@@@@@What gave away her identity was the dress 394
@@@@@What gave
away her identity was the dress she woreIt was
covered with tic-tac-toe grids and the printed
words I WIN, YOU WIN, over and overIlse had that
dress when she was four or fiveabout the age
of the twin girls in the family portrait I'd seen
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on the second floor landing of El Palacio de
Asesinos
I tried to shout, to warn her not to go near the
derelictIn any case
it didn't seem to matterShe only sat there in
her sweet little rowboat on the mild red rollers,
watching and wearing Illy's tic-tac-toe dress
I fell out of my bed, and on my bad sideI cried
out in pain and rolled over on my back, listening
to the waves from outside and the soft grinding of
the shells under the houseThey told me where I
was but did not comfort me
My missing arm seemed to burnI had to put a stop
to it or go crazy, and there was only one way to
do thatI went upstairs and painted like a
lunatic for the next three hoursI had no model
on my table, no object in view out my windowIt was all in my headAnd as I
worked, I realized this was what all the pictures
had been struggling towardNot the girl in the
rowboat, necessarily; she was probably just an
added attraction, a toehold in realityIt was the
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ship I had been after all alongThe ship and the
sunsetWhen I thought back, I realized the irony
of that: Hello, the pencil-sketch I'd made on the
day I came, had been the closest
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I tumbled into bed around three-thirty and slept
until nineI woke feeling refreshed, cleaned out,
brand-newThe weather was fine: cloudless and
warmer than it had been in a weekThe Baumgartens
were getting ready to return north, but I had a
spirited game of Frisbee with their boys on the
beach before they leftMy appetite was high, my
pain-level lo
