Wuthering Heights & Jane Eyre
by Charlotte Brontë & Emily Brontë
Contents
Wuthering Heights — CHAPTER III
Overview
Lockwood, forced to sleep in a forbidden chamber, finds Catherine’s inscriptions and diary, then endures nightmares culminating in a chilling encounter with Catherine Linton’s ghost. Heathcliff’s raw grief erupts when he hears her name, exposing his enduring obsession. Morning tensions with the household follow, and Heathcliff guides Lockwood safely home through the snow.
Summary
Zillah warns Lockwood to be quiet as she hides him in a disused chamber. Inside an oak closet-bed, he discovers books and a window-ledge scrawled with the name Catherine in variants—Earnshaw, Heathcliff, and Linton—and reads Catherine Earnshaw’s childish notes describing Hindley’s cruelty to Heathcliff and oppressive Sabbaths under Joseph.
Falling asleep, Lockwood dreams first of attending an interminable sermon by Jabez Branderham, which devolves into a violent melee. A second nightmare fixes on the casement: he grasps an icy hand and hears a voice claiming to be Catherine Linton, begging entry after twenty years. Terrified, he wounds the apparition’s wrist on the broken pane and screams.
Heathcliff rushes in, shaken. Lockwood, rattled, mentions “Catherine Linton,” provoking Heathcliff’s fury and barely suppressed anguish. After Lockwood dresses, Heathcliff, alone, opens the window and desperately implores “Cathy” to return, breaking down in grief.
Before dawn, Lockwood dozes by the kitchen fire as Joseph, then Hareton Earnshaw, appear. In the house, Zillah tends the hearth while the young widow, Mrs. Heathcliff, reads. Heathcliff berates her idleness; hostilities pause when Lockwood enters. Declining breakfast, Lockwood leaves at first light.
Heathcliff accompanies Lockwood across the snow-blotted moor, guiding him by lost markers to Thrushcross Park. Lockwood then stumbles alone through drifts to the Grange, arriving exhausted at noon, to servants who had feared him dead.
Who Appears
- Mr. LockwoodNarrator; discovers Catherine’s writings, suffers nightmares, encounters a ghostly Catherine, and is guided home by Heathcliff.
- HeathcliffHost; shaken by Lockwood’s scream, enraged at Catherine’s name, then pleads in grief for ‘Cathy’ and escorts Lockwood back.
- Catherine Linton (apparition)Ghostly voice at the window begging entry after twenty years; triggers Heathcliff’s anguished outcry.
- ZillahServant who lodges Lockwood in the forbidden room; later tends the fire and endures Heathcliff’s scolding.
- Hareton EarnshawSurly young man; performs morning chores, curses under his breath, ignores Lockwood.
- Mrs. Heathcliff (young widow)Heathcliff’s daughter-in-law; reading by the hearth, defies Heathcliff’s orders, then withdraws in sullen silence.
- JosephMorose servant; appears from his garret, smokes in silence; featured in Catherine’s diary and Lockwood’s dream.
- Jabez Branderham (dream)Fantastical preacher in Lockwood’s nightmare, delivering an absurdly long sermon that incites a brawl.