What do you say?

I say Mr Heathcliff,

I replied,

You must not.

You never shall through my means another encounter between you and the master will kill her altogether.

With your aid that may be avoided,

He continued,

And there should be danger of such an event should he be the cause of adding a single trouble more to her existence.

Why I think I'll be justified in going to extremes.

I wish you'd sincerity enough to tell me whether Catherine would suffer greatly from his loss.

The fear that she would restrains me.

And there you see the distinction between our feelings.

Had he been in my place and I in his,

Though I hated him with a hatred that turned my life to gall,

I never would have weighed a hand against him.

You may look incredulous if you please.

I never would have banished him from her society as long as she desired his.

The moment her regards ceased I would have torn his heart out and drunk his blood.

But till then I would have died by inches before I touched a single hair of his head.

And yet,

I interrupted,

You have no scruples in completely ruining all hopes of her perfect restoration by thrusting yourself into her remembrance now when she's nearly forgotten you,

And involving her in a new tumult of discord and distress.

You suppose she's nearly forgotten me?

He said.

Oh Nellie,

You know she's not.

You know as well as I do that for every thought she spends on Linton,

She spends a thousand on me.

At a most miserable period of my life I had a notion of the kind.

Haunted me on my return to the neighbourhood last summer.

But only her own assurance could make me admit to the horrible idea again.

And then Linton would be nothing,

Nor Hindley,

Nor all the dreams I ever dreamed.

Two words would comprehend my future,

Death and hell.

Existence after losing her would be hell.

Yes,

I was a fool to fancy for a moment she valued Edgar,

Linton's attachment,

More than mine.

If he loved with all the powers of his puny being he could not love as much in 80 years as I could in one day.

And Catherine has a heart as deep as I have.

The sea could be as readily contained in that horse trough as her whole affection be monopolized by him.

He's scarcely a degree dearer to her than a dog or a horse.

It is not in him to be loved like me.

How can she love in him what he has not?

Catherine and Edgar are as fond of each other as any two people can be,

Cried Isabella with sudden vivacity.

No one has a right to talk in that manner,

And I won't hear my brother depreciated in silence.

Your brother is wondrous fond of you too,

Isn't he?

Observed Heathcliff scornfully.

He turns your adrift on the world with surprising alacrity.

He is not aware of what I suffer,

Isabella replied.

I didn't tell him that.

You have been telling him something then.

You have written,

Have you?

To say I was married.

You saw the note.

And nothing since?

No.

My young lady's looking sadly worse for a change of condition,

I said.

She degenerates into a mere slut,

Said Heathcliff.

She's tired of trying to please me uncommonly early.

You'd hardly credit it,

But the very morrow of her wedding she was weeping to go home.

However,

She'll suit this house so much the better for not being over nice,

And I'll take care she does not disgrace me by rambling abroad.

Well,

Sir,

Returned I,

I hope you'll consider Mrs.

Heathcliff is accustomed to being looked after and waited on.

She's been brought up like an only daughter whom everyone was ready to serve.

You must let her have a mate to keep things tidy about her,

And you must treat her kindly.

Whatever be your notion of Mr.

Edgar,

You cannot doubt she has a capacity for strong attachments,

Or she wouldn't have abandoned the elegancies and comforts and friends to fit contentedly in such wilderness as this with you.

She abandoned them under a delusion,

He answered,

Picturing me a hero of romance and expecting unlimited indulgences from my chivalrous devotion.

I can hardly regard her in the light of a rational creature,

So obstinately has she persisted in forming a fabulous notion of my character and acting on the false impression that she cherished.

But at last I think she begins to know me.

I don't perceive the silly smiles and grimaces that provoke me at first,

And the senseless incapability of discerning that I was in earnest when I gave her my opinion of her infatuation in herself.

It was a marvellous effort of perspicacity to discover I did not love her.

I believed at one time no lessons could teach her yet.

This is poorly learned,

For this morning she announced as a piece of appalling intelligence she had actually succeeded in hating me.

If it be achieved,

I have cause to return thanks.

Can I trust your assertion,

Isabella?

Are you sure you hate me?

If I let you alone for half a day,

Won't you come sighing and wheedling to me again?

I dare say she would rather I had seen your tenderness before.

It wounds her vanity to have the truth exposed to you,

Nelly.

But I don't care,

Who knows the passion?

It was wholly on one side.

I never told her a lie about it.

She cannot accuse me of showing one bit of deceitful softness.

The first thing she saw me do on coming out of the Grange was to hang up her little dog,

And when she pleaded for it,

The first words I uttered were a wish I had the hanging of every being belonging to her,

Except one.

Possibly she took that exception for herself.

But no brutality disgusted her.

I suppose she has an innate admiration of it,

If only her precious person was secure from injury.

Tell your master,

Nelly,

That I never have in all my life met with such an abject thing as Isabella.

She even disgraces the name of Linton,

And I've sometimes relented from pure lack of invention in my experiments on what she could endure,

And she still creeps shamefully back.

Then tell him also to set his fraternal,

A magisterial heart at ease,

That I keep strictly within the limits of the law.

I have avoided up to this period giving her the slightest right to claim separation,

And what's more,

She thanked nobody for dividing us.

If she decided to go,

She might.

The nuisance of her presence outweighs the gratification to be derived from tormenting her.

Mr.

Heathcliff,

Said I,

This is the talk of a madman.

Your wife,

Most likely,

Is convinced you are mad.