`I didn't do it at all,' said his cousin. `However, we'll be friends

now. And you want me: you would wish to see me sometimes, really?'

`I told you I did,' he replied impatiently. `Sit on the settle and let me lean on your knee. That's as mamma used to do, whole afternoons together. Sit quite still and don't talk: but you may sing a song, if you can sing; or you may say a nice long interesting ballad--one of those you promised to teach me: or a story. I'd rather have a ballad, though: begin.'

Catherine repeated the longest she could remember. The employment pleased both mightily. Linton would have another; and after that another, notwithstanding my strenuous objections; and so they went on until the clock struck twelve, and we heard Hareton in the court, returning for his dinner.

`And tomorrow, Catherine, will you be here tomorrow?' asked young Heathcliff, holding her frock as she rose reluctantly.

`No,' I answered, `nor next day neither.' She, however, gave a different response evidently, for his forehead cleared as she stooped and whispered in his ear.

`You won't go tomorrow, recollect, miss!' I commenced, when we were out of the house. `You are not dreaming of it, are you?'

`Oh, I'll take good care,' I continued: `I'll have that lock mended, and you can escape by no way else.'

`I can get over the wall,' she said, laughing. `The Grange is not a prison, Ellen, and you are not my jailer. And besides, I'm almost seventeen: I'm a woman. And I'm certain Linton would recover quickly if he had me to look after him. I'm older than he is, you know, and wiser: less childish, am I not? And he'll soon do as I direct him, with some slight coaxing. He's a pretty little darling when he's good. I'd make such a pet of him, if he were mine. We should never quarrel, should we, after we were used to each other? Don't you like him, Ellen?'

`Like him?' I exclaimed. `The worst-tempered bit of a sickly slip that ever struggled into its teens. Happily, as Mr Heathcliff conjectured, he'll not win twenty. I doubt whether he'll see spring, indeed. And small loss to his family whenever he drops off. And lucky it is for us that his father took him: the kinder he was treated, the more tedious and selfish he'd be. I'm glad you have no chance of having him for a husband, Miss Catherine.'

My companion waxed serious at hearing this speech. To speak of his death so regardlessly, wounded her feelings.

`He's younger than I,' she answered, after a protracted pause of meditation, `and he ought to live the longest: he will--he must live as long as I do. He's as strong now as when he first came into the north; I'm positive of that. It's only a cold that ails him, the same as papa has. You say papa will get better, and why shouldn't he?'

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