this ere his guest reached the front; he then came
and brought his chair to the other side of my table, leaning over it, and
searching in my eyes for a sympathy with the burning hate that gleamed
from his: as he both looked and felt like an assassin, he couldn't
exactly find that; but he discovered enough to encourage him to speak.

'"You, and I," he said, "have each a great debt to settle with the man
out yonder! If we were neither of us cowards, we might combine to
discharge it. Are you as soft as your brother? Are you willing to
endure to the last, and not once attempt a repayment?"

'"I'm weary of enduring now," I replied; "and I'd be glad of a
retaliation that wouldn't recoil on myself; but treachery and violence
are spears pointed at both ends; they wound those who resort to them
worse than their enemies."

'"Treachery and violence are a just return for treachery and violence!"
cried Hindley. "Mrs. Heathcliff, I'll ask you to do nothing; but sit
still and be dumb. Tell me now, can you? I'm sure you would have as
much pleasure as I in witnessing the conclusion of the fiend's existence;
he'll be _your_ death unless you overreach him; and he'll be _my_ ruin.
Damn the hellish villain! He knocks at the door as if he were master
here already! Promise to hold your tongue, and before that clock
strikes--it wants three minutes of one--you're a free woman!"

'He took the implements which I described to you in my letter from his
breast, and would have turned down the candle. I snatched it away,
however, and seized his arm.

'"I'll not hold my tongue!" I said; "you mustn't touch him. Let the door
remain shut, and be quiet!"

'"No! I've formed my resolution, and by God I'll execute it!" cried the
desperate being. "I'll do you a kindness in spite of yourself, and
Hareton justice! And you needn't trouble your head to screen me;
Catherine is gone. Nobody alive would regret me, or be ashamed, though I
cut my throat this minute--and it's time to make an end!"

'I might as well have struggled with a bear, or reasoned with a lunatic.
The only resource left me was to run to a lattice and warn his intended
victim of the fate which awaited him.

'"You'd better seek shelter somewhere else to-night!" I exclaimed, in
rather a triumphant tone. "Mr. Earnshaw has a mind to shoot you, if you
persist in endeavouring to enter."

'"You'd better open the door, you--" he answered, addressing me by some
elegant term that I