Romanov Succession (14 page)

To beat Streicher he first had to get past Erich Franke, whom he didn't know so well: he'd run on the same tracks with Franke a few times but that had been more than a year ago when Franke had still been a second-string driver getting his apprenticeship done on obsolete cars, running respectably fourth and sixth and sometimes third in cars which in other hands wouldn't have made the first half of the field. You knew he was very good but you never worried about him because he was running inferior machinery. Now they had trusted him with a 540K and Felix had the feeling Franke would have been another half-lap ahead if it weren't for Streicher's intimidating presence out front. The Germans didn't realize that habit of command and subordination was a weakness on the motor track.

He wished he knew Franke better now; wished he had paid more attention to Franke's repertoire in the past. Franke had won at Molsheim this season, taken a second (to Streicher) at Montlhery Autodrome and another second (to Von Brauchitsch) at the Targa Florio; they were all races in which Felix hadn't been entered and he regretted that now.

Streicher was good of course: at one time he'd been the very best. But he was not as good as he had been. He needed a little help to win now. That was what Franke was there for: to provide interference for those who tried to get near Streicher.

On the eighty-ninth lap Felix made his bid against Franke, coming out of the turn on the inside and bolting ahead. This time there was no competing car to clutter up the inside rail; there was all the room in the world and Felix used the Bugatti's superior cornering balance to move ahead. They had lapped the field now and the red Mercedes ahead of him—Streicher—was nosing into the rear of the pack, shouldering the Invicta aside.

Halfway down the straightaway he glanced in the mirror and saw Erich Franke on his rump. Hardly a handspan separated the two cars. He kept his foot to the floor and rushed toward the lap turn.

The Alfa Romeo whined past both of them at reckless speed approaching the turn but Felix paid that no attention; the Alfa was still a lap behind and the driver was only trying to prove something to himself; he had no chance to win unless all the leaders dropped out.

Going into the ninetieth lap. He took his foot off the accelerator, easing for the turn. In the mirror Franke's green panzer was still riding his rear end like a hungry barracuda. He saw the Mercedes's nose dip when Franke braked. The Mercedes would have to drop to a slower speed than the Bugatti to make the turn; Franke would have to stay to the outside and he would have the inside to himself. That was how he judged it and he drove accordingly, braking hard when he came into the curve along the inside rail.

Then he heard the sliding scrape of tires and in the mirror he saw the green Mercedes's snout yaw toward the center of the glass and he realized that Franke was still there, still crowding him into the inside of the turn, and he knew there was only one reason for Franke to do that.

Franke was going to ram him from behind, break his wheels loose in the turn and toss him tumbling off the track.

He hit the accelerator and straightened the wheel.

It sent him careening toward the outside of the turn. His outside wheels rode up on the steep embankment. In the mirror the Mercedes was still there, swaying because he'd taken Franke by surprise and Franke had been forced to correct his steering.

At the top of the turn he was bending in along the very outside rim of the track and his wheels barely had purchase. Either the Bugatti would grip or it would slide off the track.

The seat bucketed under his rump, off-wheels juddering on gravel. You couldn't touch the brake because that would be death. You just had to hope the frame would take it, stay flat enough for traction. Anything less low-slung than the Bugatti wouldn't have the slightest chance.

With two wheels off the track surface the Bugatti held the curve and he skittered onto the verge of the straightaway, accelerating hard and eating toward the center track.

That was when the green Mercedes behind him broke loose. Centrifugal force pulled it right off the track and he glimpsed it up in the air, tail high. In the mirror it executed a ponderous somersault right over the astonished faces of the Italian pit crew in their dugout. It slammed down just beyond the dugout, flat upside-down and when it burst into an enormous sheet of flame he knew there was no chance Erich Franke would come out alive.

But Franke must have known that anyway. From the outset. Because once he'd committed himself to the ramming attack there'd been no way for the Mercedes to get through the turn.

Under the eyes of flagmen and race officials the cars idled around the course one half-lap, keeping their positions until the crash trucks and firemen had rushed across the oval.

Through some blind trick of fate the machine had arced clear of the eight men in the Italian dugout and crashed directly behind it in a place where there were no spectators because from that place the roof of the dugout would have obscured their view of the race. No one was hurt except Erich Franke.

Less than twelve minutes after the crash the flagman ordered the race to continue.

On the ninety-fourth lap he passed the Invicta on the straightaway and bluffed an SSK out of the inside position on the far turn. The Talbot-Lago and the Auto Union went into the pits, out of the race. Streicher was in the open, trailed by the one-off-the-pace Alfa Romeo, with Felix closing the margin in grim earnest now because the bloody Fuehrer was not going to win this race; Felix wasn't dead yet and there were six laps left to decide it.

High anger had infected the Alfa Romeo's driver and Felix saw him skid too fast through the lap turn, roaring relentlessly in pursuit of the red Mercedes—pure rage driving the car, the search for some obscure vindication because even if the Alfa overtook Streicher it would mean nothing in the record books: Streicher was on his ninety-fifth lap, the Alfa on its ninety-fourth.

The Alfa swung into the far turn beside the Mercedes; the Mercedes gave ground gracefully and the Alfa shot out ahead of it onto the straight. There was something sardonic in the way Streicher lifted his left hand off the wheel for a moment—as if in benediction to the charging Alfa Romeo.

That left nothing between Felix and the German except space: a half dozen car-lengths which Felix made up in the turns, two steps forward in each turn and one step backward in the straightaways where the Mercedes's superior power took it away from him. On the lap turn with two full laps remaining in the race Felix was within a single car-length of Streicher's rear hub.

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.