The Way to Dusty Death. Alistair MacLean

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      There was no reply for MacAlpine to make to this so he made none. Tracchia appeared to have said his say, for he fell silent and got back to his scowling. In silence and in safety – the police escort had been steadily increasing – the four men reached the Coronado pits. Without a glance at or word to anyone Harlow made for the little shelter at the rear of the pits. In their turn nobody – Jacobson and his two mechanics were there also – made any attempt either to speak to or stop him, nor did any among them do even as much as trouble to exchange significant glances: the starkly obvious requires no emphasis. Jacobson ignored him entirely and came up to MacAlpine. The chief mechanic – and he was one of acknowledged genius – was a lean, tall and strongly built man. He had a dark and deeply lined face that looked as if it hadn’t smiled for a long time and wasn’t about to make an exception in this case either.

      He said: ‘Harlow’s clear, of course.’

      ‘Of course? I don’t understand.’

      ‘I have to tell you? Indict Harlow and you set the sport back ten years. Too many millions tied up in it to allow that to happen. Isn’t there now, Mr MacAlpine?’

      MacAlpine looked at him reflectively, not answering, glanced briefly at the still scowling Tracchia, turned away and walked across to Harlow’s battered and fire-blistered Coronado which was by that time back on all four wheels. He examined it leisurely, almost contemplatively, stooped over the cockpit, turned the steering wheel which offered no resistance to his hand, then straightened.

      He said: ‘Well, now. I wonder.’

      Jacobson looked at him coldly. His eyes, expressing displeasure, could be as formidable and intimidating as Tracchia’s scowl. He said: ‘I prepared that car, Mr MacAlpine.’

      MacAlpine’s shoulders rose and fell in a long moment of silence.

      ‘I know, Jacobson, I know. I also know you’re the best in the business. I also know that you’ve been too long in it to talk nonsense. Any car can go. How long?’

      ‘You want me to start now?’

      ‘That’s it.’

      ‘Four hours.’ Jacobson was curt, offence given and taken. ‘Six at the most.’

      MacAlpine nodded, took Dunnet by the arm, prepared to walk away, then halted. Tracchia and Rory were together talking in low indistinct voices but their words didn’t have to be understood, the rigid hostility in their expressions as they looked at Harlow and his bottle of brandy inside the hut were eloquent enough. MacAlpine, his hand still on Dunnet’s arm, moved away and sighed again.

      ‘Johnny’s not making too many friends today, is he?’

      ‘He hasn’t been for far too many days. And I think that here’s another friend that he’s about not to make.’

      ‘Oh Jesus.’ Sighs seemed to be becoming second nature to MacAlpine. ‘Neubauer does seem to have something on his mind.’

      The figure in sky-blue racing overalls striding towards the pits did indeed seem to have something on his mind. Neubauer was tall, very blond and completely Nordic in appearance although he was in fact Austrian. The No. 1 driver for team Cagliari – he had the word Cagliari emblazoned across the chest of his overalls – his consistent brilliance on the Grand Prix tracks had made him the acknowledged crown prince of racing and Harlow’s eventual and inevitable successor. Like Tracchia, he was a cool, distant man wholly incapable of standing fools at any price, far less gladly. Like Tracchia, his friends and intimates were restricted to a very small group indeed: it was a matter for neither wonder nor speculation that those two men, the most unforgiving of rivals on the race-tracks were, off-duty, close friends.

      Neubauer, with compressed lips and cold pale-blue eyes glittering, was clearly a very angry man and his humour wasn’t improved when MacAlpine moved his massive bulk to block his way. Neubauer had no option other than to stop: big man though he was MacAlpine was very much bigger. When he spoke it was with his teeth clamped together.

      ‘Out of my way.’

      MacAlpine looked at him in mild surprise.

      ‘You said what?’

      ‘Sorry, Mr MacAlpine. Where’s that bastard Harlow?’

      ‘Leave him be. He’s not well.’

      ‘And Jethou is, I suppose? I don’t know who the hell or what the hell Harlow is or is supposed to be and I don’t care. Why should that maniac get off scot-free? He is a maniac. You know it. We all know it. He forced me off the road twice today, that could just as well have been me burnt to death as Jethou. I’m giving you warning, Mr MacAlpine. I’m going to call a meeting of the GPDA and have him banned from the circuits.’

      ‘You’re the last person who can afford to do that, Willi.’ MacAlpine put his hands on Neubauer’s shoulders. ‘The last person who can afford to put the finger on Johnny. If Harlow goes, who’s the next champion?’

      Neubauer stared at him. Some of the fury left his face and he stared at MacAlpine in almost bewildered disbelief. When his voice came it was low, almost an uncertain whisper. ‘You think I would do it for that, Mr MacAlpine?’

      ‘No, Willi, I don’t. I’m just pointing out that most others would.’

      There was a long pause during which what was left of Neubauer’s anger died away. He said quietly: ‘He’s a killer. He’ll kill again.’ Gently, he removed MacAlpine’s hands, turned and left the pits. Thoughtfully, worriedly Dunnet watched him leave.

      ‘He could be right, James. Sure, sure, he’s won five Grand Prix in a row but ever since his brother was killed in the Spanish Grand Prix – well, you know.’

      ‘Five Grand Prix under his belt and you’re trying to tell me that his nerve is gone?’

      ‘I don’t know what’s gone. I just don’t know. All I know is that the safest driver on the circuits has become so reckless and dangerous, so suicidally competitive if you like, that the other drivers are just plain scared of him. As far as they are concerned, the freedom of the road is his, they’d rather live than dispute a yard of track with him. That’s why he keeps on winning.’

      MacAlpine regarded Dunnet closely and shook his head in unease. He, MacAlpine, and not Dunnet, was the acknowledged expert, but MacAlpine held Dunnet and his opinions in the highest regard. Dunnet was an extraordinarily shrewd, intelligent and able person. He was a journalist by profession, and a highly competent one, who had switched from being a political analyst to a sports commentator for the admittedly unarguable reason that there is no topic on earth so irretrievably dull as politics. The acute penetration and remarkable powers of observation and analysis that had made him so formidable a figure on the Westminster scene he had transferred easily and successfully to the race-tracks of the world. A regular correspondent for a British national daily and two motoring magazines, one British, one American – although he did a remarkable amount of freelance work on the side – he had rapidly established himself as one of the very few really outstanding motor racing journalists in the world. To do this in the space of just over two years had been a quite outstanding achievement by any standard. So successful had he been, indeed, that he had incurred the envy and displeasure, not to say the outright wrath, of a considerable number of his less gifted peers.

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