It had been an awful thing to lose Henry the first time, to matrimony, but to discover what a false front he was capable of was another kind of blow, and it had left her almost speechless. Then there was the fury with herself—for she had known what Henry’s love was, and still she had gone back to suffer a little more at his hands.

Diana knew it wouldn't be right, but then she told herself that things only looked wrong when there was someone to see you.

Interesting" people were her favorite hobby. She collected them: the type who did gay things late at night and smoked cigarettes in mixed company, those would have most scandalized her own mother.

It is easy to forget now, how effervescent and free we all felt that summer. Everything fades: the shimmer of gold over White Cove; the laughter in the night air; the lavender early morning light on the faces of skyscrapers, which had suddenly become so heroically tall. Every dawn seemed to promise fresh miracles, among other joys that are in short supply these days. And so I will try to tell you, while I still remember, how it was then, before everything changed-that final season of the era that roared.

She was like a heroine in a novel that she herself was writing the character kept protesting that she was too strong for love and yet the narrator went on describing her desire.

Already she could feel the stunning weight of a lifetime of regret for letting him go, and she knew that it was enought to bury her alive.

Ah well that I can't tell you." Diana ducked her head so that the brim of her bonnet covered her face. "Some things must remain a mystery and for now I think I'll keep my opinion of you and your compliments to myself.