][<br > All women are mortal. I wonder if I believed it that autumn day I<br > walked into the art gallery in St. Ives， New Hampshire--I paint--and<br > saw her for the first time. She was a tall， striking woman about thirty<br > or so who worked with her head down as if she d have to work that<br > way， framing， until the day she died. She was wearing trousers and a<br > maroon turtleneck jersey under a light quilted vest and had the stamp，<br > I thought， of someone often photographed. And yet she seemed sad.<br > Was it perhaps because she was new to the place and had yet made<br > no friends? I didn t know. My only thought was: lovely.<br > There was something lankly tomboyish in her movements. Her<br > shoulders， though shapely， were almost too sturdy in comparison with<br > her smallish head and slight bosom. Her hair was ash blond， like flax，<br > and cut in the dutch-boy fashion， her athletic body showing the kind of<br > beauty that is often indistinguishable from good health.<br > She looked up at me. She seemed to know immediately what I felt<br > as unreservedly her eyes met mine. But it was a look of silent detach-<br > ment as much， it seemed， from the two other women working at tables<br > near her， moons to her sun， as from anything whatsoever intrusive， in-<br > dueling such customers (I imagined there couldn t be few) so instantly<br > captured as I by the mixture of vulnerability and strength composing her<br > beauty. I felt in that look an invitation to know her further， although<br > she said nothing. I had a girlfriend in Boston at the time to whom I<br > was attached， not so much， however， that I wasn t taken with and in fact<br > slightly oppressed by the memory of this woman much of the following<br > week. I thought of her. I kept thinking of her. And then I didn t think<br > of her again.<br > Her name was Farol Colorado.<br > The surname， her husband s--it took some time to learn both--al-<br > most served itself as a dark and desperate coloration to those first un-<br > settling， now solved questions， and the next few weeks I spent my free<br >