Buck La.r.s.en rolled the window down another three inches and sucked the cool, sharp air into his lungs. It was clean stuff, with a wet pine smell, and it killed the heat some and cleared his head, but he hated it, because rain made it that way. And rain was no good. Sure, it was OK sometimes; it made things grow, and all that; and probably people were saying, by G.o.d, that's wonderful, that's great--rain!

But they would feel different if they had to race on it, by Christ. It would be another story then. All of a sudden they would look up at the sky and see some dark clouds and their hearts would start pounding then and they'd be scared, you can bet your sweet a.s.s; they'd start praying to G.o.d to hold it off just a little while, just a few hours, please. But it would come, anyway. It would come. And that nice dirt track would turn to mush and maybe you're lucky and you don't total your car out, and maybe this is not one of your lucky days and the money is gone and you don't have a G.o.dd.a.m.n thing except your car and youmake a bid, only the rain has softened the track and somebody has dug a hole where there wasn't any hole a lap ago, and you hit it, and the wheel whips out of your hands and you try to hold it, but it's too late, way too late, you're going over. You know that. And nothing can stop you, either, not all the lousy prayers in the world, not all the promises; so you hit the cellar fast and hope that the roll bar will hold, hope the doors won't fly open, hope the yoyos in back won't plow into you--only they will, they always do. And when it's all over, and maybe you have a broken arm or a cracked melon, then you begin to wonder what's next, because the car is totaled, and they'll insure a blind airplane pilot before they'll insure you. And you can't blame them much, either. You're not much of a risk.

He shook his head hard, and tried to relax. It was another 60 miles to Grange. Sixty little miles.

Nothing. You can do it standing up, you have before; plenty of times. (But you were younger then, remember that. You're 48 now. You're an old b.a.s.t.a.r.d, and you're tired and scared of the rain. That's right. You're scared.) The h.e.l.l!

Buck La.r.s.en looked up at the slate-colored sky and frowned; then he peered through the misted windshield. A bend was approaching. He planted his foot on the accelerator and entered the curve at 97 miles per hour. The back end of the car began to slide gently to the left. He eased off the throttle, straightened, and fed full power to the wheels. They stuck.

Yeah, he said.

The speedometer needle slipped back to 70 and did not move. It was fine, you're OK, he thought, and you'll put those country fair farmers in your back pocket. You'd better, anyway. Maybe not for a first, but a second; third at worst. Third money ought to be around three hundred. But, he thought, what if the rain spoils the gate? Never mind, it won't. These yokels are wild for blood. A little rain won't stop them.

A sign read: GRANGE--41 MILES.

Buck snapped on his headlights. Traffic was beginning to clutter up the road, and he was glad of it, in a way; you don't get so worried when there are people around you. He just wished they wouldn't look at him that way, like they'd come to the funeral too early. You sons of b.i.t.c.hes, he thought. You don't know me, I'm a stranger to you, but you all want to see me get killed tomorrow. That's what you want, that's why you'll go to the race. Well, I'm sorry to disappoint you. I really am. That's why I ain't popular: I stayed alive too long. (And then he thought, no, that isn't why. The reason you're not popular is because you don't go very good. Come on, La.r.s.en, admit it. Face it. You're old and you're getting slow.

You're getting cautious. That's why you don't run in the big events no more, because in those you're a tail-ender; maybe not dead last, but back in the back. n.o.body sees you. n.o.body pays you. And you work just as hard. So you make the jumps out here, in the sticks, running with the local boys, because you used to be pretty good, you used to be, and you've got a h.e.l.l of a lot of experience behind you, and you can count on finishing in the money. But you're losing it. The coordination's on the way out; you don't think fast any more, you don't move fast; you don't drive fast.) A big Lincoln, dipping with the ruts, rolled by. The driver stared. I'm sorry, Buck told him. I'd like to die for you, Buddy, but I just ain't up to it; I been kind of sick, you know how it goes. But come to the track anyway; I mean, you never can tell. Maybe I'll go on my head, maybe I'll fall out and the stinking car will roll over the top of me and they'll have to get me up with a rake. It could happen.

Buck steadied the wheel with his elbows and lit the stump of his cigar. It could happen, OK, he thought. But not to me. Not to Buck La.r.s.en. He clamped his teeth down hard on the cigar, and thought, yeah, that's what Carl Beecham always said: you got to believe it'll never happen to you. Except, Carl was wrong; he found that out--what was it?--four years ago at Bonelli, when he hit the wall and bounced off and went over.

He tightened his thick, square fingers on the taped wheel. He pulled down the shutters, fast.

Whenever he'd find himself thinking about Carl, or Sandy, or Chick Snyder, or Jim Lonnergan, or any of the others, he would just pull a cord and giant shutters would come down in his mind and he would stop thinking about them. They had all been friends of his. Now they were dead, or retired and in business for themselves, and he didn't have anyone to go out and have a beer with, or maybe play cards or just foolaround; he was alone; and you don't want to make a thing like that worse, do you?

So I'm alone. Lots of people are alone. Lots of people don't even have jobs not even lousy ones like this.

He told himself that he was in plenty good shape, and did not wonder--as he had once wondered--why, since he hated it, he had ever become a race driver. It was no great mystery. There'd been a dirt track in the town where he grew up. He'd started hanging around the pits, because he liked to watch the cars and listen to the noise. And he was young, but he was a pretty good mechanic anyway so he helped the drivers work on their machines. Then, he couldn't recall who it was, somebody got sick and asked him to drive. It was a thrill, and he hadn't had many thrills before. So he tried it again.

And that was it. He'd been driving ever since; it was the only thing he knew how to do, for Christ's sake. (No, that wasn't true, either. He could make a living as a mechanic.) _So why don't I? I will. I'll take a few firsts and salt the dough away and start a garage and let the other b.a.s.t.a.r.ds risk their necks. The h.e.l.l with it_.

The rain grew suddenly fierce, and he rolled up the window angrily. For almost an hour he thought of nothing but the car, mentally checking each part and making sure it was right. G.o.d knew he was handicapped enough as it was with a two-year-old engine; it took his know-how to find those extra horses, and still he was short. The other boys would be in new jobs, most of them. More torque. More top end. He'd have to fight some.

Buck slowed to 45, then to 25, and pulled up in front of a gas station. He went to the bathroom, splashed cold water over his face, wiped away some of the grime.

He went to a restaurant and spent one of his remaining six dollars on supper.

Then he took the Chevy to a hotel called The Plantation and locked it up. The rain gleamed on its wrinkled hide, wrinkled from the many battles it had waged, and made it look a little less ugly. But it was ugly, anyhow. It had a tough, weathered appearance, an appearance of great and disreputable age; and though it bore a certain resemblance to ordinary pa.s.senger cars, it was nothing of the kind. It was a stripped-down, tight-sprung, lowered, finely-tuned, balanced savage, a wild beast with a fighter's heart and a fighter's instincts. On the highway, it was a wolf among lambs; and it was only on the track that it felt free and happy and at home.

The Chevy was like Buck La.r.s.en himself, and Buck sensed this. The two of them had been through a lot together. They had come too close too many times. But they were alive, somehow, both of them, now, and they were together, and maybe they were ugly and old and not as fast as the new jobs, but they knew some things, by G.o.d, they knew some tricks the hot-dogs would never find out.

Buck glanced at the tires, nodded, and went into the hotel. He left a call for 5:30. the old man at the desk said he wouldn't fail. Buck went to his room, which was small and hot but only cost him three dollars, and what can you expect for that?

He listened to the rain and told it, Look, I'll find second or third tomorrow, you can't stop me, I'm sorry. A man's got to eat.

He switched off the light and fell into a dark black sleep.

When he awoke, he went to the window and saw that the rain had stopped; but it had stopped within the hour, and so it didn't matter. He went out and found a place that was open and ate a light breakfast of toast and coffee.

Then he drove the Chevy the 13 miles out of town to the Soltan track. It sat in the middle of a field that would normally have been dusty but now was like a river bank, the surface slimy with black mud. The track itself was like most others: a fence of gray, rotting boards; a creaking round of hard, spintery benches; a heavy wooden crash wall; and a narrow oval of wet dirt. A big roller was busily tamping it down, but this would do no good. A few hot qualifying laps and the mud would loosen. One short heat and it would be a lake again.

Dawn had just broken, and the gray light washed over the sky. It was quiet, the roller making no sound on the dirt, the man behind the roller silent and tired. It was cold, too, but Buck stripped off hiscloth jacket. He got his tools out of the trunk and laid them on the ground. He removed the car's m.u.f.fler's first; then, methodically, jacked up the rear end, took off the hack left tire and examined it. He checked it for pressure, fitted it back onto the wheel and did the same with the other tires. Then he checked the wheels. Then the brakes.

Soon more cars arrived, and in a while the pits were full. When Buck finished with the Chevy, when he was sure as he could ever be that it was right and ready to go, he wiped his big hands on an oily rag and took a look at the compet.i.tion.

It was going to be rougher than he'd thought. There were two brand new supercharged Fords, a 1957 fuel-injection Chevrolet, three Dodge D-500s, and a hotlooking Plymouth Fury. The remaining automobiles were more standard, several of them crash jobs, almost jalopies, the sides and top pounded out crudely.

Nineteen, in all.

And I've got to beat at least 17 of them, Buck thought. He walked over to a new Pontiac and looked inside. It was a meek job, real meek. But you can't tell. He examined the name printed on the side of the car: Tommy Linden.

n.o.body. Buck put the rag away, returned to the Chevy. Several hours had pa.s.sed, and soon it would be 12 o'clock, qualifying time. He'd better get some rest.

He lay down on a canvas tarpaulin and was about to close his eyes, when he saw a young man walking up to the Pontiac. They apparently hadn't heard of the No Females Allowed rule in Soltan, for a girl was with him. She was young, too; maybe 2], 22. And not hard and mannish, like most of them, but soft and light and clean. Some girls always stay clean, Buck thought. No matter what they do, where they are. If Anna-Lee had been more that way (or even a little) maybe he'd of stuck with her. But she was a dog. Why the h.e.l.l do you marry a d.a.m.n sloppy broad like that in the first place? G.o.d. He looked at the girl and thought of his ex-wife, then focused on the kid. Twenty-five. Handsome, brawny: he thinks he's got a lot, that one. You can usually tell. Look at his eyes.

Buck half-dozed until a loudspeaker announced time for qualifying; he sat up then and listened to the order of the numbers. Twenty-two, first. Ninety-one, second. Seven, third.

He was ninth.

People started running around in the pits; customers drifted up into the grandstands; the speaker blared; then number 22, a yellow Ford, rolled up to the line.

It roared away at the drop of the flag.

Others followed.

When he was called, Buck patted the Chevy, listened to it, and grunted. The track was getting chewed up, but it was still possible to get around quickest time. He eased off the mark slowly as the flag dropped, got up some steam on the backstretch and came thundering across the line with his foot planted. He grazed the south wall slightly on his second try, but it was nothing, only a scratch.

He went to the pits and removed his helmet in time to hear the announcer's voice: "Car number six, driven by Buck La.r.s.en--26:15."

The crowd murmured approval. Buck decided it would be a decent gate and settled down again.

The Fury went through at something over 26:15.

Then it was the Pontiac's turn.

"Car number 14, driven by Tommy Linden, up."

The gray car's pipes growled savagely as it rolled out. The track was bad, now. Really bad.

Buck felt better: he had second starting position sewed up. No one could drop a h.e.l.l of a lot off of 26:15 in this soup.

The Pontiac accelerated so hard at take-off that the rear almost slewed around. Easy, 14, Buck thought. Easy. It'll impress the little girl but your a.s.s'll be at the end of the pack.

Number 14 came through the last turn almost sideways, straightened, and screamed across the line. It stuck high on the track, near the wall, at every curve. Buck saw the kid's face as he went by. It was unsmiling. The eyes were fixed straight ahead.

Then it was over, and the loudspeaker roared: "Tommy Linden, number 14, turns it in 26:13!"Buck frowned. The other supercharged Ford would probably make it under 26. Sure it would, with that torque.

The kid crawled out of the Pontiac but before he could get his helmet off, the girl in the pink dress jumped from the stack of tires and began to pull awkwardly at the strap. The kid grinned. "Come on, leave it go," he said, and pushed the girl gently aside. Already his face was dirty, no longer quite so young. He looked at his tires and walked over to Buck. "Hey," he said, "I had somebody fooling with my hat, I didn't get the time. You remember what I turned?"

"26:13," Buck said.

"Not too bad, huh?" the kid said, happily. Then, he spit out his gum. "What'd you turn?"

"26:15.".

The kid appraised Buck, looked at his age and the worry in his face. "That's all right," he said, "h.e.l.l, nothing wrong with that. You been around Soltan before?"

"Not for a while," Buck said.

"Well, like, sometimes I steal a little practice; you know?" He paused. "I'm Tommy Linden, live over to Pinetop."

Buck did not put out his hand. "La.r.s.en," he said.

The young man took another piece of gum from his pocket, unwrapped it, folded it, put it into his mouth. "I'll tell you something," he said. "See, like I told you, I practice here once in a while. I got Andy Gammon's garage backing me--they're in Pinetop?--see, and the thing is, I'm kind of after 36. You know? The blown Ford?"

"Yeah."

"So, what I mean is, if you can pa.s.s me, what the h.e.l.l, go on, know what I mean? But, uh--if you can't, I'd appreciate it if you'd stay out of my way." The kid's eyes looked hard and angry. "I mean I really want me that Ford."

Buck lit his cigar, carefully. "I'll do what I can," he said.

"Thanks a lot," the kid said. Then he winked. "I got the chick along, see. She thinks I'm pretty good. I don't want to let her down; you know?" He slapped Buck's arm and walked back to his own car, walked lightly, on the b.a.l.l.s of his feet. His jeans were tight and low on his waist and the bottoms were stuffed into a pair of dark boots. He doesn't have a worry, Buck thought. He may be a little scared, but he's not worried. It's better that way.

The sun began to throb and the heat soaked into Buck's clothes and he began to feel the old impatience, the agony of waiting. Why the h.e.l.l did they always take so d.a.m.n long? he wondered. No reason for it.

He started to walk across the track, but the plate in his leg was acting up--it did that whenever it rained--and he sat down instead. His face was wet; dirt caked into the shiny scar tissue behind his ear, and perspiration beaded the tips of the black hairs that protruded from his nostrils. He looked over and saw Tommy Linden and the girl in the pink dress. She was whispering something into the kid's ear; he was laughing.

d.a.m.n the heat! He wiped his face, turned from Tommy Linden and the girl and rechecked his tires. Then he checked them again. Then it was time for the first race, a five-lap trophy dash. It didn't count for anything.

The race started; the two Fords shot ahead at once, Buck gunned the Chevy and took after them. Number 14 spent too much time spinning its wheels and had to drop behind. But it stayed there, weaving to the right, then to the left, pushing hard. Buck knew he could hold his position--anyone could in a five lapper--but he decided not to take any chances; it didn't mean a G.o.dd.a.m.n. So he swung wide and let the Pontiac rush past on the inside. It fishtailed violently with the effort, but remained on the track.

Within a couple of minutes it was over, and Buck's Chevy was the only car that had been pa.s.sed: he'd had no trouble holding off the Mercs, and they kept daylight between themselves and the Fury.

But of course it meant nothing. The short heats were just to fill up time for the crowd; n.o.body took them seriously.

A bunch of motorcycles went around for 10 laps, softening up the dirt even more; there weretwo more dashes; and then it was time for the big one--for the 150 lap Main Event.

Once again Buck pulled into line; it was to be an inverted start. Fast cars to the rear, slow cars in front.

He slipped carefully into the shoulder harness, cinched the safety belt tight across his lap, checked the doors, and put on his helmet. It was hot, but he might as well get used to it; he'd have the d.a.m.n thing on for a long time.

Number 14 skidded slightly beside him, its engine howling. Tommy Linden fitted his helmet on and stretched theatrically. His eyes met Buck's and held.

"You know what?" Linden yelled. "I don't think them two Fords is exactly stock, you know what I mean?"

Buck smiled. The kid's OK, he thought. A pretty nice kid. "Well, are you?" he shouted.

"h.e.l.l, no!" Linden roared with amus.e.m.e.nt.

"Me either."

"What?"

The loudspeaker crackled. "Red Norris will now introduce the drivers!"

Up ahead, the track was like a rained-on mountain trail; great clots of mud and sticky pools of black surfaced it all the way around; there wasn't a clear hard spot anywhere.

Buck glanced over at number 14 and saw Tommy Linden waving up at the grandstand. A middle-aged man waved back. Buck turned away.

"Gonna let me get him?" The kid was pointing at number 36.

"Don't ask me! Ask him!"

"Yeah, why don't I do that!"

After the introductions, the official starter walked up with a green flag, furled. The drivers all buckled their helmets. The silence lasted a moment, then was torn by the successive explosions that trembled out of the 19 racing stock cars.

Buck stopped smiling; he stopped thinking of Tommy Linden, of any other human being. He thought only of the moments to come. I'll follow 36 he decided, let it break trail; then I'll hang on. That's all I have to do. Just don't get too d.a.m.n close to the wall. You don't want to spend time pounding out a door. Be smooth. Hang on to 36 and you're in hardward.

The cars roared like wounded lions for almost a full minute, and some sounded healthy while others coughed enough to show that they were not so healthy; then the man with the flag waved them off, in a bunch, for the rolling start. Buck could see the Pontiac straining at the leash, inching forward, and he kept level. They circulated slowly around, the starter judged them, he judged they were all right, and gave them the flag.

It was a race.

Buck immediately cut his wheel for a quick nip inside the Pontiac, but the kid was quicker; he'd antic.i.p.ated the move and edged to the right to hold Buck off. At the first turn, number 14 threw its rear around viciously, and Buck knew he'd have to kiss the wall and bull through or drop back. He dropped back. There was plenty of time.

He followed the Pontiac closely, but he found that it was not so easy after all. The car cowboyed through every turn, scaring off the tail-enders, and it was everything he could do to hang on. Ahead, the Fords were threading their way through traffic with great ease, leaving a wake of thick mud.

He relaxed some and allowed the long years of his experience to guide the car. Gradually the Pontiac was picking off the stragglers; within 15 minutes it had pa.s.sed the sixth place Mercury, and was drawing up on five.

You better not try it, Buck said. Those boys aren't working too hard. They can go a lot faster. I hope you know that.

But the Pontiac didn't settle down, it didn't slacken its pace any, and Buck knew that he would have to revise his strategy. He'd planned to wait for number 14 to realize that it couldn't hope for better than a third; then he was going to bluff him. You can bluff them when the fever's pa.s.sed, when they're not all out and driving hard.But he could see that he wasn't going to be able to bluff the Pontiac.

He could only outdrive him, nerf him a little, maybe, shake him up, cause him to bobble that one time, and then streak by.

Once the decision was made, Buck moved well back in the seat. They were about halfway through now. Give it seven more laps; then make the bid.

He swung past a beat-up Dodge on the north turn and was about to correct when the driver lost it. The Dodge went into a frenzied spin, skimmed across the muddy track and bounded off the wall.

Buck yanked his tape-covered wheel violently to the left, then to the right, and managed to avoid the car.

d.a.m.n! Now number 14 was four up and going like the wind. Well. Buck put his b.u.mper next to the Merc in front of him and stabbed the accelerator. The Merc wavered, moved; Buck went by. It worked on the second car, too; and he was in position to catch 14 as it was pa.s.sing a Ford on the short straight.

He waited another three laps, until they were out of the traffic somewhat, and began to ride the Pontiac's tail. They both hit a deep rut and both fishtailed, but no more than three inches of daylight showed between them.

Buck tried to pa.s.s on the west turn by swinging left and going in a little deeper, but the Pontiac saw him and went just as deep; both missed the wall by less than a foot.