Mrs. Dean tells Lockwood that the events she is recounting happened only the previous winter. She notices his interest in Catherine Linton and teases that he might fall in love with her, but Lockwood insists he will return to the wider world and asks whether Catherine obeyed Edgar Linton’s command to stop visiting Wuthering Heights.

Mrs. Dean explains that Catherine obeyed because devotion to her father remained her strongest feeling. Edgar, aware that he was dying, questioned Mrs. Dean about Linton Heathcliff’s character and prospects. Mrs. Dean judged Linton delicate and unlikely to live to manhood, but not cruel like Heathcliff, and suggested Edgar would have time to learn whether Linton could suit Catherine.

Edgar looked toward the churchyard and reflected on his own approaching death. Though he had long wished to be buried beside Catherine Earnshaw, he now feared leaving young Catherine exposed to enemies. Edgar said he could bear Heathcliff’s triumph if Linton could comfort Catherine, but not if Linton were only a weak instrument of Heathcliff’s designs; Mrs. Dean promised to remain Catherine’s friend and counsellor.

Spring came, but Edgar did not truly recover, though Catherine mistook his walks and flushed appearance for signs of returning health. On Catherine’s seventeenth birthday, rain kept Edgar from his usual churchyard visit. Edgar wrote again to Linton, asking to see him, but Linton replied that Heathcliff would not allow him to come to Thrushcross Grange and begged instead for a meeting outside, arguing that he and Catherine did not deserve separation.

Edgar pitied Linton but refused because he could not accompany Catherine himself. He offered letters in the meantime, and Linton continued writing; however, Heathcliff inspected the correspondence and shaped it away from Linton’s personal complaints toward repeated pleas for an interview with Catherine. With Catherine also urging Edgar at home, Edgar finally agreed that Catherine and Linton might ride or walk together about once a week, under Mrs. Dean’s guardianship, on the moors near the Grange.

Mrs. Dean explains that Edgar’s decision was also influenced by inheritance concerns: he wished Catherine might retain or return to Thrushcross Grange through marriage to his heir. Edgar did not know that Linton was failing almost as quickly as himself. Mrs. Dean admits she too began to think Linton might be improving, not yet understanding that Heathcliff was forcing his sick son to pursue the marriage because death threatened to spoil Heathcliff’s plans.