Why this, and why now? he asked, considering his stylistic evolution. At home he’d been influenced by the work of his father, a master draftsman and composer in the Western realist tradition. At Yale, where he first began to imbibe the ink of Derek Walcott, he was seduced by the light of impressionism. After that was a leap to constructivism and the work of the Mexican muralists, which led him to Cuba, where he was drawn to the vibrant, rhythmic art of the color-intuitive campesinos.

And now he had done this, he half-said, half-asked, hearing in his head the feathery tenor of his father’s voice. This. The impact of the word flung his arms out wide and spun him around, showing him in the swirling abstractions a vision of himself that he recognized as neither past, present, nor future.

Sitting on the dull cement floor in a corner, beneath a tent of cobweb, he tried to remember if he’d ever experienced anything like this, resting his chin on his knees for support as his head filled up with thoughts and memories. After sorting and stacking and counting and filing and cross-referencing for date and subject and characters and ideas, he was as unclear about his compulsion as he’d been at the beginning. He checked his watch. He was fifteen minutes late. Today they would have to wait. Because the feeling was pulling him up now, and shoving him toward a canvas.

You’ve survived three weeks of this, he said to himself as he mixed some green on a palette. But what is this? he asked again. His brush bit into the unknown. What the hell is this?

With the ballerina still on her toes, floating across the stage like a mast on the horizon, the applause went up and the curtain came down, and the Dance Theater of Harlem’s benefit performance for the United Negro College Fund broke for intermission.

Sylvia, in a black dress, a string of pearls around her neck, took Lewis’s hand and walked with him, cutting her steps short, as equally handsome couples who had paid to be seen in the right company poured into the center aisle and streamed into the lobby of the New York State Theater at Lincoln Center.

Patting him on the arm as she spied Boogie Boo, Sylvia asked Lewis where he’d be. He pointed to Virgil and patted her shoulder.

“Oh, Boogie, I feel like I’ve died and gone to negro hell.”

“Oh come on, Syl,” Boogie replied. “You know black folks ain’t got money till they showing it. And ain’t nobody can work an evening gown like a sister who knows her hair’s a-yit. After looking at some o’ them hairstyles tonight I’ve got a mind to quit work tomorrow and open me a shop.”

“Stop, Boogie, stop,” Sylvia whispered through her teeth. “Can’t you see I’m being sophisticated in my too-high shoes. Goddamn, girl, if these hooker pumps don’t kill me, you will.”

“Oh come on, Syl, you know whamtalkin about. Just check it right. On the night before an event like this a stylist is a sister’s best friend. See, cause sisters know they can’t always vouch for black hair. Cause black hair likes to improvise. Black hair is like fucking jazz. And not swing either. Bebop. Why d’you think so many sisters are wearing dreads today? Dreads can’t do shit but stay nappy.”