"Oh, Ellen! don't let them say such things," she pursued in great trouble. "Papa is gone to fetch my cousin from London: my cousin is a gentleman's son. That my—" she stopped, and wept outright; upset at the bare notion of relationship with such a clown. (18.72)
Upon first meeting her cousin, young Cathy allows status anxiety to guide her treatment of Hareton. Like her mother, Cathy wants to belong to the right people. What she doesn't realize yet is that Hareton is in fact the rightful owner of Wuthering Heights.
Quote 2
"Oh, I will die," she exclaimed, "since no one cares anything about me. I wish I had not taken that." Then a good while after I heard her murmur, "No, I'll not die—he'd be glad—he does not love me at all—he would never miss me!" (12.6)
Catherine enjoys engineering the romantic dramas in her life. She yearns to provoke Edgar into a frenzy of concern, but he will never be as tormented as she would like.