Well it gets stranger. I went back to the original .zip archive. removed all instances of the figure and reinstalled and got the same issue the second time. At least the first installation worked for a while. The subsequent installations did not.

Still trying to figure out where the original downloaded archive is so I can, through the ReadMe file, try to contact the creator. It was a limited freebie here several years ago but....well, too much Poser Water has gone under the render bridge since and it is now irrelevant to the community. But is was a lovely figure at the time.