'I've never been to one of these before,' said Carol, as they passed beneath the trees. It felt strange, to be walking through what was virtually a forest in the midst of all these people.
'You don't know what you've been missing,' said Rosie. 'This is the way music's meant to be heard, underneath the stars.'
She looked up. There were no stars yet – the sun would not be going down for almost an hour – but behind the canopy of branches the sky was already growing dark.
'They're up there,' said Rosie. 'Take my word for it.'
The trees suddenly gave way, and before them lay the broad expanse of the Great Lawn, acres of it, already covered with human figures. She couldn't remember ever having seen so many people gathered together, except in pictures of Woodstock. It’s like a religious event, she thought, with a feeling of excitement, and she was suddenly very happy about being here, among all these people, not just in the park, but happy about being in New York where special things like this could happen, happened all the time.
'Do you want to sit up close,' Rosie was saying, as they picked their way among the people and the blankets, 'or is halfway back okay?'
'Oh, this is fine,' she said.
He stopped at the first open spot of ground and, with a flourish, laid out the blanket. Reaching into the basket, he began to pull out paper plates and silverware.
'Wait till you see the dinner I've packed!'
There was French bread, and goose-liver pate, and deviled eggs, and cold chicken, and Rosie's own sweet golden wine, and strawberry tarts for dessert. It was absolutely perfect, like a dream, almost, to be sitting here on Rosie's blanket among this happy crowd (some of them surely envying her right now, it was such an extravagant dinner), with the food spread out before them and the band shell in the distance and, behind it, the towers of Central Park South glowing gold in the sunset.
They were still eating, finishing the last of the wine, when the orchestra began to take its seats. She could hear it tuning up, one instrument at a time, then increasing in volume and complexity until the sound swelled into a wave.
Suddenly applause swept the crowd, and heads turned; the conductor had appeared. There was an interlude of silence – and then the music began, a gaily seductive piece that made her want to sway her body in time. 'It's Dvorak,' Rosie whispered. ' 'Slavonic Dances.' Afterward I'll play you something even nicer.'
'On what?'
He smiled. 'You'll see.'
It was dark now, with the only light coming from the band shell and the distant buildings. She looked in vain for a moon.
'Sorry,' said Rosie. 'No moon tonight.' She hadn't realized he'd been watching her.
'That's a shame,' she said. 'I would have liked a full moon overhead. It would have been just the right touch.'
He shrugged. 'This month has two full moons, one at the beginning, one at the end, which makes it pretty special. Right now you'll just have to make do with starlight.'
The stars had come out – the brighter ones, at least, that could penetrate the haze – by the time the orchestra reached the second half of the program.
' 'The Rite of Spring,' ' said Rosie, as the haunting tones of a bassoon floated in the air.
'I know,' she said. 'I love it. I've always wanted to see the ballet but never had the chance.'
'The inspiration for it was the image of a naked girl dancing round and round before the elders of her tribe – round and round until she died.'
Her heart beat faster. 'Yes,' she said, 'I can picture it.'
The night grew even darker as the piece progressed; the crowd was still and silent. Lying back on Rosie's blanket and gazing up at the sky, Carol found it easy to forget where she was, and where the strange, discordant music was coming from, with its undertone of menace and ancient evil. At times she almost imagined it was directed at her alone.
Toward the end, as the woodwinds became strident and the kettledrums pounded like a pulse beat, he turned to her again. She sensed him looking down at her in the darkness.
'Carol, you're not tired yet, are you?'
'No. Why?'
'I just thought, since you're lying down… '
'No, honestly, I was just enjoying the music' Had she somehow offended him? She sat up.
'Then you're not tired?'
'Not at all.'
'Good.'
Suddenly, with a drumbeat and a blare of horns, the music ended. The meadow echoed with applause, and then people around them were standing, folding blankets, and pushing slowly through the darkness toward the paths out of the park.
She and Rosie picked up their things and followed, moving with the rest. On the outskirts of the crowd, vendors were selling hot dogs, ice cream, soda, and white plastic hoops that glowed in the dark. Rosie disappeared for a moment and came back with a hoop, which he fitted over her head like a necklace.
'There,' he said, 'it's your halo.'
Around them now the crowd was splitting up, half streaming toward the paths to the east, half to the west. Carol began following the second group, but Rosie stopped her.
'Let them go,' he said. 'I have a better idea.' He took her hand and they began walking north, away from the crowds.
'Wait,' she said, suddenly afraid. 'Where are we going?'
He turned to her and smiled. His grip tightened on her hand. 'Don't worry, it's a special place I know. You'll love it.'
They went on, cutting across paths and down a slope toward a low wooded area. Soon they had left the crowd far behind them.
'But isn't this dangerous?' said Carol, in a near whisper. The trees were so thick now that she could no longer see the lights of the buildings that bordered the park.
'You're safe with me,' he said. 'Honest. Trust me.'
She still felt nervous; she had heard so many frightening things about this park that she'd even been uneasy walking in it earlier with him. She remembered Sarr Poroth's story about wandering through the park that winter day. He had come out safely enough, but he hadn't been here at night and he wasn't old and frail like Rosie. Though Rosie's grip on her hand was anything but frail.
They were walking blind now; she had lost all sense of direction and was relying completely on him.
'I don't know,' she said, trying to control her nervousness with a joke, 'I sure hope you know karate.'
She heard him chuckle as he pulled her along. 'I don't need karate. I've got God on my side.'
A few steps farther on, at the entrance to a foul-smelling little tunnel that ran beneath a footbridge, he stopped.
'Look, remember that little rhyme I taught you? In the Old Language?'
'You mean the one we sang together on the roller coaster?'
'That's right. It made you feel braver then, and it'll do the same now.'
'But I've forgotten all the words.'
'I haven't. Come on, I'll teach it to you again.'
As they started through the darkness of the tunnel, their footsteps loud against the cobblestones, he whispered the words, and she repeated them, and the echoes in the tunnel repeated them again. And he was right: it was happening just as before, the fear was leaving her like a dream, a dream that on waking she would never be able to remember.
They emerged from the tunnel and left the path, moving through a densely wooded thicket where the ground was rocky and she nearly stumbled. Ahead of them loomed an archway of branches… and suddenly she found herself in a grassy clearing, a nearly perfect circle surrounded on all sides by trees so close their branches seemed almost intertwined. She knew she had never been here before, or even near it, but the place seemed somehow
