Free The Key to Rebecca by Ken Follett Page A

I’m dismissed, she thought. You’re a little too much, Major Vandam: there’s a certain self-righteousness about you, and you rather like to be in charge of things; you’re so masterful. I may take you in hand, puncture your vanity, do you a little damage.
    “No, thanks,” she said. “I must go.”
    He stood up. “I’ll look forward to hearing from you.”
    She shook his hand and walked away. Somehow she had the feeling that he was not watching her go.
     
    Vandam changed into a civilian suit for the reception at the Anglo-Egyptian Union. He would never have gone to the Union while his wife was alive: she said it was “plebby.” He told her to say “plebeian” so that she would not sound like a country snob. She said she was a country snob, and would he kindly stop showing off his classical education.
    Vandam had loved her then and he did now.
    Her father was a fairly wealthy man who became a diplomat because he had nothing better to do. He had not been pleased at the prospect of his daughter marrying a postman’s son. He was not much mollified when he was told that Vandam had gone to a minor public school (on a scholarship) and London University, and was considered one of the most promising of his generation of junior army officers. But the daughter was adamant in this as in all things, and in the end the father had accepted the match with good grace. Oddly enough, on the one occasion when the fathers met they got on rather well. Sadly, the mothers hated each other and there were no more family gatherings.
    None of it mattered much to Vandam; nor did the fact that his wife had a short temper, an imperious manner and an ungenerous heart. Angela was graceful, dignified and beautiful. For him she was the epitome of womanhood, and he thought himself a lucky man.
    The contrast with Elene Fontana could not have been more striking.
    He drove to the Union on his motorcycle. The bike, a BSA 350, was very practical in Cairo. He could use it all the year round, for the weather was almost always good enough; and he could snake through the traffic jams that kept cars and taxis waiting. But it was a rather quick machine, and it gave him a secret thrill, a throwback to his adolescence, when he had coveted such bikes but had not been able to buy one. Angela had loathed it—like the Union, it was plebby—but for once Vandam had resolutely defied her.
    The day was cooling when he parked at the Union. Passing the clubhouse, he looked through a window and saw a snooker game in full swing. He resisted the temptation and walked onto the lawn.
    He accepted a glass of Cyprus sherry and moved into the crowd, nodding and smiling, exchanging pleasantries with people he knew. There was tea for the teetotal Muslim guests, but not many had turned up. Vandam tasted the sherry and wondered whether the barman could be taught to make a martini.
    He looked across the grass to the neighboring Egyptian Officers’ Club, and wished he could eavesdrop on conversations there. Someone spoke his name, and he turned to see the woman doctor. Once again he had to think before he could remember her name. “Dr. Abuthnot.”
    “We might be informal here,” she said. “My name is Joan.”
    “William. Is your husband here?”
    “I’m not married.”
    “Pardon me.” Now he saw her in a new light. She was single and he was a widower, and they had been seen talking together in public three times in a week: by now the English colony in Cairo would have them practically engaged. “You’re a surgeon?” he said.
    She smiled. “All I do these days is sew people up and patch them—but yes, before the war I was a surgeon.”
    “How did you manage that? It’s not easy for a woman.”
    “I fought tooth and nail.” She was still smiling, but Vandam detected an undertone of remembered resentment. “You’re a little unconventional yourself, I’m told.”
    Vandam thought himself to be utterly conventional. “How so?” he said with