The Burden

 AGATHA CHRISTIE
writing under the name
MARY WESTMACOTT

 (1956)

The Burden is a non-detective-short story. It tells about the life of Laura Franklin. Born as second child and a daughter - the so often unwanted second child that follows too soon upon the first - Charles. Her father and mother had been kind to her, affectionate, but it was Charles they had loved. Even, everybody fears that Laura might be 'taken' young.But it was Charles who died (of infantile paralysis), not Laura.

Long to be loved - after the death of Charles - Laura thinks that she was her parents' only child. She was, as she had phrased it to herself, 'all they had in the world.'But it had been a shock for her that she got a baby sist
er, instead. Young Laura prayed to the Lady in the Blue Cloak with intention "let the baby go to heaven".
The fire had been a kind of turning-point in her life. She saw herself dimly before it-an unhappy jealous child, longing for attention, for love. But on the night of the fire, a new Laura had come into existence-a Laura whose life had become suddenly and satisfyingly full. From the moment that she had struggled through smoke and flames with Shirley in her arms, her life had found its object and meaning-to care for Shirley - her baby sister. She had saved Shirley from death.

She would look after Shirley, see that no harm came to her. But a child of eleven couldn't, of course, foresee the future: the Franklins, taking a brief holiday together, flying to Le Touquet and the plane crashing on the return journey. . . .
The story goes. A baby Shirley telling Laura in stuttering unintelligible language what her dolls were doing. An older Shirley coming back from kindergarten. An older Shirley had come back from boarding-school. And Laura was never think about anyone else, except Shirley. She just couldn't bear if shierly made a mess of her life and was unhappy.

The only friend of Laura - Mr. "Baldy" Baldock, also an old friend of her father - always telling her think about herself. As he put it "So stop walking up and down looking like a tragedy queen, Laura. I've told you already you take life too seriously. You can't run other people's lives for them. Young Shirley has got her own row to hoe. And if you ask me, she can take care of herself a good deal better than you can. It's you I'm worried about, Laura. I always have been. . . ."

The story keeps going, the tragic one.
Will Laura ever feel the she was wanted, as in her childhood she had longed to be wanted.

"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.e was wanted, as in her childhood she had longed to be wanted.
For the first time, she felt and comprehended the weight of love... "