“It was the night porter from an address in Bloomsbury,” he said. “There are no residents there at all. The place is used during the day as a doctor’s consulting rooms. Apparently Baker’s given up practice, and left six months ago. But we can get hold of him all right. The night porter gave me his address. I wrote it down on this piece of paper.”
25
It was then that Maxim looked at me. He looked at me for the first time that evening. And in his eyes I read a message of farewell. It was as though he leaned against the side of a ship, and I stood below him on the quay. There would be other people touching his shoulder, and touching mine, but we would not see them. Nor would we speak or call to one another, for the wind and the distance would carry away the sound of our voices. But I should see his eyes and he would see mine before the ship drew away from the side of the quay. Favell, Mrs. Danvers, Colonel Julyan, Frank with the slip of paper in his hands, they were all forgotten at this moment. It was ours, inviolate, a fraction of time suspended between two seconds. And then he turned away and held out his hand to Frank.
“Well done,” he said. “What’s the address?”
“Somewhere near Barnet, north of London,” said Frank, giving him the paper. “But it’s not on the telephone. We can’t ring him up.”
“Satisfactory work, Crawley,” said Colonel Julyan, “and from you too, Mrs. Danvers. Can you throw any light on the matter now?”
Mrs. Danvers shook her head. “Mrs. de Winter never needed a doctor. Like all strong people she despised them. We only had Doctor Phillips from Kerrith here once, that time she sprained her wrist. I’ve never heard her speak of this Doctor Baker, she never mentioned his name to me.”
“I tell you the fellow was a face cream mixer,” said Favell. “What the hell does it matter who he was? If there was anything to it Danny would know. I tell you it’s some fool fellow who had discovered a new way of bleaching the hair or whitening the skin, and Rebecca had probably got the address from her hairdresser that morning and went along after lunch out of curiosity.”
“No,” said Frank. “I think you’re wrong there. Baker wasn’t a quack. The night porter at Museum 0488 told me he was a very well-known woman’s specialist.”
“H’m,” said Colonel Julyan, pulling at his mustache, “there must have been something wrong with her after all. It seems very curious that she did not say a word to anybody, not even to you, Mrs. Danvers.”
“She was too thin,” said Favell. “I told her about it, but she only laughed. Said it suited her. Banting I suppose, like all these women. Perhaps she went to this chap Baker for a diet sheet.”
“Do you think that’s possible, Mrs. Danvers?” asked Colonel Julyan.
Mrs. Danvers shook her head slowly. She seemed dazed, bewildered by this sudden news about Baker. “I can’t understand it,” she said. “I don’t know what it means. Baker. A Doctor Baker. Why didn’t she tell me? Why did she keep it from me? She told me everything.”
“Perhaps she didn’t want to worry you,” said Colonel Julyan. “No doubt she made an appointment with him, and saw him, and then when she came down that night she was going to have told you all about it.”
“And the note to Mr. Jack,” said Mrs. Danvers suddenly. “That note to Mr. Jack, ‘I have something to tell you. I must see you’; she was going to tell him too?”
“That’s true,” said Favell slowly. “We were forgetting the note.” Once more he pulled it out of his pocket and read it to us aloud. “ ‘I’ve got something to tell you, and I want to see you as soon as possible. Rebecca.’ ”
“Of course, there’s no doubt about it,” said Colonel Julyan, turning to Maxim. “I wouldn’t mind betting a thousand pounds on it. She was going to tell Favell the result of that interview with this Doctor Baker.”
“I believe you’re right after all,” said Favell. “The note and that appointment seem to hang together. But what the hell was it all about, that’s what I want to know? What was the matter with her?”
The truth screamed in their faces and they did not see. They all stood there, staring at one another, and they did not understand. I dared not look at them. I dared not move lest I betray my knowledge. Maxim said nothing. He had gone back to the window and was looking out into the garden that was hushed and dark and still. The rain had ceased at last, but the spots fell from the dripping leaves and from the gutter above the window.