by Alison Case
I saw a brief flicker of sadness in Bodkin’s face. ‘What would please me most would be to make you laugh yourself, without feeling it your duty to do so,’ he said. ‘It’s a poor kind of wit that is only laughed at from a sense of duty. No, it is my job to find what will make you laugh, not yours to laugh at what doesn’t amuse you.’
‘Between Dr Kenneth’s determination to amuse, and Mrs Kenneth’s determination to be amused, I am sure you both will soon be laughing all day long,’ I said. ‘I shall take it upon myself to sew you a little motley flag, as a wedding present. And may you never know worse strife in marriage than the puzzle of how much to laugh, and when.’ I made my goodbyes then, and set off back to Wuthering Heights. The conversation had made me a little sad, though whether it was for Bodkin or myself, I could not have told you.
The will was read the next day. After a legacy of thirty pounds to Joseph and ten to me, it left everything to Hindley, but charged him with supplying Cathy with five hundred pounds on her marriage, and with providing ‘a suitable education’ for Heathcliff. My heart sank at the vague words, and Hindley snorted.
‘Suitable,’ he said under his breath. ‘Yes, I’ll suit him. He’ll get a thoroughly suitable education from me.’
Cathy pouted and Heathcliff scowled, but there was no further discussion with the solicitor present. I only hoped that the responsibilities of marriage and mastership would mature and settle Hindley’s character, and that his largely unencumbered inheritance would soften his resentment of Heathcliff. It didn’t, as it turned out, but you knew that already.
I had my first trial of all my good resolutions, not long after the funeral. Hindley was spending a good deal of time out-of-doors, walking the land with Joseph – consulting him, he said, but I suspect it was mostly to bask in his new sense of possession. His wife moped about the house, looking bored. For a week after the funeral, she was in daily expectation of ‘callers’ from town, and was quite cast down when they failed to appear. Finally she made mention of it to me.
‘How am I to know whom I should visit,’ she asked, ‘if no one comes to visit me?’
‘We are too far out for casual visiting, ma’am,’ I explained. ‘People don’t come out here, generally, unless they have some reason to.’
‘But I am the new mistress of Wuthering Heights,’ she said. ‘I should think that would be reason enough, don’t you think? They should all wish to meet me.’
‘They have mostly met you at church, already,’ I said. ‘And if they haven’t, they will have an opportunity next week, or the week after. Folk are in no hurry, here, to expand their acquaintances.’
‘But what do the ladies do all day, if they do not pay calls, and receive callers in turn? What did Hindley’s mother do?’
‘I can’t speak of the ladies in Gimmerton,’ I said, ‘but Mrs Earnshaw always had plenty to do, what with teaching the children, helping the poor in the neighbourhood, sewing, looking after her poultry and her garden, and so on. She would go into Gimmerton now and again, when she had errands there, and while she was there she would call on her friends, but that was not above once in a month, and less in winter.’
Mrs Earnshaw looked crestfallen. ‘I can’t teach the children,’ she said. ‘They are too big and too wild for me to manage, and anyway Hindley said that the curate has them in hand. As for the poultry: the hens seem nice enough, but the rooster tried to peck me, and the geese are so fierce, I am afraid to go near them. And I hate paddling in the dirt.’
I assured her that the rooster and the geese would be less threatening, once they knew she belonged to the household, and that there was no need for her to work in the garden, if she didn’t like it.
‘But what do you mean by helping the poor? We used to have beggars come to the back door, sometimes, and Mother would give them some food, if we had any to spare, but I have not seen any beggars here.’
‘We don’t get beggars here much, for the same reason we don’t get visitors,’ I said. ‘We are too far from town. But we have poor folk who live here, in our own cottages – decent, hard-working people, for the most part, who yet cannot make ends meet, for one reason or another, and the mistress always did what she could for them.’
‘What sort of things?’
‘Well, she had a little chest of infants’ clothes, that she would keep in good repair, and bring by when someone had a new baby. When they are that small, you know, they grow out of clothes faster than you can make them, and it’s a great expense to keep making new. There is a christening dress in there too, quite a nice one that she worked herself. The mothers keep the chest for the first three or four months – sometimes longer, if they can – and then it comes back here to be furbished up for the next baby.’
‘Where is the chest now?’
‘Out with Mrs Hearne – she had her third child last month. I kept it up myself after the mistress died, as best I could. I had less time to spare, though, and I’m not so fine a needlewoman as she was. Shall I give it to you, when it comes back?’
‘I suppose so,’ she said doubtfully. ‘What else did she do?’
‘Oh the usual: bring food and medicine for the sick, give out flannel in winter where it was needed, that sort of thing. Oftentimes she would bring some small children home here for a day or two, if the mother was sick or injured and there were no older children to look after them. She liked having little children about, if they were not too noisy.’
‘But how did she know what was needed?’
‘From the servants, generally. Most of them don’t live here, you know, but only come in by day from nearby cottages. It’s really only Joseph and I that live here, for the most part.’
‘So I am not to go visiting, and find out the news of the town from my equals, but instead my servants are to bring me news of their people, so that I can act as dressmaker, nurse, and nurserymaid to them? It does not seem very ladylike to me.’
I was annoyed, in spite of all my good resolutions.
‘You asked me what my late mistress did, ma’am, so I told you,’ I said. ‘You are mistress here now, and can do as you think best. But I will say that Mrs Earnshaw was loved and admired by all who knew her, your husband included, and no one ever thought she was less than a lady because she cared for those who were worse off than she, instead of running off to town every day to gossip.’
She had the sense to look a little abashed at this, and I regretted my strong words.
‘You must remember that during the time I knew her, Mrs Earnshaw had always her own children to look after,’ I added more gently, ‘to teach and to guide and to set a good example for, and of course they were her main concern, and took most of her time. Perhaps she had more time for visiting her friends before then – I couldn’t say, for that was before my time here. When your own children come along, your duties will expand accordingly.’
‘Of course they will,’ she pouted. ‘And in the meantime I have a duty to make acquaintance with the better class of my neighbours, I think. Hindley’s mother grew up in the neighbourhood, he told me, so of course she already knew everybody, but it is different for me.’
‘You are the best judge of that,’ I said.
‘But give me the chest when it comes back,’ she added, ‘and I will look it over and see what needs to be done. It will be good practice for making my own baby clothes in time. And if you hear of any beg— any poor cottagers who need something, will you tell me? Then we can consult about what to do, maybe. I shall rely on your advice a good deal, Nelly, you know. I have a feeling you and I are to be great friends, for all I am your mistress.’
I was resolved that she would be nothing of the sort, but I told her I was happy to advise her as to what was needed for the poor, though I rather suspected I would end up furnishing a good deal more than advice in that area. This proved to be the case – Mrs Earnshaw preferred to let me be the one to visit the poor in their cottages, talk with them, and deliver whatever little things would ease their difficulties. I h
ad been doing this already, since the mistress died, so it was no addition to my duties – besides which I liked the walks, and the chance to gossip, and the gratification of being able to confer benevolence at my master’s expense. And it made me popular with the tenants. Whatever I gained by it, though, she lost – at least as regarded the respect of the tenantry and the neighbourhood at large. It did not go unnoticed that she ‘would not take the trouble’ to attend to her charities herself, but delegated a servant to do them for her.
To fulfil her self-imposed duty of amusing herself with constant visits in town, Mrs Earnshaw convinced Hindley that she needed a pony chaise of her own, which he willingly provided. And then, when, on the return from her first foray in this vehicle, the staid little pony broke into a trot unbidden, in its eagerness to be home, she grew frightened, and decided she also needed a boy to drive for her. I made an effort to get Heathcliff to take on this duty, thinking it would please him and build goodwill between them, but she declined to be driven by him, and Heathcliff also objected, so one of the other farm lads was pressed into service instead, to his great amusement, for as he said, he had never heard of anyone needing a coachman for a pony chaise before. In this contraption, Mrs Earnshaw made it her business to go to town some three or four days a week, to shop and pay visits.
All of this cost money, of course. Mrs Earnshaw, to her credit, at least declined Hindley’s proposal to redecorate the house and fit up a parlour for her, saying she liked everything just as it was. But still there was the pony and chaise, and the boy to drive it, and then she spent a great deal on millinery, and had expensive consultations with a dressmaker at regular intervals, to have made up all the finest possible gradations of her mourning. Hindley in turn laid in a large stock of French wines and fine brandy, to establish ‘a proper gentleman’s cellar’, and then had to hire a carpenter to fit up shelves to hold them, and a locksmith to fit a lock to the door, though none of us were like to steal it. Then Mrs Earnshaw evinced a dislike to porridge, and so that staple was banished to the servants’ table and the nursery, while the master and mistress ate fine white bread and rolls, fetched twice a week from the bakery in Gimmerton.
The late master had been a saving man. Like all people, great and small, who derive their livelihood from the land, he well knew what a few bad harvests could do to the household finances. He also had a healthy horror of debt, having seen many times how the first easy steps in that direction could lead inexorably down to ruin. The estate yielded little to spare above household expenses, but that little went to the bank, with the aim of maintaining there a sum that could tide us over any lean years to come. The income from the estate had suffered somewhat during the master’s final illness, when he could not see to things himself, but Joseph had tightened his fist on household expenditures accordingly, and we had all dined on porridge and roast onions, while the mutton went to market. As a result, there was still a good sum of money in the bank, even after the legacies had been paid. A sensible man would have left it there until he learned how to add to it, or at the very least set aside the sum that would be due to Cathy on her marriage. But Hindley had always been under such constraint, he was like a dog kept on a short chain, who suddenly finds a link give way, and takes off like a hare, determined to make up for a lifetime’s captivity all at once.
I said nothing. I had concluded that both duty and interest bade me confine myself to the work I was paid to do, to give advice only if it was asked for, and not involve myself in concerns that were nothing to do with me. Of course, now would have been the time to give my notice and start seeking another position, while Hindley was still feeling generous with his love and his money and his freedom. Yet I kept finding one reason after another to put it off a little further. Had you asked me then why I stayed, I would have given you one or another of these reasons, in the full conviction that they were all that motivated me, but the truth was that I did not want to leave. Not that I was happy there, particularly, nor that I could not see trouble coming – I would have had to be blind not to – but I had come to feel, deep in my heart, that my fate was bound up in that of Wuthering Heights and its family, and all my bitter experience had yet to shake that feeling.
Not long after Hindley’s return, my mother came to visit us for the first time since that ill-fated Christmas, three years before. She came officially to visit Hindley and meet his new wife, but she had another purpose that became evident as soon as she had me alone.
‘Leave their service, Nell,’ she said.
‘Why should I?’ I said, my heart beating faster. ‘I couldn’t get so good a position elsewhere, at my age.’
‘You could, in fact. There’s a wool merchant’s family in Brassing now, looking for a housekeeper, who’d count themselves lucky to get you, knowing me as they do. You’ll get better wages and better treatment there, for they know the value of an intelligent and honest housekeeper, and being in trade themselves, they don’t expect to get more than they pay for.’ But when she saw me looking stubborn, she put her hands on my shoulders and spoke more seriously: ‘Hindley’s married, Nell. What was between you is over and done. You’ll do no good to them here, nor they to you, if you stay. There’s no worse sin you can do than to come between man and wife.’
‘Come between them!’ I cried hotly. ‘What are you accusing me of? I could no more come between them than I could between a dog and his skin! Hindley hovers over her as if he was her cloak, and he scarcely speaks to me but to complain I’m not waiting on Her Ladyship fast enough.’ I was fighting to keep back tears, now, but I’d rather have died than show my mother that, and to hide it I showed her so sullen and defiant a face you might have mistaken me for Cathy, or Heathcliff himself.
‘Hush,’ she said sharply. ‘Nelly, you well know what I mean. There are things between you and Hindley that he can’t share with his wife.’
‘Which is true whether I’m here or not.’
‘But which your being here keeps always before him.’
‘If he doesn’t like it, he can give me notice.’
‘He won’t. You know that. He could never find another housekeeper to do all that you do here, for double your wages, or treble even. I’d guess he doesn’t pay you the whole of what he owes you now, does he?’ I looked down and said nothing, but the colour that rose in my face gave away my answer surely enough. Recently, Hindley had given me only about a third of my wages in money, and the rest in his note of hand, and managing the household accounts as I did, I couldn’t see how he was like to do better, or as well, in future.
‘Do you want to become like old Joseph, hoarding up the lengthening score of your unpaid wages, and fancying yourself rich because you have what can do you no good in this world or the next?’
‘So that’s what he keeps in that old Bible of his!’ I cried, glad enough to find something to laugh about, and change the subject. ‘He won’t let anyone else touch it, Mother, but snatches it away, mumbling that he’s been a “servant of servants, and laid by treasure in Heaven”.’ I declare, he’s gone mad, and thinks he’ll collect his unpaid wages after death!’
‘It wouldn’t surprise me, though I doubt the final reckoning there will be much to his liking,’ she said. ‘But you’re the last one ought to laugh at him, Nelly, when you’re headed down the same road yourself.’ Her words stung, more than I liked. The truth was that I’d treasured Hindley’s note of hand more than I ever had my wages, because it held him to me, will he or nill he, and I’d imagined myself, a year or two hence, with a handful more to add to it, maybe giving me a bit more respect in the household. I didn’t like to compare those thoughts to the picture of old Joseph clutching his Bible and mumbling his strange toothless mixtures of prayers and curses at us all.
So I dropped that subject, and instead began trotting out all the reasons I had been telling over to myself, for why I ought to stay. I spoke of my fears for how Heathcliff would fare under Hindley’s authority, and recalled the master’s request to me to look out
for him, which I described as a deathbed promise from me to him; I mentioned the new mistress’s ignorance of housekeeping and her reliance on my judgement, and my new role as her almoner among the poor in the neighbourhood. I represented to her more generally how careless both she and Hindley were of household expenses, and hinted at how easy it would be for a new housekeeper, with no ties of duty or affection to the family, to take advantage of their carelessness, and line her own pockets at their expense.
‘In short, you have no intention of leaving, whatever I may say,’ said my mother irritably.
I opened my mouth to deny this, stopped, and then shut it again. If she ordered me to leave, would I obey her? And if not, why encourage her to try? I looked steadily at my feet. ‘I think it is right for me to stay,’ I said softly.
My mother sighed. ‘I don’t think it is right at all,’ she said, but there was no argument in her voice. ‘I suppose I ought not to be angry that you are eager to stay where you know you are needed, and that you see a duty here. And if I thought duty was all your motive, I would be at peace with it, though I still think you could do a great deal better elsewhere. But it is not all your motive, is it?’
I continued to stare at my feet. My face was burning, and I felt tears welling in my eyes. ‘It is,’ I insisted. ‘The rest – all that, you know – it’s over now. I swear it is.’ I made myself look her in the eyes. ‘I have learned my lesson; I know my place now.’
‘It’s only your place whilst you are here, Nelly,’ she said gently. ‘Among manufacturing people, places are not so fixed. Why, thirty years ago I would have considered Mrs Thorne my inferior, and her husband was your father’s playmate in youth, as you know. Now she is my mistress, and could easily place herself as above me, yet I count her my friend, and she treats me as an equal. You would make your own place there. And you’re a comely lass yet, Nell: it wouldn’t surprise me, in a few years, to see you mistress of a snug household of your own.’
