Toured to Death Read Free Page B

umbrellas out onto place Saint-Nicolas, a picturesque square whose centerpiece was a statue of the somber Christmas saint. The old man peered down from the top of his lazy fountain, the water barely dribbling from the four lion heads that sprouted just below his feet.
    They had eaten lunch at Dominick’s on their very first trip, a three-week extravaganza fueled by sex and excitement and next to no money. How many more places would she find from their travels? Not that she was looking.
    Amy settled into a white plastic chair at a red plastic table. She asked the waiter for a croque-monsieur and an Orangina and was surprised at how quickly the order arrived. That was the one advantage of coming here in high season. The cafés did their best to churn the tables.
    Amy took her first bite, then turned her chair to get the best view. Only gradually did she become aware of a couple, an older woman and a younger man, staring at her from under an umbrella of the adjacent café.
    Amy didn’t consider herself the type to draw stares. True, she was tall and slim—not model slim, but close—with a five-foot-ten frame inherited from her father. In all other ways her looks were remarkably unremarkable. In her early thirties, an ordinary age, she possessed brown, slightly wavy hair cut to shoulder length and pulled back into a chignon. Her nose, mouth, ears, and brown eyes were equally ordinary. Eddie’s best friend had once described her as the prettiest girl in the office. And although Amy had never worked in an office, the description rang true.
    Her one extravagance was the eyeglasses. She loved them and felt they added some much-needed definition. A visual signature, with unlimited variety. Since childhood she had thumbed her nose at contact lenses. And the very idea of LASIK surgery . . . Her current favorite was a pair of Lafont sunglasses, with round tortoiseshell frames, and she was wearing them now.
    Amy tried not to stare back but couldn’t help glancing their way. And then it came to her. “Ms. Davis,” she said in a flash of recognition. No wonder they’d been staring. “Excuse me. I was daydreaming.” She tucked fifteen euros under her ashtray, took her plate and glass, and went to join them.
    â€œOh, you didn’t recognize us. Admit it,” the woman purred.
    â€œNo, I did.”
    â€œI forgive you.” Georgina Davis flourished an outstretched hand, as if to embrace her approach. “I barely recognized you myself. Your glasses are different.” She laughed in a pleasant, self-deprecating way. Her gold bracelets jangled as she moved an elegant crocodile purse an inch closer to her iced tea, her best effort to make room at the small table.
    A British friend had once suggested that while some cultures might be obsessed with birth, education, or other barometers, in America things were more elemental. Beauty, youth, and money. This was how a democracy judged its people, he’d said, which explained why most U.S. magazines printed photographs of their subjects, found a way to mention their age, and always gave some hint of how well off they were. Amy had been appalled by the observation but now found herself using it to evaluate the two people seated around the curve of the table.
    Georgina Davis was third-generation money, granddaughter of Davis Buttons, Inc., and worth a comfortable hundred million. A well-preserved sixty, Amy estimated, and probably ready to deny it.
    In the final category, Georgina lost more of her democratic prestige. A soft aurora of strawberry hair did its best to soften a jaw that could be unkindly called lantern and a cleft in the chin too deep and heroic to be labeled a dimple. On a man it might be considered a strong face. A man at least would have had the option of cloaking it with facial hair. On a sixty-year-old woman, however, all you were left with was the odd impression that you were always catching sight of her from the wrong