Judith and Lawrence Lewis had been approaching a friend's dock in their 32-foot cabin cruiser when Judith observed a boat traveling swiftly across a channel behind them.

"Something is going to have to be done about the speeding on this lake," she said, turning to her close friend Marlene Cavallaro, who had accompanied her on a 30-minute moonlit cruise along with her husband, Greg, and two other couples. "People are going too fast," Judith said, watching the boat disappear.

Moments after dropping the Cavallaros at their dock in Compass Cove on Saturday, the couple and their 8-year-old miniature Dalmatian, Lady Dotty, were struck and killed instantly by a 38-foot speedboat traveling in excess of 60 mph on Smith Mountain Lake, officials have said. The speedboat, driven by Mark de Tournillon, 45, had plowed into them from behind, catapulted over the boat and cleared the front end of the cabin cruiser before landing upright in the water, officials said.

"They both left us smiling and healthy," Marlene Cavallaro said. "It's inconceivable that this could happen," she said.

The Lewises were known among friends as avid and experienced boaters who often spent their free time traveling up and down the East Coast and down to the Caribbean.

Greg Cavallaro said the couple had been planning an excursion of several months to Florida along the Intercoastal Waterway in a second boat - a 38-foot Regal - they kept near Annapolis, Md. He said that the couple had bought the second boat specifically for the trip.

Friends said the couple shared a unique bond having both lost spouses to cancer in previous marriages. Having been longtime professional acquaintances, the two rekindled their friendship while attending a home builders convention in Virginia Beach after Judith's husband, John Spencer, had passed away. Judith and Lawrence instantly hit it off, friends said. "About a month later, they couldn't be apart," Greg Cavallaro said.

Married in June 2003, both Judith and Lawrence were active in helping to raise money for cancer research, and each year, Judith was chairwoman of the John Spencer Cancer Bash, a gala named for her first husband. The 2003 and 2004 events raised more than $100,000 for the American Cancer Society.

"It was a true love story made for a movie," Greg Cavallaros said. "They had a lot in common and a true understanding of what each other had been through."

Prior to moving to Smith Mountain Lake, the couple lived in Lexington, where Lawrence had retired from his job as a salesman in Richmond. Judith was an accomplished artist who had won several awards and sold pieces in Lexington and at Smith Mountain Lake, Marlene Cavallaro said.

Together, the couple were members of a tight-knit dining group, dubbed the "Hump Nighters" because the group met on Wednesday - the day of the week often seen as the midweek hump. Typically, they would meet at one anothers' houses or restaurants near the lake. Sonny Baar, a close friend of the couple and member of the dining remembers Judith as "outgoing and vivacious," while Lawrence, he said, often liked to hang back and take care of her. "He watched what she wanted and kind of doted on her," he said.

The Lewises had been returning from a dinner party at the Cavallaros' dock when they were struck by the speedboat.

Standing on the Lewises' front porch on Monday afternoon, Greg Cavallaro looked out onto the yard and thought back to Saturday night. "The irony is that they were tragically killed together doing what they love," he said, his voice becoming hoarse. "And that was boating."