The Burden
Page 19
‘Leave Shirley out of it. This is between you and Henry. How do you feel about Henry? That it was all for the best?’
‘No.’
‘Thank God for that.’
‘Henry didn’t want to die. I killed him.’
‘Do you regret?’
‘If you mean – would I do it again? – yes.’
‘Without remorse?’
‘Remorse? Oh yes. It was a wicked thing to do. I know that. I’ve lived with it ever since. I can’t forget.’
‘Hence the Foundation for Sub-Normal Children? Good works? A course of duty, stern duty. It’s your way of making amends.’
‘It’s all I can do.’
‘Is it any use?’
‘What do you mean? It’s worth while.’
‘I’m not talking of its use to others. Does it help you?’
‘I don’t know …’
‘It’s punishment you want, isn’t it?’
‘I want, I suppose, to make amends.’
‘To whom? Henry? But Henry’s dead. And from all I’ve heard, there’s nothing that Henry would care less about than sub-normal children. You must face it, Laura, you can’t make amends.’
She stood motionless for a moment, like one stricken. Then she flung back her head, the colour rose in her cheeks. She looked at him defiantly, and his heart leapt in sudden admiration.
‘That’s true,’ she said. ‘I’ve been trying, perhaps, to dodge that. You’ve shown me that I can’t. I told you I didn’t believe in God, but I do, really. I know that what I’ve done was evil. I think I believe, in my heart of hearts, that I shall be damned for it. Unless I repent – and I don’t repent. I did what I did with my eyes open. I wanted Shirley to have her chance, to be happy, and she was happy. Oh, I know it didn’t last long – only three years. But if for three years she was happy and contented, and even if she did die young, then it’s worth it.’
As he looked at her, the greatest temptation of his life came to Llewellyn – the temptation to hold his tongue, never to tell her the truth. Let her keep her illusion, since it was all she had. He loved her. Loving her, how could he strike her brave courage down into the dust? She need never know.
He walked over to the window, pulled aside the curtain, stared out unseeing into the lighted streets.
When he turned, his voice was harsh.
‘Laura,’ he said, ‘do you know how your sister died?’
‘She was run over –’
‘That, yes. But how she came to be run over – that you don’t know. She was drunk.’
‘Drunk?’ she repeated the word almost uncomprehendingly. ‘You mean – there had been a party?’
‘No party. She crept secretly out of the house and down to the town. She did that now and again. She sat in a café there, drinking brandy. Not very often. Her usual practice was to drink at home. Lavender water and eau-de-Cologne. She drank them until she passed out. The servants knew; Wilding didn’t.’
‘Shirley – drinking? But she never drank! Not in that way! Why?’
‘She drank because she found her life unbearable, she drank to escape.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘It’s true. She told me herself. When Henry died, she became like someone who had lost their way. That’s what she was – a lost, bewildered child.’
‘But she loved Richard, and Richard loved her.’
‘Richard loved her, but did she ever love him? A brief infatuation – that’s all it ever was. And then, weakened by sorrow and the long strain of looking after an irascible invalid, she married him.’
‘And she wasn’t happy. I still can’t believe it.’
‘How much did you know about your sister? Does a person ever seem the same to two different people? You see Shirley always as the helpless baby that you rescued from fire, you see her as weak, helpless, in need always of love, of protection. But I see her quite differently, although I may be just as wrong as you were. I see her as a brave, gallant, adventurous young woman, able to take knocks, able to hold her own, needing difficulties to bring out the full capabilities of her spirit. She was tired and strained, but she was winning her battle, she was making a good job of her chosen life, she was bringing Henry out of despair into the daylight, she was triumphant that night that he died. She loved Henry, and Henry was what she wanted; her life was difficult, but passionately worth while.
‘And then Henry died, and she was shoved back – back into layers of cotton-wool and soft wrapping, and anxious love, and she struggled and she couldn’t get free. It was then that she found that drink helped. It dimmed reality. And once drink has got a hold on a woman, it isn’t easy to give it up.’
‘She never told me she wasn’t happy – never.’
‘She didn’t want you to know that she was unhappy.’
‘And I did that to her – I?’
‘Yes, my poor child.’
‘Baldy knew,’ Laura said slowly. ‘That’s what he meant when he said: “You shouldn’t have done it, young Laura.” Long ago, long ago he warned me. Don’t interfere. Why do we think we know what’s best for other people?’ Then she wheeled sharply towards him. ‘She didn’t – mean to? It wasn’t suicide?’
‘It’s an open question. It could be. She stepped off the pavement straight in front of the lorry. Wilding, in his heart of hearts, thinks it was.’
‘No. Oh, no!’
‘But I don’t think so. I think better of Shirley than that. I think she was often very near to despair, but I don’t believe she ever really abandoned herself to it. I think she was a fighter, I think she continued to fight. But you don’t give up drinking in the snap of a finger. You relapse every now and then. I think she stepped off that pavement into eternity without knowing what she was doing or where she was going.’
Laura sank down on to the sofa.
‘What shall I do? Oh! What shall I do?’
Llewellyn came and put his arms round her.
‘You will marry me. You’ll start again.’
‘No, no, I can never do that.’
‘Why not? You need love.’
‘You don’t understand. I’ve got to pay. For what I’ve done. Everyone has to pay.’
‘How obsessed you are by the thought of payment.’
Laura reiterated: ‘Everyone has to pay.’
‘Yes, I grant you that. But don’t you see, my dearest child –’ He hesitated before this last bitter truth that she had to know. ‘For what you did, someone has already paid. Shirley paid.’
She looked at him in sudden horror.
‘Shirley paid – for what I did?’
He nodded.
‘Yes. I’m afraid you’ve got to live with that. Shirley paid. And Shirley is dead, and the debt is cancelled. You have got to go forward, Laura. You have got, not to forget the past, but to keep it where it belongs, in your memory, but not in your daily life. You have got to accept not punishment but happiness. Yes, my dear, happiness. You have got to stop giving and learn to take. God deals strangely with us – He is giving you, so I fully believe, happiness and love. Accept them in humility.’
‘I can’t. I can’t!’
‘You must.’
He drew her to her feet.
‘I love you, Laura, and you love me – not as much as I love you, but you do love me.’
‘Yes, I love you.’
He kissed her – a long, hungry kiss.
As they drew apart, she said, with a faint shaky laugh:
‘I wish Baldy knew. He’d be pleased!’
As she moved away, she stumbled and half fell.
Llewellyn caught her.
‘Be careful – did you hurt yourself? – you might have struck your head on that marble chimney-piece.’
‘Nonsense.’
‘Yes, nonsense – but you’re so precious to me …’
She smiled at him. She felt his love and his anxiety.
She was wanted, as in her childhood she had longed to be wanted.
&n
bsp; And suddenly, almost imperceptibly, her shoulders sagged a little, as though a burden, a light burden, but still a burden, had been placed on them.
For the first time, she felt and comprehended the weight of love …
Giant’s Bread
A MARY WESTMACOTT NOVEL
Agatha Christie
‘A satisfying novel.’
New York Times
Vernon Deyre is a sensitive and brilliant musician, even a genius. But there is a high price to be paid for his talent, especially by his family and the two women in his life. His sheltered childhood in the home he loves has not prepared Vernon for the harsh reality of his adult years, and in order to write the great masterpiece of his life, he has to make a crucial decision with no time left to count the cost …
‘When Miss Westmacott reaches the world of music, her book suddenly comes alive. The chapters in which Jane appears are worth the rest of the book put together.’
New Statesman
ISBN 978–0–00–649945–9
Absent in the Spring
A MARY WESTMACOTT NOVEL
Agatha Christie
‘The one book that has satisfied me completely – the book I always wanted to write.’
Agatha Christie
Returning from a visit to her daughter in Iraq, Joan Scudamore finds herself unexpectedly alone and stranded in an isolated rest house by flooding of the railway tracks. This sudden solitude compels Joan to assess her life for the first time ever and face up to many of the truths about herself. Looking back over the years, Joan painfully re-examines her attitudes, relationships and actions and becomes increasingly uneasy about the person who is revealed to her …
‘I’ve not been so emotionally moved by a story since the memorable Brief Encounter … Absent in the Spring is a tour de force which should be recognized as a classic.’
New York Times
‘Very readable indeed.’
Times Literary Supplement
ISBN 978–0–00–649947–3
The Rose and the Yew Tree
A MARY WESTMACOTT NOVEL
Agatha Christie
‘Quiet and intelligent, with class distinctions which motivate its characters.’
Books
Everyone expected Isabella Charteris, beautiful, sheltered and aristocratic, to marry her cousin Rupert when he came back from the War. It would have been such a suitable marriage. How strange then that John Gabriel, an ambitious and ruthless war hero, should appear in her life. For Isabella, the price of love would mean abandoning her dreams of home and happiness forever. For Gabriel, it would destroy his chance of a career and all his ambitions …
‘Miss Westmacott writes crisply and is always lucid … much material has been skilfully compressed.’
Times Literary Supplement
ISBN 978–0–00–649948–0
A Daughter’s a Daughter
A MARY WESTMACOTT NOVEL
Agatha Christie
‘These books are dramatic, and concentrate on the solution to situations which arise out of the high tensions in life.’
Max Mallowan
Ann Prentice falls in love with Richard Cauldfield and hopes for new happiness. Her only child, Sarah, cannot contemplate the idea of her mother marrying again and wrecks any chance of her remarriage. Resentment and jealousy corrode their relationship as each seeks relief in different directions. Are mother and daughter destined to be enemies for life or will their underlying love for each other finally win through?
‘Miss Westmacott shows narrative talent – I should expect her books to be very popular.’
Observer
ISBN 978–0–00–649949–7
Come, Tell Me How You Live
AN ARCHAEOLOGICAL MEMOIR
Agatha Christie
‘Perfectly delightful … colourful, lively, occasionally touching and thought-provoking.’
Books & Bookmen
Agatha Christie was already well known as a crime writer when she accompanied her husband, Max Mallowan, to Syria and Iraq in the 1930s. She took enormous interest in all his excavations, and when friends asked what her strange life was like, she decided to answer their questions in this delightful book.
First published in 1946, Come, Tell Me How You Live gives a charming picture of Agatha Christie herself, while also giving insight into some of her most popular novels, including Murder in Mesopotamia and Appointment with Death. It is, as Jacquetta Hawkes concludes in her introduction, ‘a pure pleasure to read’.
‘Good and enjoyable … she has a delightfully light touch.’
Country Life
ISBN 978–0–00–653114–2
About the Author
Agatha Christie (1890–1976) is known throughout the world as the Queen of Crime. Her first book, The Mysterious Affair at Style, was written during the First World War and introduced us to Hercule Poirot, the Belgian detective with the ‘Little Grey Cells’, who was destined to reappear in nearly 100 different novels or short stories over the next 50 years. Agatha also created the elderly crime-solver, Miss Marple, as well as more than 2,000 colourful characters across her 80 crime books.
Agatha Christie’s books have sold over one billion copies in the English language and another billion in more than 100 countries, making her the best-selling novelist in history. Her stories have transcended the printed page, also finding success as adaptations for stage, films, television, radio, audiobooks, comic strips and interactive games, and her many stage plays have enjoyed critical acclaim – the most famous, The Mousetrap, opened in 1952 and is the longest-running play in history. Agatha Christie was made a Dame in 1971.
It was her sharp observations of people’s ambitions, relationships and conflicts that added life and sparkle to her ingenious detective stories. When she turned this understanding of human nature away from the crime genre, writing anonymously as Mary Westmacott to prove to herself that her books could sell on merit rather than her fame alone, she created bittersweet novels, love stories with a jagged edge, as compelling and memorable as the best of her work.
Also by the Author
THE MARY WESTMACOTT COLLECTION
Giant’s Bread
Unfinished Portrait
Absent in the Spring
The Rose and the Yew Tree
A Daughter’s a Daughter
The Burden
Copyright
Harper
An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers
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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 1997
This edition 2009
First published in Great Britain by Heinemann 1956
Copyright © Agatha Christie Mallowan 1956
www.agathachristie.com
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Ebook Edition © NOV 2013 ISBN 9780007534999
Source ISBN: 9780006499503
Version 2013-10-11
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