'My dear, don't you know?
He picked her up in Monte Carlo or somewhere; she hadn't a penny.
She was a companion to some old woman.'
More laughter, more lifting of the eyebrows.
'Nonsense, not really?
How extraordinary men are.
Maxim, of all people, who was so fastidious.
How could he, after Rebecca?'
I did not mind.
I did not care.
They could say what they liked.
As the car turned in at the lodge gates I leant forward in my seat to smile at the woman who lived there.
She was bending down, picking flowers in the front garden.
She straightened up as she heard the car, but she did not see me smile.
I waved, and she stared at me blankly.
I don't think she knew who I was.
I leant back in my seat again.
The car went on down the drive.
When we turned at one of the narrow bends I saw a man walking along the drive a little distance ahead.
It was the agent, Frank Crawley.
He stopped when he heard the car, and the chauffeur slowed down.
Frank Crawley took off his hat and smiled when he saw me in the car.
He seemed glad to see me. I smiled back at him. It was nice of him to be glad to see me.
I liked Frank Crawley.
I did not find him dull or uninteresting as Beatrice had done.
Perhaps it was because I was dull myself.
We were both dull. We neither of us had a word to say for ourselves. Like to like.
I tapped on the glass and told the chauffeur to stop.
'I think I'll get out and walk with Mr Crawley,' I said.
He opened the door for me.
'Been paying calls, Mrs de Winter?' he said.
'Yes, Frank,' I said.
I called him Frank because Maxim did, but he would always call me Mrs de Winter.
He was that sort of person.
Even if we had been thrown on a desert island together and lived there in intimacy for the rest of our lives, I should have been Mrs de Winter.
'I've been calling on the bishop,' I said, 'and I found the bishop out, but the bishop's lady was at home.
She and the bishop are very fond of walking.
Sometimes they do twenty miles a day, in the Pennines.'
'I don't know that part of the world,' said Frank Crawley; 'they say the country round is very fine.
An uncle of mine used to live there.'
It was the sort of remark Frank Crawley always made.
Safe, conventional, very correct.
"The bishop's wife wants to know when we are going to give a fancy dress ball at Manderley,' I said, watching him out of the tail of my eye.
'She came to the last one, she said, and enjoyed it very much.
I did not know you have fancy dress dances here, Frank.'
He hesitated a moment before replying.
He looked a little troubled.
'Oh, yes,' he said after a moment, 'the Manderley ball was generally an annual affair. Everyone in the county came.
A lot of people from London too.
Quite a big show.'