What Souls Are Made Of--A Wuthering Heights Remix Read online

  My stomach feels leaden. I do not know what to do now, except sit silent and still, as Nelly exhales and takes my hand. Her grip is very firm.

  “Miss Cathy,” she says lowly. “You must not wail or complain. You must not speak of Heathcliff at all, here. The Lintons have suffered a terrible loss, and you must put their feelings first.”

  Nelly often does this, talking to me as if I do not understand how other people’s feelings work. As if I have not comforted Edgar plenty of times when he has been miserable for some reason or another. She has often told me I am hard of heart, but I think it is quite mean of her to imply such a thing all over again when I am lying on my sickbed.

  “Tell me what you mean,” I say impatiently.

  She clutches my hand tighter. “Mr. and Mrs. Linton also caught fever,” she says, in that same low voice. I understand now that she is trying to be somber and respectful, and wishes me to be the same. “They have died. Your Edgar is Mr. Linton now. He and his sister are in mourning.”

  The breath leaves my lungs, all at once. “Both of them?” I say.

  Nelly nods.

  “I know how it feels to lose both parents, and to be alone. I’ll be kind to him,” I tell her.

  “Very prettily put,” she says. “You should say so to him yourself. And be kind to his sister too.”

  “I will,” I say. “Of course I will. You think I’m so cold, Nelly, but I am not.”

  And suddenly, my eyes are streaming. I am weeping.

  There is a pause. Then Nelly gathers me up. She is awkward, holding me, because it isn’t how we are with each other, but she still does it. “Hush now. Hush.”

  But I need not hush. I should mourn. I am going to marry Edgar one day. We have agreed it, even if we are not formally engaged. We have an understanding, so that means I should understand how he feels, shouldn’t I? His pain should be my pain, and I love him enough to grieve that he has lost his parents. And he and Isabella are so soft. The slightest inconvenience upsets them. They cry over the smallest hurts. A grief like this will drown them. I’ll have to join them in those waters, or they will begin to think I am as hard-hearted as Nelly does. As my father did once too.

  Nelly is still holding me. “Don’t cry,” she mutters. “It’ll all be well, Miss Cathy. Wait and see.”

  Does she think I really mourn? I do mourn, a little. But it is Heathcliff I mourn the most. My tears are the same ones I wept when I realized he was gone. That he left without even saying goodbye to me. He heard—he was there when …

  It doesn’t matter. I won’t think of that. Not now.

  Where is Heathcliff? And why hasn’t he come home to me? How could he have listened to my words, and taken them so seriously?

  Surely he knows my heart better than this. He must.

  Nelly may say what she likes. But it will not be well until Heathcliff is safe.

  Chapter Three

  Heathcliff

  I’M SOFT.

  Don’t like that I am. Before, I didn’t think I was. I despise people like that. Edgar Linton’s soft. So pale and big-eyed. Never been hurt by anything but the fist I put in his face once, because he was bothering you, Cathy. Simpering over you. He cried then. Fat, miserable tears. Shocked. Like the world had never done him harm before and he didn’t know what to do now it had.

  I don’t cry when I’m hit. I’ve learned better. Same as you.

  Mostly I’m strong. Throw me out on the moors at night, I’ll do fine. Give me an axe, tell me to set a fire, harvest peat, I can do it. I can work land. Want me to take a punch, and I’ll take it. Pain doesn’t frighten me.

  But the city is hell. Never seen the like of it. Beggars in corners. People shouting, screaming. Laughter too, and quiet talk, but even that is too much when there’s so many people. My ears are ringing. Raw nerves are all I am, stumbling about, trying to find a place to stop and breathe.

  I know about Liverpool. Or thought I knew. I know the ships dock here, carrying all sorts. Sugar, rum, tobacco. What Nelly bakes into the cakes, what Hindley drinks and smokes. It’s all from here. I came from here too. Don’t think I was carried over the water, though I keep dreaming of it. Gray, shifting. Enough to make me sick, like I’m caught on it forever.

  Can’t see the water. No sea and no river, not yet. The thick of the city’s got me. But the city’s gray and shifting like tidal waves. So many people and so much noise, lights spilling out of doors and windows. But the roads are filth. Suffering’s all over. There’s rats, mangy dogs. People who’re all skin over bones. But there’s money, too. That’s why most come here—to make money, to know what being rich is. And some must get it. I see it round me. Ladies in colorful skirts. Carriages. Big signs over shops, painted up bright, selling hats and ribbons, sugar sweets. Things people don’t get for need but for want, now they’ve got money to feed their wants with.

  I see a tavern. People spilling out the doors, and candles lit inside. I’m thirsty. Near the Heights there’s a spring. Clean, fresh water for drinking if it’s boiled right. There’s no water like that here. Only sick stuff, stinking and rotten. But I don’t walk over to the tavern for small beer, the light stuff that’ll fix thirst safer than water can. I go in, and it’s all noise and bodies pressed up against me. I want to go straight back out, but I don’t. I go and buy an ale. Proper ale. I don’t hide that I’ve got a little coin.

  It doesn’t take long. A man sidles up to me. He’s friendly. Asks me when I came to the city. I tell him today. Just a few hours ago, in fact.

  “I came into the first tavern I saw,” I say. I make myself sound nervous. I’ve been told I look sullen, angry, when I’m not thinking. But when I try, I can look different.

  “Your first experience of Liverpool,” he says, whistling through his teeth. “It must be a big shock!”

  “Yes,” I say to him. “A real shock. You get nothing like this where I come from.”

  His eyes rake me over. Maybe he’s thinking I don’t look like someone who comes from the same soil as he does. Or maybe he just thinks I’m a country fool, same as all the rest who come here looking for work and find drink instead.

  “You’re a young lad,” he says comfortingly. “Everything’ll be new to you. I remember when I was your age…” He trails off, and clucks his tongue against his teeth. “But you’ll get used to the life here soon enough.”

  “You think so?” I keep an innocent look on me. Let him think I trust him. Let him think we’re friends.

  He smiles, and says, “Let’s get you a better drink. Have you ever drunk wine?”

  No. I’ve never had strong ale neither. But real wine’s rich stuff. Costs good coin. I lick bitter ale foam from my teeth, lips closed. Think about what to do. Then I shake my head at him.

  “Then let’s get you a proper welcome,” he says warmly, and slaps a heavy hand against my back. I don’t shake him off.

  He gets me wine. I try it, because he’s watching. My head starts feeling light. But the way I stumble after him, that’s for show.

  I tip some wine away as I stumble. The less I carry, the less I’ll have to drink when he looks.

  He takes me over to his friends. They’re playing cards. The deck is grubby, the red on the hearts and diamonds so bright it’s bloodlike. They’re playing a game. Lanterloo. Do I know it? They ask me. I tell them no. They all grin, friendly. We’re all friends here. They say they’ll teach me to play.

  I sit.

  We play for a while. Can’t tip all the wine away, so I hold it up, pretending to drink. And then I drink a bit for real. One of them says, “Why don’t we wager? Just for fun.”

  I agree.

  We make bets. I win the first round. They all applaud me. A woman handing out drinks looks over and rolls her eyes. Turns away.

  I smile at them. Let them think I believe I’ve won fair. That they’re getting me nice and drunk. That I’ll wager more and more coin. That they’ll take everything I’ve got when I’m good and drunk and trusting. I know this sham. br />
  The whole time, I’m watching them. Trying to trick them—that’ll be a risk. I know it. But I can read them. The twist of a mouth. Way they hold their cards. There’s answers in that, stuff that tells me who has a good hand and who doesn’t. Who’s lying and who isn’t.

  We’re all friends here. We keep playing.

  Two rounds later, I’m ready to strike. I wager like I did before. I lose once. They comfort me. Say it happens to everyone. Ask me if I want another drink. I’ll win one more, then lose worse in a moment. But then. Then I’ll surprise them. I’ll turn their game on them and take all their coin from their hands. Show them I’m no easy mark. They’re trying to con me, but I’m going to be the one to con them.

  But first I try to make nice. I say I’ll get the drinks this time. They protest. But I insist. They tell me I’m good, a good young man. I get up, taking most of my coin off the table. “So I can get you good wine, like you got for me,” I say, earnest. They laugh. They don’t think much of me. I go. Move through the crowd.

  A hand grabs my sleeve.

  “Don’t fight me now,” a voice says. But it’s not a threat. It’s not the fake friendly of the men, either. “You don’t want to make them angry. And you’re going to. The second you win, you’ll have a knife in your belly, and no one here’ll defend you.”

  I’m not scared of knives. But I’m no fool. I look at the boy who’s got me. He’s my age, maybe. Hard to tell. Bony-faced, tall, nose freckled. Brown as me, but different. African. He tugs my sleeve again.

  “Come on,” he says. “If you want ale, we’ll get it somewhere else.”

  “I don’t want ale,” I say. “I want to win more money.”

  “Then win it from people you can fight,” he says. “Not them. Come on.”

  Most of my money’s in my pocket, but not all. Thinking of leaving what’s on the table makes my teeth itch. But thinking of a knife in the belly gets me moving.

  I follow him out. We walk fast together. Uneven streets, wet now from rain I didn’t hear. Lights mirrored on it. Makes everything look strange. I think, if he’s tricking me, I can take him. I’ve still got my knife. Sold the sickle a while back, when I was still on the road to Liverpool, but the knife’s reliable. He said those men would gut me? Well, I can gut him too. He’s given me ideas.

  But he doesn’t turn on me. He gets me somewhere I can see water. Not open sea, but a closed-up dock, keeping the water level under ships. I realize I’m looking at the Mersey. All river, no sea, though we’ve got the sea’s ships in front of us. Still, the smell of salt’s here, and something else. City smell. He exhales, all at once.

  “James,” he says, offering me his hand. “But you can call me Jamie. Everyone does.”

  I take it. We shake.

  “Heathcliff,” I say.

  “Where did you learn sharping?” Jamie asks. “You almost fooled them.”

  Hindley taught me. He didn’t mean to. He didn’t like me, but he liked gambling. Liked cards and dice and drink, and sometimes I could observe a game or two. When he was really drunk he could be nice or deadly. I’d watch him: if his hand went for his cards, if he slurred out my name, I’d come sit. Cut the deck for him. Learn.

  His friends all cheated him. Men from the village. Gentlemen from his school days. He didn’t see how they looked at him when they bled him dry, hungry and disgusted all at once. But I did. And I learned.

  I shake my head. “They would have knifed me.”

  “You asking me? Yeah, they would have done it. Isaiah and his men are okay sharpers, but you spend your time shamming laborers, and you get to be ruthless. Laborers are strong, and they don’t like to get tricked. Sometimes they get violent.” He flexes a hand to demonstrate. “So Isaiah’s men know how to fight. You could be a better sharper, but you’d best learn to be smarter before you risk your neck like that again.”

  My stomach feels hot. I don’t like being a fool. Don’t even want to thank him, but I make myself do it.

  He shrugs, scuffing a boot against stone. “We have to watch out for each other.”

  We. Like we’re the same. I stay quiet.

  He starts walking again. I follow. We walk side by side, mirroring steps.

  “You’re not a farmhand,” he says eventually. “Not their usual mark. I knew it. Second I saw you, I knew.”

  “Saw,” I repeat flatly. Think of my skin and his. “What did you see?”

  “You’ve got scarred hands,” he says, easy and quiet. Like we’re friends, just talking. “Maybe you’re running from a bad master? An owner? I hear law’s changed on that, but you’d never know it here.”

  “I’ve got no master,” I bite out.

  “Says nothing about you if you do,” Jamie says. “Or … did. You’re here now. You don’t have one anymore.” He goes silent, thinking. Then says, “Are you a lascar?”

  “Lascar,” I say, like I’m his echo.

  “A sailor from the East,” he explains. “But if you don’t know—I guess not, right?”

  I didn’t need it explained. I know the word. Been called it before. Look at him, a regular dark little lascar isn’t he? Villagers over in Gimmerton, people sitting behind me in church—I heard it whispered about me. Dripping in my ears like poison. But right now, standing by the Mersey, the word lascar settles on me strange, like weight on my bones. I don’t know what to say, but I don’t need to. Jamie’s gone on speaking.

  “Maybe I’m thinking wrongly. Maybe you’re a rich man’s bastard, cast out of your home? No?”

  I don’t shake my head, don’t glare, but he reads the silence all the same.

  “Then you’re just another laborer after all. No work in your old village, so now you’re here trying to make your fortune.” He exhales. “Ah well. That’s dull.”

  He stops, turning on his heel to look at me.

  “You need a bed, I know a lady who’s renting one,” he says. “Well. Half a bed. You haven’t got enough for a whole one.”

  I lost coin to Isaiah because this stranger interfered. But I say, “You don’t know that.”

  His mouth twitches. Almost smiling.

  “Don’t fight me,” he cautions, and lifts a hand up. Shows me a palmful of coins. And I jerk, touch my pocket, and realize it’s lighter.

  “It’s yours, it’s yours,” he says quick, and hands it over. Pours it out so I have to reach and catch it. Can’t reach for my knife at the same time. Smart of him. “But there’s a lesson for you. You can do numbers and shams. That’s good. But you’re too soft. You’ll need to learn better.”

  He looks at me, waiting. Maybe he wants me to ask him to teach me.

  I say nothing.

  “Come on,” he says eventually. “I’ll show you what you can rent.”

  I’ve got pride. But I’m tired, head heavy. I don’t say no. I keep on walking. Don’t even turn back and walk away when he says, all casual, “Where are you from anyway? I can ask.” Quick grin. “My da’s a sailor. Kru, from the Pepper Coast. It’s part of Africa,” he adds when I stare at him. He says it like he’s said it plenty before. Like people often don’t know. “Ma’s Irish. What about you?”

  “I don’t know,” I say lowly. It’s not true. Not a lie either though.

  “Right,” he says. He doesn’t look pitying. Good. I’d have fought him, if he’d pitied me. “Well, maybe one day you’ll figure it out.”

  * * *

  I lie in my half bed. A stranger lies next to me, silent. Someone in another bed’s snoring loud. I can’t sleep.

  My pockets are lighter, a frightening kind of light, because I paid for a month in full. This is the best I could get. Half a bed, in a house that takes men who aren’t white. Aren’t “properly English,” is what the landlord said. So, this is where I’ll stay.

  I hesitated. Didn’t want to pay so much. But the landlord said to me, “You can stay here, laddie, or you can stay in a cellar.” He pointed down. Like I don’t know where cellars are. “It’ll only cost you a penny a night,
if money’s your worry, but you’ll get dirty water up to the knee whenever it rains. Some places put beds high up on bricks, but not all, and that doesn’t help the smell—”

  “I’ll take the half bed,” I said, cutting off his words.

  “Good choice,” he said to me. I paid up.

  The only light’s from rushlights—reeds burning in holders. The sheets are musty. The air’s got a thick smell, sweet mold, coal smoke. I lie awake and think. Can’t stop thinking.

  Cathy … Where am I from?

  I shouldn’t ask you. You don’t know.

  Most of the time, I never cared, not knowing. I wanted to be where you were. Home was the Heights. Home was you. But I wondered, sometimes. And now there’s no you for me anymore, I wonder almost always.

  When I was a boy, I lived in this city. I don’t remember much now. But I was hungry. The kind of hunger that eats you. You start seeing your own ribs. You want to sleep all the time.

  It was your father who found me, Cathy. Stopped dead in the street. Looked at me, eyes big as plates. He thought he knew where I came from. It made him act strange. Made him carry me home under his coat, telling me he’d give me a new family. He fed me, too. First time he did, it made me sick. After that, he was careful. Small bites only. Meat pie, still hot—just a piece of crust, a sliver of the gravy from inside. A bit of bread. Maybe I don’t remember my life, but I remember how good bread was.

  He told me I’d get porridge in my new home. He told me what it’d be like. Milky, so thick you could stand a spoon up in it. As a treat, it’d have a pat of butter in it, he said. Or black treacle. Sweet, sticky. Hearing that made me hungrier. Made me eat my food fast again, not scared of getting sick.

  I remember him watching me eat, like his eyes were starving for it.

  He asked me my name. I didn’t answer. Don’t know what I would have answered now. That’s long gone.

  “Heathcliff,” he said. “I’ll name you Heathcliff.” Ran a hand over my hair. “That was my firstborn’s name.”

  I didn’t ask if his firstborn was dead. Hearing him, I already knew.