Rebecca

by Daphne du Maurier

For Manderley was ours no longer. Manderley was no more.

We can never go back again, that much is certain.

We all of us have our particular devil

who rides us and torments us, and we must give battle in the end.

Poor whims of fancy, tender and un-harsh. They are the enemy to bitterness and regret, and sweeten this exile we have brought upon ourselves.

The word lingered in the air once I had uttered it, dancing before me, and because he received it silently, making no comment, the word magnified itself into something heinous and appalling, a forbidden word, unnatural to the tongue. And I could not call it back, it could never be unsaid.

“I never saw her,” she said, holding the glass away to see the effect, “but I believe she was very lovely. Exquisitely turned out, and brilliant in every way. They used to give tremendous parties at Manderley. It was all very sudden and tragic, and I believe he adored her.

The letter R was the last to go, it twisted in the flame, it curled outwards for a moment, becoming larger than ever.

We came to Manderley in early May,

with the bloodred wall still flanking us on either side, we turned

the last corner, and so came to Manderley.

These things disturbed me, I was not happy about them. I wanted to forget them but at the same time I wanted to know why they disturbed me, why they made me uneasy and unhappy.

and then the sentence I had first heard upon Beatrice’s lips, haunting me ever since, a sentence I read in every eye, on every tongue—“She’s so different from Rebecca.”

that cloud of dark hair against the very white skin, and her costume suited her so. Yes, she was very beautiful.”

Theirs was a brief beauty. Not lasting very long.

“Tell me,” I said, my voice casual, not caring a bit, “tell me, was Rebecca very beautiful?” Frank waited a moment. I could not see his face. He was looking away from me towards the house. “Yes,” he said slowly, “yes, I suppose she was the most beautiful creature I ever saw in my life.”

“Do you think she can see us, talking to one another now?” she said slowly. “Do you think the dead come back and watch the living?”

I could fight the living but I could not fight the dead.

I had just experienced something that was degrading and horrible and mad, something that I did not fully understand even now, that I had no wish to remember, that I wanted to bury forevermore,

“Rebecca has won,”

She knew she would win in the end.”

I had built up false pictures in my mind and sat before them. I had never had the courage to demand the truth. Had I made one step forward out of my own shyness, Maxim would have told me these things four months, five months ago.

It’s gone forever, that funny, young, lost look that I loved. It won’t come back again. I killed that too, when I told you about Rebecca… It’s gone, in twenty-four hours. You are so much older…”