Foreshadowing

Almost mimicking the story's visions and premonitions, du Maurier has filled the narrative with moments that point to some future event. She uses foreshadowing to indicate that trouble is coming soon, such as when John sees what he thinks is a small child wearing a hooded jacket fleeing danger through the streets and jumping from boat to boat across the canal. He has an uneasy feeling about what he has just seen but does not express this to Laura.

Barely twenty-four hours later, John sees the same little girl running for her life, and he follows her, calling out that he will protect her. But when he gets into a room with the "little girl," she ends up being a "little thick-set woman dwarf." The dwarf stabs John and, as he dies, he sees again his wife and the twin sisters on a boat—something that he...