A woman who spoke in full sentences and finished them.

A woman who made decisions and did not look to a man’s face to see whether she was allowed to have made them.

A woman who laughed, which I had never once heard her do while she was married.

With her father’s trust restored to her own control — thirty million dollars that had been stolen and forged against and finally returned — she did not retreat into a quiet, careful safety, as I half expected.

She did the opposite.