Smaller paths ran away from the camping areas down to baseball fields and cinder tracks or up and in through groves silted ankle-deep with redwood mold, smelling like cool, powdered armpits. Julie directed Farrell onto one of the steep grades, and he followed it slowly down a black arcade of trees with a mandarin moon brooding in their top branches, until he came out suddenly into a meadow and saw lights jigging far ahead.

“We’ll walk from here,” Julie said as the cars and motorcycles began to drift into shape on both sides of the path. Farrell cut the engine and heard owls. He also heard Gervaise‘ basse-dance La Volunté being played by crumhorns and a rebec. The tune twinkled across the meadow, cold as coins, tiny and shining and sharp as new nails.

“Be damned,” he said softly. He parked the BSA near a Norton and told them to play nicely. Julie and he walked on toward the lights. She linked her arm in his, letting her fingers lie along the inside of his wrist.

“Pick a name,” she said. La Volunté ended to the sound of laughter. There was a dark tent, floating at its base like a distant mountain.

“Lester Young. No, Tom a’Bedlam.” She stopped walking and stared. “You know. With a host of furious fancies, whereof I am commander—”

“Be serious,” she said with surprising fierceness. “Names mean something here, Joe. Pick a good name, quickly, I’ll tell you why later.”

But the music had made him pleasantly frisky, rocking him gently in the sweet air. He said, “All right, Solomon Daisy. Malagigi the Dwarf Enchanter. Splendid name.” The consort began to play another Gervaise piece, a pavane, giving it the slow, gracious lilt that makes a pavane something more than procession.