Then he was approaching his own pit dugout and he saw Sergio DeFeo standing on the verge making semaphore Waves of his arms.
Felix ignored the pit boss and pushed the fuel pedal to the floor.
In the far turn Streicher accelerated hard and his tires almost broke loose but he held his lead. But Felix saw his head cock to the side as he went through the turn and that meant something significant: an alert driver normally didn’t do that. It meant Streicher was tired.
But it was the last lap turn coming up: two kilometers left in the race and Streicher still had a jump on him. Felix had part of the Mercedes’s heavy slipstream but he had to overtake.
The crowd was roaring in anticipation. Felix swung left toward the verge-Streicher veered the same way, blocking him. On the long straightaway Felix weaved to the right but Streicher stayed with him, just ahead, the great swollen Mercedes taking up too much room. Streicher wasn’t pushing it full out; he had two thirds of his attention on his wing mirrors. There was more than enough unused soup in the Bugatti to get ahead of Streicher because the Bugatti could accelerate faster than the big car but first there had to be an opening and Streicher wasn’t going to give him one.
He was going to have to make one for himself by outfeinting Streicher; it was the only chance left. The raw final question was whether the old lion’s reaction time was still quick enough and Felix didn’t think it was. He feinted left and broke to the right. Streicher stayed with him but he’d expected that; he feinted left again, straightened, and broke left, and got his nose in before Streicher pushed hard to the left and crowded him against the verge. He had to drop back and they were approaching the far turn now, and Streicher damn well wasn’t going to let him by on the inside even if he had to slow the big Mercedes to a crawl.
That was the answer then-if Streicher wasn’t alert enough to second-guess him. But if Streicher countered with the right move it would finish the race with a German win.
Going into the turn he began to swing wide. He did it hesitantly in order to give Streicher the idea that he only wanted to move Streicher out into the middle before veering back to the inside where the Mercedes couldn’t go because of its centrifugal momentum in the turn. It was the sensible way to do it-the classic ploy-and Streicher wasn’t having any: he stayed two meters off the inside edge of the track, ready to veer either way.
The crest of the turn, and now was the time. Felix slammed throttle to floor and went whistling toward the outside bank of the turn, accelerating so rapidly that both rear wheels broke loose and skidded to the right.
It slid him into line with the straightaway and he dropped the pressure just enough to give the tires a bite before he straightened the steering wheel and drove his foot hard against the accelerator.
Streicher was coming across at him like a projectile but his reaction had been just a hair too slow and Felix saw the prow of the Mercedes off his left shoulder when he reached the whining top of third gear and slipped the rear right wheel off the track onto the loose embankment. The free tire spun a fog of dust into the sky and then his engine speed was up in the red zone and he yanked the Bugatti back onto the track at top revs in fourth and that was the race. The Mercedes chewed up his tonneau all the way to the line but Streicher had no way to get past him and the chequered flag dropped across the Bugatti with the German a single handspan behind.
The pit crew formed quickly around him and he stood under the hard hot sun waiting for his belly to stop chugging. Someone said, “Good, your Highness. Damned good.”
He found a cigarette and took the time to light it and draw deep before his attention came slowly around. “Franke didn’t make it, did he.”
The pit boss, DeFeo, kicked the ground with his foot, splashing a little spiral of dust. “Dead when they pulled him out.” Then a sudden burst of anger: “Didn’t you see me wave you off?”
DeFeo came around the car and pointed to the right front wheel. “Look at it. It’s shredding. You’d have blown it in another half-lap. I could see the pieces flapping for God’s sake.”
“But it didn’t blow, did it, Sergio.” He went to the front of the car and unbuckled the bonnet fasteners and lifted it back to have a look at the intricate confusion of the long Bugatti engine. Heat contraction made it crackle and ping. Little wafts of steam drifted up from the valve covers. He laid the flat of his palm against the steel bonnet and pushed it down.
The middle-down sun burned like a flame at his back. The horizons turned bronze. Enzione came over from his own dugout-grinning. “Beautiful driving.”
“Streicher’s getting too old.”
Enzione nodded; he was twenty-eight. “Lap time gets shorter and the young ones get harder and harder to beat. You and I, we’re getting old too.” He swung himself closer and dropped his voice. “None of us could see that much in the dust back there. Did Franke try what I think he tried?”
“Yes.”
“The pig.”
Felix had to go up to the winner’s box but there was something else first and when he walked up out of the dugout he turned to his left instead of his right. Enzione hurried to catch him, half-running on his thin short legs. “Don’t do it. Not now, anyway.”
“It doesn’t feel like waiting.” He left Enzione standing in his tracks and went along to the Mercedes dugout.
He walked right up to Streicher and hit the unflinching German in the pit of the stomach. When Streicher clutched the injury Felix clouted him across the temple.
Streicher straightened slowly. A sunburned wedge on his chest was visible within the triangle of his carelessly open jumper. He got his breath and said, “The answer to your question is no. I didn’t put him up to it. It was a suicide thing to do-he knew that before he began it. You could see that much?”
By not denying it Felix confirmed it; and Streicher drew a ragged breath. “Then use your head, Highness. He was too good a driver for me to sacrifice. I give you my word of honor. I had nothing to do with it.”
“What is the word of honor of a Nazi flunky worth on the open market these days?”
Streicher wasn’t going to be baited. “You ran a good race. Very good. You might consider joining our team-as you can see there’s an opening now.” He went even more dour: “There may be several in fact.”
Felix took one parting shot: “It was time you thought about retiring anyway.” He left that behind him; turned and walked heavily toward the winner’s box.
19
He made his way through the congratulatory crowd, answering their hoots with a spare nod. An eddy of heat rose from his stomach; he was thinking about Erich Franke and the closeness of it.
He put the crowd behind him and advanced toward the officials-only car park with the hard sun in his face. Someone spoke to him and he replied with detached courtesy without breaking stride.
He saw two people silhouetted beside the gate; he said, “Well then-this is a surprise,” but he was too washed-out to put inflection in it.
Irina Markova’s eyes were kind; it was an unusual expression on her. “Was that deliberate-what the German tried to do?”
“Yes.”
He shook hands with Alex Danilov. Alex’s long face seemed distracted. “I need a word with you.” The tone of his voice made it more than an idle invitation.
He glanced into the car park. Drivers and pfficials were pulling out. He said, “Have you got a car with you?”
“Yes.”
“I was going to borrow DeFeo’s to get to the airport. Run me out there-we can talk on the way.”
Irina said, “Alex was going there anyway.” There was something poignant about the way she said it.
He said to Alex, “I thought you were cleaning rifles in Texas or something.”
“He came to his senses,” Irina said drily.
“Marvelous,” Felix said. “Then you’ve decided to rejoin our gay little band of Ruritanian fops?” He turned with them and they walked along past the wire fence. Cars shot past, throwing up dust. Someone waved and shouted at Felix from a passing roadster; he waved casually and went on talking to Alex: “I don’t know if there’s going to be
