Wuthering Heights

charity. I gave him my heart, and he took and pinched it to death, and
flung it back to me. People feel with their hearts, Ellen: and since he
has destroyed mine, I have not power to feel for him: and I would not,
though he groaned from this to his dying day, and wept tears of blood
for Catherine! No, indeed, indeed, I wouldn’t!” And here Isabella began
to cry; but, immediately dashing the water from her lashes, she
recommenced. “You asked, what has driven me to flight at last? I was
compelled to attempt it, because I had succeeded in rousing his rage a
pitch above his malignity. Pulling out the nerves with red hot pincers
requires more coolness than knocking on the head. He was worked up to
forget the fiendish prudence he boasted of, and proceeded to murderous
violence. I experienced pleasure in being able to exasperate him: the
sense of pleasure woke my instinct of self-preservation, so I fairly
broke free; and if ever I come into his hands again he is welcome to a
signal revenge.

“Yesterday, you know, Mr. Earnshaw should have been at the funeral. He
kept himself sober for the purpose—tolerably sober: not going to bed
mad at six o’clock and getting up drunk at twelve. Consequently, he