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key from her skirt pocket and, after several ineffective tries, succeeded in opening the lock and then the planked door. She stood aside and motioned me in.
    “It isn’t much,” she said.
    Correct; it wasn’t. I stepped into a square room scantily furnished. I saw none of the scattered paraphernalia usually found in an artist’s workshop. Instead of an easel there was a wooden drafting table, tilted upward, and a high stool with a rattan seat. A tall cupboard with closed doors sagged crazily. I assumed it held brushes, watercolors, and supplies.
    A cot was planted in the center of the floor. It was covered with a single sheet and light cotton blanket. The small pillow was soiled. I could see no plumbing, not even a faucet. The most attractive feature was a skylight: two big hinged windows opened by hanging chains.
    “Plenty of light for your painting,” I observed.
    She suddenly became talkative. “And for two or three hours a day I get the direct sun. I can suntan naked on the cot. After locking the door from the inside of course. See the bolt? I’ve slept here a few nights when the weather is nice. Then I look up and see the stars.”
    She stopped talking as abruptly as she had started and bowed her head as if embarrassed by her outburst. I turned my attention to the walls. The interior of the cabin was lined with cheap wall-board which bore a number of Natalie’s watercolors of imaginary flowers. A few were framed and hung. The others were simply pushpinned to the wall. Again mother had been right: “Some are pretty and some are just blah.”
    I stepped closer to examine her work and sensed her coming up behind me, possibly to observe my reactions. I thought her brushwork was merely serviceable but her sense of color was admirable. The subject matter turned me off—all those buds, blooms, and leaves that never existed in nature but were products of her imagination or dreams. What surprised me were the blossoms with an undeniable resemblance to sexual organs, male and female.
    “Well?” Nettie said at my shoulder. “What do you think?”
    “Striking,” I said. “Unique. Are you familiar with the work of Georgia O’Keeffe?”
    “No.”
    “Take a look,” I advised. “I think you’ll be amazed at what she did.”
    “I don’t want to study other people’s work. I want to be me. Original.”
    “Surely you went to art school to learn technique, perspective, composition. Didn’t you study the work of other artists then?”
    “I never went to art class. I bought a book and taught myself.”
    “Remarkable,” I said.
    “A lot of hard work but I enjoy it. It’s my escape.”
    “From what?”
    “Oh...” she said vaguely. “Things. People.”
    “All people? Surely you have friends.”
    She lifted her chin. “A few,” she said defensively, and I guessed she was lying.
    Perhaps I looked at her pityingly—I didn’t mean to, I swear I didn’t—but what happened next astounded me. She looped her bare arms about my neck, careened into me, thrust her head forward and attempted to kiss my lips. But in her frantic haste her aim was bad and she kissed my chin. She tried again and this time succeeded. Her mouth was hot.
    She pulled away and gasped, “Archy?” It was an entreaty and the first time she had used my name. Then she kissed me again, her assault so ravenous I staggered back a step. But she would not let me escape and in the blink of a gnat’s eye I found myself clutching her as tightly as she embraced me. I am not made of cedar shingles, you know.
    It was I who had the sense to close the inside bolt on the door before we fumbled away our clothes. We then attempted to determine if a folding cot could bear the weight of two bodies and the demented thumping of our naked pas de deux. It couldn’t, but fortunately it collapsed slowly and I do not believe either of us was aware of our descent to the floor.
    Lordy, her body was magnificent and I recant all those snide comments made previously