Wuthering Bites by Sarah Gray Read Free Book Online Page A

measure owing to me, and praised me for my care. I softened toward Heathcliff, and thus Hindley lost his last ally. Still, I couldn’t dote on Heathcliff, and I wondered often what my master saw to admire so much in the sullen boy, who never, to my recollection, repaid his indulgence by any sign of gratitude. He was not insolent to his benefactor; he was simply unfeeling, but he had only to speak and Mr. Earnshaw would bend to his wishes.
    As an instance, I remember Mr. Earnshaw and the children once met upon a band of gypsies at a parish fair. The gypsies noticed young Heathcliff at once and it came about that they knew him and they knew his poor dead mother. The tale told was that the boy became lost in Liverpool from the others and was thought dead. When Heathcliff learned the tale, he begged that he should go with the gypsies to meet his relations and, at first, Mr. Earnshaw forbid it.
    â€˜Gypsy!’ taunted Hindley, cuffing him heartily when his father walked away. ‘Orphan, gypsy.’
    â€˜Tell him to let me go with them,’ Heathcliff insisted, allowing himself to be pummeled again and again, ‘or I will speak of these blows and you’ll get them from your father with interest.’
    â€˜Off with you, dog!’ cried Hindley, threatening him with an iron weight used for weighing potatoes and hay in one of the market stalls.
    â€˜Throw it,’ Heathcliff replied, standing still, ‘and then I’ll tell how you boasted that you will turn me out of doors as soon as he dies, and see whether he will not turn you out directly.’
    Hindley threw it, hitting Heathcliff on the breast. The boy fell, but staggered up immediately, breathless and white. The master did come along at that very moment and, taking pity, sent young Earnshaw home and allowed Heathcliff to catch up to the gypsies and go along.
    I do not know what the boy did that day and night with the gypsies, but I can tell you he returned a different boy. He somehow seemed darker, but carried a confidence I sometimes found frightening. As he entered the barn upon his return, Hindley demanded to know where he had been and what the gypsies had told him of his parentage. When Heathcliff did ignore the request, Hindley knocked him off his feet. I was surprised to witness how coolly the child gathered himself and sat down on a bundle of hay to overcome the qualm which the violent blow occasioned, before he entered the house to announce his return. I persuaded him easily to let me lay the blame of his bruises on a new horse purchased only the day before at the fair: he minded little what tale was told since he had gotten what he wanted in going with the strangers. He complained so seldom, indeed, of such stirs as these with Hindley that I really thought him not vindictive.”
    Again, Mrs. Dean met my gaze. “I was deceived completely, as you will later hear.”

Chapter 5
    I n time, of course, Mr. Earnshaw began to fail. He had been active and healthy, yet his strength left him suddenly, and when he was confined to a chair in the corner, he grew grievously irritable. He became preoccupied by the growing number of vampires in the countryside and worried what would become of his children. We understood that the vampires were flooding into England and Scotland from their native land of Transylvania, where human blood was becoming scarce, but none knew what to do about it. Mr. Earnshaw could not sleep or eat for his obsession with the bloodsuckers. All day he filled journals with plans for strengthening the defenses at Wuthering Heights, and at night he burned candle after candle to the nub. By then, he was barely able to walk without the steady arm of a companion. His temper flared over the smallest things, and even though his body had grown weak, he could still rage with the roar of a charging bull. Nothing would make him so furious as some suspected slight of his authority.
    This was especially true concerning Heathcliff.