The Burden - Christie Agatha (читать книги TXT) 📗

Mr. Baldock, grinding his teeth and snorting with venom, was penning a really vitriolic review for a learned journal of a fellow historian's life work.

He turned a ferocious face to the door, as Mrs. Rouse, giving a perfunctory knock and pushing it open, announced:

"Here's little Miss Laura for you."

"Oh," said Mr. Baldock, checked on the verge of a tremendous flood of invective. "So it's you."

He was disconcerted. A fine thing it would be if the child was going to trot along here at any odd moment. He hadn't bargained for that. Drat all children! Give them an inch and they took an ell. He didn't like children, anyway. He never had.

His disconcerted gaze met Laura's. There was no apology in Laura's look. It was grave, deeply troubled, but quite confident in a divine right to be where she was. She made no polite remarks of an introductory nature.

"I thought I'd come and tell you," she said, "that I'm going to have a baby brother."

"Oh," said Mr. Baldock, taken aback.

"We-ell…" he said, playing for time. Laura's face was white and expressionless. "That's news, isn't it?" He paused. "Are you pleased?"

"No," said Laura. "I don't think I am."

"Beastly things, babies," agreed Mr. Baldock sympathetically. "No teeth and no hair, and yell their heads off. Their mothers like them, of course, have to-or the poor little brutes would never get looked after, or grow up. But you won't find it so bad when it's three or four," he added encouragingly. "Almost as good as a kitten or a puppy by then."

"Charles died," said Laura. "Do you think it's likely that my new baby brother may die too?"

He shot her a keen glance, then said firmly:

"Shouldn't think so for a moment," and added: "Lightning never strikes twice."

"Cook says that," said Laura. "It means the same thing doesn't happen twice?"

"Quite right."

"Charles-" began Laura, and stopped.

Again Mr. Baldock's glance swept over her quickly.

"No reason it should be a baby brother," he said. "Just as likely to be a baby sister."

"Mummy seems to think it will be a brother."

"Shouldn't go by that if I were you. She wouldn't be the first woman to think wrong."

Laura's face brightened suddenly.

"There was Jehoshaphat," she said. "Dulcibella's last kitten. He's turned out to be a girl after all. Cook calls him Josephine now," she added.

"There you are," said Mr. Baldock encouragingly. "I'm not a betting man, but I'd put my money on its being a girl myself."

"Would you?" said Laura fervently.

She smiled at him, a grateful and unexpectedly lovely smile that gave Mr. Baldock quite a shock.

"Thank you," she said. "I'll go now." She added politely: "I hope I haven't interrupted your work?"

"It's quite all right," said Mr. Baldock. "I'm always glad to see you if it's about something important. I know you wouldn't barge in here just to chatter."

"Of course I wouldn't," said Laura earnestly.

She withdrew, closing the door carefully behind her.

The conversation had cheered her considerably. Mr. Baldock, she knew, was a very clever man.

"He's much more likely to be right than Mummy," she thought to herself.

A baby sister? Yes, she could face the thought of a sister. A sister would only be another Laura-an inferior Laura. A Laura lacking teeth and hair, and any kind of sense.

3

As she emerged from the kindly haze of the anaesthetic, Angela's cornflower-blue eyes asked the eager question that her lips were almost afraid to form.

"Is it-all right-is it-?"

The nurse spoke glibly and briskly after the manner of nurses.

"You've got a lovely daughter, Mrs. Franklin."

"A daughter-a daughter…" The blue eyes closed again.

Disappointment surged through her. She had been so sure-so sure… Only a second Laura…

The old tearing pain of her loss reawakened. Charles, her handsome laughing Charles. Her boy, her son…

Downstairs, Cook was saying briskly:

"Well, Miss Laura. You've got a little sister, what do you think of that?"

Laura replied sedately to Cook:

"I knew I'd have a sister. Mr. Baldock said so."

"An old bachelor like him, what should he know?"

"He's a very clever man," said Laura.

Angela was rather slow to regain her full strength. Arthur Franklin was worried about his wife. The baby was a month old when he spoke to Angela rather hesitatingly.

"Does it matter so much? That it's a girl, I mean, and not a boy?"

"No, of course not. Not really. Only-I'd felt so sure."

"Even if it had been a boy, it wouldn't have been Charles, you know?"

"No. No, of course not."

The nurse entered the room, carrying the baby.

"Here we are," she said. "Such a lovely girl now. Going to your Mumsie-wumsie, aren't you?"

Angela held the baby slackly and eyed the nurse with dislike as the latter went out of the room.

"What idiotic things these women say," she muttered crossly.

Arthur laughed.

"Laura darling, get me that cushion," said Angela.

Laura brought it to her, and stood by as Angela arranged the baby more comfortably. Laura felt comfortably mature and important. The baby was only a silly little thing. It was she, Laura, on whom her mother relied.

It was chilly this evening. The fire that burned in the grate was pleasant. The baby crowed and gurgled happily.

Angela looked down into the dark blue eyes, and a mouth that seemed already to be able to smile. She looked down, with sudden shock, into Charles's eyes. Charles as a baby. She had almost forgotten him at that age.

Love rushed blindingly through her veins. Her baby, her darling. How could she have been so cold, so unloving to this adorable creature? How could she have been so blind? A gay beautiful child, like Charles.

"My sweet," she murmured. "My precious, my darling."

She bent over the child in an abandonment of love. She was oblivious of Laura standing watching her. She did not notice as Laura crept quietly out of the room.

But perhaps a vague uneasiness made her say to Arthur:

"Mary Wells can't be here for the christening. Shall we let Laura be proxy godmother? It would please her, I think."

Chapter Four

1

"Enjoy the christening?" asked Mr. Baldock.

"No," said Laura.

"Cold in that church, I expect," said Mr. Baldock. "Nice font though," he added. "Norman-black Tournai marble."

Laura was unmoved by the information.

She was busy formulating a question:

"May I ask you something, Mr. Baldock?"

"Of course."

"Is it wrong to pray for anyone to die?"

Mr. Baldock gave her a swift sideways look.

"In my view," he said, "it would be unpardonable interference."

"Interference?"

"Well, the Almighty is running the show, isn't He? What do you want to stick your fingers into the machinery for? What business is it of yours?"

"I don't see that it would matter to God very much. When a baby has been christened and everything, it goes to heaven, doesn't it?"

"Don't see where else it could go," admitted Mr. Baldock.

"And God is fond of children. The Bible says so. So He'd be pleased to see it."

Mr. Baldock took a short turn up and down the room. He was seriously upset, and didn't want to show it.

"Look here, Laura," he said at last. "You've got-you've simply got to mind your own business."

"But perhaps it is my business."

"No, it isn't. Nothing's your business but yourself. Pray what you like about yourself. Ask for blue ears, or a diamond tiara, or to grow up and win a beauty competition. The worst that can happen to you is that the answer to your prayer might be 'Yes'."