The opening days of a Grand Slam are like sorting through bits of a jigsaw puzzle – every piece has significance, but its meaning is not yet clear. Only at the end of the two weeks do the multitude of happenings come together and produce the name of the final champion.

Serena Williams clinging on to her first-round match today will surely turn out to mean something when this year’s French Open closes, but what? A crucial juncture in a road to eventual victory? A foreshadowing of vulnerability in the rounds to come? Or something as yet unanticipated?

We’ll have to wait and see. Meanwhile, the question during the early stages of her match against Tsvetana Pironkova was simply, what is going on with Serena? Something was clearly wrong. She went down 5-2, unable to do anything against Pironkova’s medium-paced shots on the sodden surface. Her movement was off-kilter – was it the heavy layer of clay underfoot? A reoccurrence of her knee injury? Or was she just numbed by the wind blowing into her semi-backless dress?

Unusually, the whole family had turned out – dad Richard, mom Oracene and sister Venus were all in the stands.

Serena clawed her way back to 5-5 from 5-2. The rain became heavier, and counterintuitively, it was Serena asking for play to be stopped. After going down a break again at 6-5, she effectively called time herself.

Play on the outside courts continued for several more minutes, but inside, Serena and Richard held an intense discussion. When play resumed in drizzly conditions six hours later, Richard stood courtside and argued with an official about the resumption.

She was dressed more warmly, but Serena’s face was ashen as she walked back out on court. She quickly dropped the set with four straight unforced errors. At the changeover, she appeared to be crying – though she brushed off the suggestion afterwards.

And then – well, we all know the drill by now. She did what she did at Australia in the second round against Nadia Petrova, and at Miami in the final against Justine Henin – begin a remarkable turnaround. Though Prionkova kept fighting, she was allowed only two more games as Serena completed a 5-7, 6-1, 6-1 victory.

Afterwards, she was her usual unfathomable mix of glibness and sincerity, throwing out (or at least assenting to) several factors that drove her to victory. Outside the room’s large windows, fans leaned over the hedge and took pictures. What inspired her to turn it around? There was her perfect record in first-round Grand Slam matches to keep (now 30-0). Avenging Pironkova’s defeat of Venus at the Australian Open two years ago. And erasing memories of a collapse against Arantxa Sanchez Vicario as a 16-year-old in 1998.

But the most resonant was this one. “I was thinking there’s no way I’m going to go home on a Sunday, you know. It’s not even Monday,” she said. “I was just like, ‘no way,’ so it kept me really motivated.”

To show just how crazy such matches can be, consider how the players described the match. “She started to play much better in the second and third sets, and she beat me,” was Pironkova’s blunt summary. But, she added, her weaker forehand wing began to break down after the rain delay, which took the pressure off Serena by giving her an obvious place to attack. Eurosport commentators, meanwhile, wondered aloud why Serena wasn’t attacking Pironkova’s forehand more. And Serena, who always rejects the notion of adapting to her opponent’s game and focuses on her own shots, probably didn’t even think about the issue at all.

As for what happened during the turnaround, Pironkova said, “She started hitting harder and making less mistakes.” Serena said, “I was playing more patient.”

Pirnokova saw the slow, damp conditions as “normal.” Serena saw them as “pretty tough.”

This game is anything but a straightforward one. Still, at least the results always are. Serena’s win means things stay on course for her to meet Henin in the quarterfinals, which could turn out to be a vital piece of the puzzle in the women’s championships.

Henin did not have her opening match all her own way either, coming back from a break down in the second set, but she never looked as hapless as Serena during her worst moments. According to her, we’re seeing the emergence of a more warm, open Henin than in the past. During her post-match interview, the beaming smile she once wore during her early days of interviews on the circuit seemed to be back. It would only show up in interviews conducted in French, though, and that doesn’t seem to have changed.

Today, she looked happiest of all when the official’s query of “Any English questions?” was met by silence. A few did creep in at the end, the first the same as the one she had just answered in French – can you talk about your next opponent?

“You must learn French, I think,” she laughingly told the reporter.

Where does this new Henin fit into the picture, and will she be as effective as the tightly-buttoned one? Answer to come – perhaps in the quarterfinal against Serena.