Late in the heavy, sodden, humid Sarasota nights 1978-1980, if anyone were listening, two children’s voices might be heard. The girl is riding a standard bicycle for women with lowered tubes that let the rider pedal without bending forward, and the boy is riding a Raleigh road bike. The New College library, in one of the old Ringling buildings on the bay, closes at midnight. Traffic lights often separate them by one or two blocks, and one night within hearing range, beyond visibility, a scream immobilizes the boy with panic and fear. He catches up to her. Two men had cut her off with their car. Her scream protected her. Was this the last night they played the game that began after they saw the Kurosawa epic? Riding behind her, separated by a block or two, the boy would cry out in the darkness, Derzu! The replying cry, Capitan! would tell him where in the dark that she was riding.
















