Death Is a Lap Ahead

Chapter III The Man Behind the Wheel

Whitey ate very lightly, very slowly, forcing relaxation on himself so that the food would not knot his stomach. He bought adhesive, a wide type, and he taped his middle, drawing it tight across the small of his back. He shaved his wrists and taped them too, not so tightly as to cut circulation, but enough to give support.

When he got back to the pit, Bob Oliver was gone. The stands were full and the overflow was beginning to spread along the fence. But not on the curves. No man was fool enough to stand at a curve.

It took a precious half hour to locate a willing kid who knew something about cars, to hire him, to coach him in the teamwork necessary to gas the iron quickly, yank rubber and replace it. He gave the kid chalk and a blackboard and told him to keep track of laps, of his position, to hold up the board every fifth lap until two hundred and ninety laps had been completed. Then every lap to the end.

Inside he had the cold feeling that he would never live to the two hundred and ninetieth lap. But maybe it didn’t make a hell of a lot of difference. If he died on the track maybe Bob Oliver would be cured of the bug, of the racing disease. And that would be almost a fair return for what the kid’s father had done for Whitey Edison.

Something had happened to his vision and his hearing. All colors were intensified and all sounds. The startling vividness of everything intensified his desire to live, fighting against the fatalism that had begun to fill him.

The race was scheduled to start at two. At one-thirty the stuttering roar of motors killed all other sounds. Whitey watched the racing cars, picked out Red Lariotti’s orange job, the battered blue iron driven by Sig Carter, Wally Yobe’s job in battleship gray, Skip Morgan driving the Ace Special in fire-engine red.

They had their positions. Whitey wedged his bulk behind the wheel, chilled in spite of the heat of the sun. He had checked every inch of the car. There were nineteen entered. Five abreast in three rows, four in the last. He was second from the inside rail in the second row.

He was pushed and for painful moments the motor wouldn’t catch. At last it did and he joined the slowly circling cars which were loosely edging into position. At a few minutes after two the formation was reasonably tight, going down the far straightaway, the white pacemaker sedan leading. The sedan upped its speed coming around the east comer and the power plants began to blare. Down the straightaway, the stands on the right. Perfect formation. The sedan gunned over the starting line, darted out of the way. The blue flag flashed down and the formation jumped ahead, gaps beginning to widen.

Still too tightly bunched, they roared down at the west comer. It was very unlike the qualifying heat. The outside world was a blur, a stream of misty color. The cars around him were solid and real, apparently motionless, his speed being measured only in reference to theirs.

The vibration shook him and the wheel hammered his wrists. The crash helmet tugged at his head and he sank down a fraction of an inch. The tires of nineteen cars made a wet, ripping counterpoint to the crescendo blast of hot exhausts.

They were packed too tightly at the curve. Whitey held his breath, stared straight ahead, utilizing the side vision that enabled him to see the car on either flank. The man on the right moved in too close, and he drifted down toward the left, seeing a gap ahead of him, holding the car in trim through the banked curve, gunning it into the open place as he straightened out, sensing that if he hadn’t gunned it, the car on his right would have forced him down into the car on the left.

Ahead they were thinning a little on the straightaway, Lariotti’s orange job almost down to the east corner, lengths in the lead. He guessed that he was in sixth place, possibly fifth. A good place to hold for a few laps while they thinned out.

He had a sudden sense of well-being and realized that it was because the fear had not begun to oppress him. The sense of well-being faded as he remembered that he had not yet been forced to pass a car. He had squirted out of a gap, but purely from the instinct to avoid a tangle.

The car ran sweetly, seeming to flatten on the straightaway, seeming to hug closer to the macadam with every increase in speed.

The east comer flashed by smoothly, the stands on the right in the straightaway streaming by like a gay torn ribbon. A blunt snout crept up on his right, on the outside. He rode high toward the curve, slowing slightly, teasing the man on his right to back away and try an inside shot. The snout dropped back suddenly and, as he rounded me curve he put it to the floor, took it down close to the rail, risking a quick glance and seeing that the man who had made the bid was a good five lengths back.

He thought. If I can fight off all bids, if I can hold it right here, maybe the car will last better than the boys ahead and I can place.

But he knew that he was deluding himself, that he was putting off the decisions that would have to be made.

He came into the west corner, saw the car spinning ahead of him, gauged its spin, saw that it was carrying up toward the outside rail, sufficiently slowed to be out of danger. He flashed by it, instinctively leaning in on the curve, clearing it by a good dozen feet. But he had slowed. As he came out into the straightaway, a battered blue car edged up, the snout even with him, on the inside.

He held the position, managed to draw away from Sig a foot or so. He went high on the corner, Sig riding below him. Out of the corner he tried to hold position, but Sig had a shorter route, and in the straightaway Sig’s nose was in front, his deck even with Whitey.

They roared down at the next corner. Sig moved up a little, forcing him out. He felt his footlift, without conscious volition. He dropped back, drifted down the rail, Sig riding three lengths ahead, his bid successful. In anger, Whitey stamped hard, rode up on Sig, moved into the man’s slipstream, taking advantage of the little tug of air behind the battered blue iron, backing off for legal clearance on the curves, edging up again on the flats.

He heard the distant muted whine of the siren, and, as they flashed by the stands, he saw a crumpled car piled against the concrete wall, a man lying curiously twisted and very still about eight feet from the red flames that licked at the blistering paint.

But there was no time to think. The curve was on him. The sight of the flames had made him dizzy and sick. It was with surprise that, the next time around, he saw the big chalked “15” on the board — the “4” below it. Fourth place at the fifteenth lap. Seven and a half minutes of the two and a half hours behind him.

Fourth place. That meant that of the three cars ahead of him, one was Lariotti, one was Sig Carter. Either Morgan or Yobe would have to be behind him. Either one would want to make a bid. Two men out of the race. Thirteen cars behind him.

There was no more sense of well-being. He found himself wishing that something would happen to the power plant. Something bad. Something that would put him out for keeps. The motor droned with horrible efficiency.

The vibration began to have its usual hypnotic effect — down the straightaway, ease off for the curve, slam into the straightaway again, curve coming up, ease off a little, lean in, slam it down again.

Lap after lap, the blue car riding ahead of him as though the two cars were joined.

On the back stretch they screamed by a slow car with such speed that it loomed up and was gone before Whitey could make the slightest response. He felt the sweat pop out on him. He had barely seen the black smoke boiling from under the bonnet, sensed the motorless quiet of the car.

Had it been three feet closer to them... He knew that it was not one of the leaders ahead of him. They could not have slowed down to that extent in such a short space. Thus it had to be one of the ones behind.

Thirty laps — fifty — eighty. Forty minutes gone of the two and a half hours. The vibration and the sickening speed ate into him, inflaming unaccustomed muscles. His hands began to blister through the heavy gloves and his right foot ached with the effort of the precision control.

He felt as though he were being beaten with a vast club.

And as yet he had not made a bid at a car ahead.

Ninety laps. The gray nose of a car came up on the outside. Wally Yobe was making his bid. Yobe was in so close and Sig, ahead, was so close to the rail that Whitey was boxed. He couldn’t fight Yobe’s bid without over-running Carter. He guessed that Carter had not seen Yobe as yet.

Yobe ran neck and neck with him around the curve, mouth tight, face expressionless, hidden by helmet, goggles and pattern of dust.

On the straight, Yobe moved up. Sig Carter went into the far curve at dangerous speed, opening up a wide gap between the blue and yellow cars. Wally Yobe gave up his bid to take Carter’s spot, and eased down into the open space. At the ninety-fifth lap Whitey saw that he was running fifth.

He knew that there was more stuff under the hood of the yellow car than either Yobe or Carter could call on. The difference was the man behind the wheel. He felt shame and yet shame couldn’t conquer fear.

He rode along in fifth place, making no attempt to creep up on Wally Yobe, riding in Yobe’s slipstream the same way he had ridden in Carter’s. The line of three cars, riding nose and tail, edged out and Whitey saw that they were overtaking another car. He knew that the other car had been lapped.

He watched as he crept up on it. He watched in horror. His hands clamped more tightly on the wheel and he fought the impulse of his foot to lift. Carter passed it. Yobe crept up on it, passed it. His nose crept up on it. He held position around the curve. The straightaway was open. Yobe was pulling away. He had lifted off for the curve. Time to blast. Yet he couldn’t push down. The lapped car drew ahead. He nosed in behind it, weak and sick.

In the distance Carter and Yobe continued to move away. Another nose came up on the outside. He let it go by. At the hundredth lap he was in sixth place.