the chapel, with his
family. There was the will, however, to hinder that, and my loud
protestations against any infringement of its directions. The funeral
was hurried over; Catherine, Mrs. Linton Heathcliff now, was suffered to
stay at the Grange till her father's corpse had quitted it.

She told me that her anguish had at last spurred Linton to incur the risk
of liberating her. She heard the men I sent disputing at the door, and
she gathered the sense of Heathcliff's answer. It drove her desperate.
Linton who had been conveyed up to the little parlour soon after I left,
was terrified into fetching the key before his father re-ascended. He
had the cunning to unlock and re-lock the door, without shutting it; and
when he should have gone to bed, he begged to sleep with Hareton, and his
petition was granted for once. Catherine stole out before break of day.
She dared not try the doors lest the dogs should raise an alarm; she
visited the empty chambers and examined their windows; and, luckily,
lighting on her mother's, she got easily out of its lattice, and on to
the ground, by means of the fir-tree close by. Her accomplice suffered
for his share in the escape, notwithstanding his timid contrivances.

CHAPTER XXIX

The evening after the funeral, my young lady and I were seated in the
library; now musing mournfully--one of us despairingly--on our loss, now
venturing conjectures as to the gloomy future.

We had just agreed the best destiny which could await Catherine would be
a permission to continue resident at the Grange; at least during Linton's
life: he being allowed to join her there, and I to remain as housekeeper.
That seemed rather too favourable an arrangement to be hoped for; and yet
I did hope, and began to cheer up under the prospect of retaining my home
and my employment, and, above all, my beloved young mistress; when a
servant--one of the discarded ones, not yet departed--rushed hastily in,
and said 'that devil Heathcliff' was coming through the court: should he
fasten the door in his face?

If we had been mad enough to order that proceeding, we had not time. He
made no ceremony of knocking or announcing his name: he was master, and
availed himself of the master's privilege to walk straight in, without
saying a word. The sound of our informant's voice directed him to the
library; he entered and motioning him out, shut the door.

It was the same room into which he had been ushered, as a g