When Maxim stopped the car I opened my eyes and sat up. We were opposite one of those numerous little restaurants in a narrow street in Soho. I looked about me, dazed and stupid.
“You’re tired,” said Maxim briefly. “Empty and tired and fit for nothing. You’ll be better when you’ve had something to eat. So shall I. We’ll go in here and order dinner right away. I can telephone to Frank too.”
We got out of the car. There was no one in the restaurant but the ma?tre d’h?tel and a waiter and a girl behind a desk. It was dark and cool. We went to a table right in the corner. Maxim began ordering the food. “Favell was right about wanting a drink,” he said. “I want one too and so do you. You’re going to have some brandy.”
The ma?tre d’hotel was fat and smiling. He produced long thin rolls in paper envelopes. They were very hard, very crisp. I began to eat one ravenously. My brandy and soda was soft, warming, curiously comforting.
“When we’ve had dinner we’ll drive slowly, very quietly,” said Maxim. “It will be cool, too, in the evening. We’ll find somewhere on the road we can put up for the night. Then we can get along to Manderley in the morning.”
“Yes,” I said.
“You didn’t want to dine with Julyan’s sister and go down by the late train?”
“No.”
Maxim finished his drink. His eyes looked large and they were ringed with the shadows. They seemed very dark against the pallor of his face.
“How much of the truth,” he said, “do you think Julyan guessed?”
I watched him over the rim of my glass. I did not say anything.
“He knew,” said Maxim slowly, “of course he knew.”
“If he did,” I said, “he will never say anything. Never, never.”
“No,” said Maxim. “No.”
He ordered another drink from the ma?tre d’h?tel. We sat silent and peaceful in our dark corner.
“I believe,” said Maxim, “that Rebecca lied to me on purpose. The last supreme bluff. She wanted me to kill her. She foresaw the whole thing. That’s why she laughed. That’s why she stood there laughing when she died.”
I did not say anything. I went on drinking my brandy and soda. It was all over. It was all settled. It did not matter anymore. There was no need for Maxim to look white and troubled.
“It was her last practical joke,” said Maxim, “the best of them all. And I’m not sure if she hasn’t won, even now.”
“What do you mean? How can she have won?” I said.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I don’t know.” He swallowed his second drink. Then he got up from the table. “I’m going to ring up Frank,” he said.
I sat there in my corner, and presently the waiter brought me my fish. It was lobster. Very hot and good. I had another brandy and soda, too. It was pleasant and comfortable sitting there and nothing mattered very much. I smiled at the waiter. I asked for some more bread in French for no reason. It was quiet and happy and friendly in the restaurant. Maxim and I were together. Everything was over. Everything was settled. Rebecca was dead. Rebecca could not hurt us. She had played her last joke as Maxim had said. She could do no more to us now. In ten minutes Maxim came back again.
“Well,” I said, my own voice sounding far away, “how was Frank?”
“Frank was all right,” said Maxim. “He was at the office, been waiting there for me to telephone him ever since four o’clock. I told him what had happened. He sounded glad, relieved.”
“Yes,” I said.
“Something rather odd though,” said Maxim slowly, a line between his brows. “He thinks Mrs. Danvers has cleared out. She’s gone, disappeared. She said nothing to anyone, but apparently she’d been packing up all day, stripping her room of things, and the fellow from the station came for her boxes at about four o’clock. Frith telephoned down to Frank about it, and Frank told Frith to ask Mrs. Danvers to come down to him at the office. He waited, and she never came. About ten minutes before I rang up, Frith telephoned to Frank again and said there had been a long-distance call for Mrs. Danvers which he had switched through to her room, and she had answered. This must have been about ten past six. At a quarter to seven he knocked on the door and found her room empty. Her bedroom too. They looked for her and could not find her. They think she’s gone. She must have gone straight out of the house and through the woods. She never passed the lodge-gates.”