Hating it when we know far more than the narrator, as in the costume-ball scene in Rebecca

Of course it wouldn't be a modern gothic romance if it didn't have some element of the ridiculous, and we can agree I think that the "costume ball" episode in Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca is ridiculous in the extreme. I like novels where the plot points match or come together, but I don't like it when I know so much more than the narrator and the plot opens so wide you could walk through the holes. Here's what happens: the local gentry pressure the de Winters to resurrect the tradition of an annual costume ball. The extremely demure (unnamed) narrator has to decide what costume to wear; the hateful chief servant, Mrs. Danvers, who hates the narrator, as the narrator well knows, suggests in a saccharine voice that she dress as one of the young women in a painting in the portrait gallery. I'm hardly giving anything away to say that all readers will guess this is a trap, and of course the narrator walks right into it and creates a costume that either (a) looks exactly like her husband's late 1st wife (the eponymous Rebecca) or was the same costume that R wore in some previous party. Husband is angry and appalled, narrator is hurt and ashamed, Mrs. Danvers gloats. OK so that leaves us wondering what exactly has happened to Rebecca. It's one thing for Maxim de Winter to still be in mourning, but why is he so angry? He does not appear in any way to be in love w/ the narrator, so why did he rush into this marriage? Two possibilities: R is alive and in hiding somewhere for some reason. Or, Maxim killed her or was instrumental in her death in some manner - a jealous and temperamental husband, a maniac, a killer - that's pretty extreme but, hell, this is a gothic romance so extremes are still w/in bounds.

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