"Is there any reason to believe," Fanshaw was saying in a tone that arrested all her attention suddenly, "that people in the next life would be any less futile than people in this life? It's horrible to want to do way with death."
"How can you feel that way? It's all such fun," she said boisterously. So Fanshaw too ... She felt he was changing the subject.
"Coming back on the Baltic, Nan ... you should have seen Edgar. He blossomed into a regular society butterfly and actually forced me to play bridge with some dreadful girls named Van Ryn he dug up somewhere."
"New Yorkers?"
"Yes."
"Was the famous Mrs. Harry Van Ryn along?"
"Was she? You should have seen how she dressed! Might have thought it was the Lusitania. Her daughters were quieter than she was, and rather more intelligent, I must allow them that."
They were silent a while. Rosy afterglow flowed like water through the window.
"Where did you go besides Siena?"
"O, to Arezzo, Urbino, and then to Assissi and San Gimingiano."