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So long as the procession kept to the highway of the Bayswater Road, it retained the foot’s-pace, but, turning into less important thorough-fares, it soon broke into a trot, and so proceeded, with intervals of walking in the more fashionable streets, until it arrived. In the first carriage old Jolyon and Nicholas were talking of their wills. In the second the twins, after a single attempt, had lapsed into complete silence; both were rather deaf, and the exertion of making themselves heard was too great. Only once James broke this silence:

“I shall have to be looking about for some ground somewhere. What arrangements have you made, Swithin?”

And Swithin, fixing him with a dreadful stare, answered:

“Don’t talk to me about such things!”

In the third carriage a disjointed conversation was carried on in the intervals of looking out to see how far they had got, George remarking, “Well, it was really time that the poor old lady went.” He didn’t believe in people living beyond seventy, Young Nicholas replied mildly that the rule didn’t seem to apply to the Forsytes. George said he himself intended to commit suicide at sixty. Young Nicholas, smiling and stroking a long chin, didn’t think his father would like that theory; he had made a lot of money since he was sixty. Well, seventy was the outside limit; it was then time, George said, for them to go and leave their money to their children. Soames, hitherto silent, here joined in; he had not forgotten the remark about the “undertaking,” and, lifting his eyelids almost imperceptibly, said it was all very well for people who never made money to talk. He himself intended to live as long as he could. This was a hit at George, who was notoriously hard up. Bosinney muttered abstractedly “Hear, hear!” and, George yawning, the conversation dropped.