They called you dark-skinned gypsy, dirty lascar, vagabond, devil. You’ll give them dark, dirt, devil. Cathy wanted a whip. Hindley a fiddle. You’ll give her whip, him fiddle. You took a seat at the end of the hearthstone. Petted a liver-coloured bitch. There was some warmth in the room and it came from an open fire. Flames that licked, peat that steamed, coals that glowed, and wood that hissed.
Hindley called you dog and beat you with an iron bar. Mr Earnshaw tried once more to stop him. He sent Hindley to college, just to get the maniac away. And things picked up for a while. Then you watched your father die, watched the life drain from his eyes, his last breath leave his lips. You knelt at his feet and wept. You held onto his lifeless hand, the skin as brittle as a wren’s shell. Cathy wiped the tears from your eyes. Hindley came back from the funeral with a wife. She was soft in the head and as thin as a whippet. Always coughing her guts up. Things got bad again. Banished from the house, set to work outside, in the pissing wind and whirling rain. You were flogged, locked out, spent your evenings shivering in a corner while that cunt stuffed his face, supping ale and brandy. Eating and drinking, singing and laughing with his slut.
The wind has lulled now and you listen to its hush. You hear a fox scream and an owl cry. The night gathers in pleats of black and blue. The cold rain falls. You teeter on the brink. It would be so easy to tumble and smash your skull on the rocks. Let the life bleed out of the cracks and let the slimy things take you. No one would miss you. Not even you. The only thing that is real is the hardness of the rock and the pestilent air that festers. You could dive head-first onto the granite. Dead in an instant. Released from the teeth of experience.
You remember another night as black as this. Your love had lost her shoes in the bog beneath Whitestone Clough. You crept through a broken hedge, groping your way up the path in the dark, planting yourselves on a flowerpot, under the drawing-room window. They hadn’t put the shutters up and the light poured out. You clung to the ledge and peered in. It was carpeted in crimson and there were crimson-covered chairs. A shining white ceiling fretted with gold. A shower of glass drops hanging on silver chains, shimmering. It was Edgar and his sister Isabella. She was screaming, shrieking as if witches were ramming red-hot needles in her eyes. Edgar was standing on the hearth weeping. In the middle of a table sat a little dog, shaking its paw and yelping. They were crying over that dog, the silly cunts. Both had wanted to hold it and neither had let the other do so. You laughed, you and Cathy. They were like toy dogs themselves, all prim and prettified. Milksopped and mollycoddled.
They stopped yelping. They must have heard you laugh. Then Edgar saw you at the window and started shouting. You ran for it, but they’d let the bulldog loose, a big bastard with a big bastard head, and it had got Cathy by the ankle. It sank its bastard teeth in and wouldn’t let go. You got a stone and thrust it between its bastard jaws, crammed it down its bastard throat, throttled that bastard dog with your bare hands. Its huge purple tongue was hanging half a foot out of its mouth, and blood and slaver dripped from its lips.
Then there was a servant running towards you. A big bear of a man. He grabbed Cathy and dragged her in. You followed him. Mr Linton was running down the hallway, shouting ‘What is it?’ The man grabbed you inside too and pulled you under the chandelier. Mr Linton was looking over his spectacles. Isabella said, ‘Put him in the cellar.’ ‘That’s Mr Earnshaw’s daughter,’ said another. ‘Her foot is bleeding.’ You cursed the servant, swore like a trooper. He dragged you into the garden, threw you on the grass, then went back to the house and locked the door behind him.
You went to the window again. Thought about smashing it in. She was sitting on the sofa. A servant brought a bowl of water. They took off her shoes and stockings. They washed her feet. They fed her cake. Edgar stood and gawped. They dried her wild hair and combed it sober. They wheeled her to the fire. The Lintons stood there staring.
You should shelter. Soaked to the bone and shivering, teeth chatter in your skull. You think about a nook beneath Nab Hill where the earth is soft and the rocks block the wind. It was the first place you and Cathy fucked. She took hold and put you inside her. Her white thighs astride your black hips. Your teacher, your lover, your sister, your mother. She was all you needed in the world. The rest could go to hell.
She stayed at Thrushcross Grange for five weeks. Till Christmas. Hardly knew her when she returned. Turned up on a black pony, hair all done, wearing a fancy hat with a feather in the ribbon. Even her speech was altered. She was dressed in a silk frock. You felt ashamed of your appearance, felt dirty. Your hair was coarse and uncombed. She said you looked grim and laughed in your face. You couldn’t stand to listen to that laugh, couldn’t stand to be so black next to one so white. You ran out of the room, burning with shame. Your flesh was a fire of disgust. The next day the Lintons were invited to the house. You were banished to the outbuildings. They called you dog, called you devil. You’ll give them dog, give them devil.
Your thoughts are jumbled. They whirr like the storm around you. They make a flaysome din in your skull. Shelter. There’s a cave under Penistone Crags. A roof over your head. A hole to lig in. Get out of the storm. Where are you? Somehow you are lost. The moor so familiar, but you don’t recognise the landscape. You make out black shapes, skeletal outlines of withered hawthorns. Whinstone and mud. The ground keels. You are somewhere. You are nowhere. You are here. The night is as black as your shame, as black as your face. You are wandering like a blind man. You don’t know anything any more. Not what’s up. Not what’s down. You don’t know who you are, where you came from. You don’t even know your own name.
I woke the next morning with my head on a pillow of mud, Cathy. I could hear the worms crawl through the earth beneath. I imagined them poking their blind noses through the loam. I ached all over. Every bone was a bruise. Everything I touched and everything around me was cold and wet. I watched an ant crawl over the back of my hand, clambering over each hair as though it were a hillock. It was a bright June morning. The sun was shining, making the dew glisten. I stood slowly, painfully, and looked around. I recognised where I was. Somewhere between Harbut Clough and Shackleton Knoll. Not far from the prominent stoop where you first kissed me on the lips. Lips so soft. Kisses so sweet. The lark and the linnet sang to us.
I walked along a faint path, past Lumb Falls, towards Abel Cross. My head was pounding and my mouth was parched. My eyes stung and my legs throbbed. I was shivering. I picked up pace. Got to gather heat. I walked past a cluster of farmhouses and stone outbuildings. By a mistal I could hear the milch cows lowing inside. Maybe they would let me have some barley bread and buttermilk. No, got to keep on going. I contoured over the hillside, Crimsworth Dean in the distance. The forest beneath, a verdant roof of leaves. I could see at the top of the woods the outline of Slurry Rock jutting out like a boar’s fang. I walked along the grassy bank of the beck until it sloped gently down to the water. I stooped to drink where the flow was strong. I let the cold of the water flurry in the cup of my hands, then supped greedily. My mouth and throat unclagged as the cool liquid slooshed.
I could live out here, a wild man in a cave. I didn’t need anyone else, want anyone else, have anyone else. I could catch rabbits with snares I’d make myself and cook them on the fire. I could make a rod out of willow and fish for trout and pike. I could make a bed out of fresh heather and, like the titmouse, I’d gather the soft heads of cotton grass to line my nest. Fuck people, I didn’t need them. People only brought you pain. Better to stay away from people. At least until I had a plan.
I thought about you with the Lintons that day, when they came to visit. I vowed to get you all or die attempting it. Supping mulled ale from silver mugs. I was a stain on their polished tray. I was the muck on their well-scrubbed floor. Leave them