He hoped the impression given, during the two laps’ trial run, was that he had pushed the Saab to a point near its limit. Tactics had to be right now, or he would stand no chance.
As he placed the Saab on its mark, Bond made the final decision. He would let Luxor have his head for at least the first five laps. This would give him valuable experience of the circuit at various speeds, and let him see whether Luxor was capable, as he suspected, of blocking any attempt to overtake by using really dangerous manoeuvres.
Providing Bond could match Luxors skill, and the Saab was powerful enough to stay close, he would begin to make his bid at the beginning of the sixth lap. Then, once ahead, Bond could unleash the reserve power and make a run for home. If he drove with a little dash, but within the safety limits of both car and circuit, there was the distinct possibility that he could outdistance Luxor by at least half a lap. That should be his place no later than lap eight.
Bismaquer was looking at him. Bond raised his thumb, and the flag twirled. Luxor’s engine fired with a roar, denoting more power than would usually be under the bonnet of a Shelby-American.
The Saab grumbled quietly, and Bond glanced around, noting the distance between the two cars and, at the same moment, catching Luxor’s sunken eyes. They seemed to bore into him with an expression of intense hatred.
Bond faced forward and signalled to Bismaquer.
The flag went up. Bond slid into first, released the hand brake, and hovered his right foot over the accelerator.
The flag came down.
The so-called Shelby-American shook its tail as it streaked away from the grid. With such a fast start, Luxor was out to thrash him completely. As Bond started to build up power, he realised that Bismaquer’s driver intended to put a lot of distance between them, in the shortest possible time. He kicked down hard on the accelerator, bringing the turbo in quickly, watching the speed rise.
Already, Luxor must have been averaging a hundred on the straight before the chicane. Bond kept piling on the pressure, hearing the turbo whine like a jet engine as he thrust the gears into fifth, passing the 120 mark, which brought him close up behind the sloping fastback of Luxor’s car.
It was a matter of feet now, and Bond was forced to decelerate and change down to hold the hundred, riding directly behind Luxor. He saw the brake lights flicker, as they came up to the chicane. Bond changed down again rather than use his brakes, easing the car through the sashay of the chicane, the speedometer showing around seventy as Luxor appeared to become airborne over the hump at the end.
Bond hit the hump at just under seventy miles per hour, leaving his hands loose on the wheel, until he felt the solid jar as the Saab came into contact with the track again. Then he changed up, his foot toeing the accelerator.
Around the full hundred appeared to be Luxor’s safe limit, and Bond followed him through the right-angle turn without letting up on speed. He allowed the Saab to drift in the Shelby-American’s wake to the right, then hard right, feeling the rear tyres protest as they kept their grip. Ten of those, and the rubber would really start to burn off, Bond thought. By the time the knowledge had been assimilated, they were at the Z bend.
Here, Luxor had his own technique – using the brakes constantly on the hairpins of the zigs and zags of the bend, but putting on power, even during the short runs between.
Through, and into the next straight. Bond realised they must have taken the Z at a minimum of seventy, rising to eighty. Luxor was undoubtedly not only a confident, technical expert, but a man with steel nerves. Yet, on this long straight, he hardly took the little silver car above the hundred.
Before they reached the first of the two final bends, Bond decided that Luxor cruised at around one hundred miles per hour, with a possible forty, maybe fifty, in reserve for the straights when he needed it.
It was good technique. The circuit called for accuracy in speed, and hard work as well as concentration. Out-think him, Bond whispered to himself. If he read it correctly, Luxor was going to keep up the pace until the last three, possibly four, laps and then – sure that Bond was both tired and running the Saab flat out – he would push down and surge ahead, using his maximum speed.
They flashed past the stands. Bond, at a glance, saw that the head-up display speedometer was showing a fraction above a hundred. Luxor had drawn slightly ahead.
Maybe it was time to change tactics, not wait until later in the race. Stick with him for this one anyway; then decide when to make the first pass.
By the time they had negotiated the second lap and were screaming past the stands again, Bond was sweating, working hard, still loath to use brakes, keeping a check on speed with gears and accelerator.
This would be the ideal place, he decided, as they whined on towards the chicane. When they ended the third lap he would have a go.
The Saab was less than six feet behind the square tail of Luxor’s car as they came out of the final turn on lap three. Now, he thought, watching Luxor drift slightly to the left. Not really enough room, but, if he obeyed the rules, Luxor would have to let Bond through.
A fraction of pressure on the wheel and the Saab slid to the right, coming very close to the Shelby-American. Further to the right. Bond saw the edge of the track too close to his front inside wheel, but he pressed on, up into fifth gear and a hard kick down. The turbo reacted, and he felt the push of power, like a jet engine. The Saab’s nose was reaching out, half way down Luxor’s chassis, unmistakably clearing to overtake.
Then, with a jarring horror, Bond saw Luxor veer over at an angle, cutting across to stop him, increasing speed so that Bond almost had to stand on the brakes to avoid slamming into the other car’s side. In a fraction of a second, the Saab was behind again, losing ground. Bastard, Bond snarled to himself. He changed down, dropping speed to negotiate the chicane. Once through, he put his foot down again, closing so that they went into the right-angle bend almost locked together.
This time, Bond felt considerable drift, the Saab sliding over to the left during the final moments of the turn. He glanced at the head-up digital figures of the speedometer and was not surprised. They registered 105; and, by the time he was aware of the speed building to 125, the zig-zag of the Z bend was on them.
Try him on the far straight, Bond thought. Force the bastard off the road if need be; the Saab had the weight to do it.
They came out of the Z bend, Luxor still accelerating and Bond determined not to lose an inch, trying to position for a breakthrough.
Then it happened.
He knew he would be able to prove nothing later. The blame would be put firmly on an overheated turbo, or some other excuse. At the time, however, he saw both the manoeuvre and the action quite plainly.
Luxor accelerated slightly, moving ahead by a few feet – three or four at the most. As Bond curled his own toes on the Saab’s accelerator, he saw distinctly the small object drop away from Luxor’s rear bumper. For a fraction of a second, he thought Luxor was in trouble: that stress was causing a break-up of some rear component. But the whooshing noise under the Saab made the truth plain enough.
Luxor had jettisoned some form of incendiary device, set to ignite as it hit the track.
All Bond was aware of after that was a sheet of flame surrounding the car, engulfing him, and then rapidly dying away.
They were about midway to the penultimate bend, and James Bond at first thought the bid had failed. The enveloping flame could only have been there for a second, and he had probably outrun it at this speed. Then he experienced a sense of shock as the fire warning buzzed and the red light began to blink on the dashboard.
One of the last things Bond had fitted to the Saab was the relatively new on-board, fire detection and extinguisher system, marketed and developed by Graviner. Fixed-temperature detectors – set high, and at a very fine pitch for the Saab – monitored the engine and underside of the car, especially those areas adjacent to the fuel tank. The guts of the system were situated deep within the Saab’s larg
e boot. In a protected bed sat a seamless chrome and steel container, filled, under pressure, with the most efficient of extinguishants, Halon 1211. From the container, spray pipes ran to the engine compartment and around the car, particularly along the underside.
The extinguisher automatically fired when the detectors signalled a fire warning; while the whole system could also be activated manually from a thump button on the dashboard. The light and buzzer warnings were also automatically operated the moment heat set off the sensors.
In the present case, fire had engulfed the car, catching the underside, thereby activating the system without further help from Bond.
Literally within seconds, ten kilogrammes of Halon 1211 engulfed the Saab, sweeping from underside to engine compartment, extinguishing the fire immediately and leaving no damage in its wake, for the properties of Halon are non-damaging to engine components, electrical wiring, or humans. It is also non-corrosive and, once the fire had been extinguished, the evaporation rate is so fast that no residue remains.
Bond, very much aware of what was going on, changed down, braked, and took the last two bends at a moderate sixty-five. It was only when he was into the long straight – past the stand – knowing that he was entering the fifth lap, that Bond opened up the car again, relieved to feel no change in engine response.
Luxor, however, was well away – a good two miles ahead, just entering the chicane. Deep within his head, where anger boiled, Bond willed coolness. Luxor had deliberately attempted to burn him to death on the track – expecting the incendiary device to blow the Saab’s petrol tank and probably the turbo-charger at the same time.
Settling himself firmly, Bond did not let his eyes waver from the road ahead. His hands ran through the gears as he increased power, roaring along the straight towards the chicane. His speed rose to over the hundred until the little green digital figures on the head-up display steadied at 130.
Bond changed down, but still took the chicane at his highest speed yet. The Saab rose like an aircraft, rotating on take-off, then bounced on its rear end first, almost out of control. Bond wrestled with the wheel. The screen of trees off the edge of the track slewed into vision. He heard the tyres protest until he brought the car back on line, pouring on a little more speed, then slowing as the Z bend approached.
From then onwards, it was a question of using speed on the straights, without trying to push the Saab to its full stretch, in order to gain on Luxor, who was going all out now, clinging to his lead.
It took another two laps before the Saab came within striking distance of its adversary. Then, nose to bumper, they crossed the line once more – into the eighth lap. Bond searched for his chance, jinking and pushing hard, while Luxor piled on more and more power.
Walter Luxor was rattled, Bond decided. The more he pushed, the more Luxor began taking chances. His driving was still immaculate, countering every move Bond made, but speed appeared to be his blind spot. He risked going through the chicane, the right-angle and Z bends, with the narrowest of safety limits.
Lap nine. Only one to follow, then it would be all over. For the penultimate time, the stands blurred past them. Bond realised he was involuntarily gritting his teeth. Whatever the consequences, there had to be some way of overtaking Luxor.
The idea germinated fast. One hope in a thousand; a risk which could end in disaster. They slid through the chicane, Luxor slowing this time as he hit the hump. Perhaps the driver’s nerves were, at last, getting ragged. Now the killing, dangerous, right-angle bend.
Luxor lined himself up, keeping far to the right – his wheels almost touching the grass at the track’s edge – in order to take the punishing bend at one hundred. Bond, three feet or so behind him, was himself pushing almost a hundred.
Luxor went into the turn, holding to the right, fighting the strain, to stay close to the verge for as long as possible, before pressure and speed forced the car over to the left. He reached the maximum point of turn and the car, under the stress of angle, speed, and torque, started to slide outwards. A touch on the brakes slowed him fractionally.
It was the moment Bond had been waiting for: that second before Luxor was dragged to the left and forced to slow. Bond took his final opportunity.
Instead of following directly in Luxor’s slipstream, the Saab suddenly went out of line, flicking to the left. Bond checked the turn on the wheel, feeling the stress hauling the Saab even further to the left than he intended, correcting with the wheel, steering right, and knowing that, if the wheels locked, he would be in a spin and off the road.
The Saab was drifting. Then, for a second, a space appeared – clear road on the bend to Luxor’s left. In a moment, Luxor’s car would itself be dragged into that clear area, just as it had been each time they took the right-angle bend. In that fraction of time, Bond felt the Saab steady. He kicked on the accelerator, sensing the Saab’s spoiler push the rear down on to the road. His own body was forced back in the driving seat as full power took hold.
Almost aloud, Bond prayed that the Turbo’s constantly-increasing forward speed would overcome any further slide to the left and that he could still hold the Saab into the turn without touching the verge. The turbo-charger whined, rising to a pitch of noise which should, by rights, have ended in some kind of explosion.
Then, quite suddenly, it was over. The Saab shot through on the outside of the sliding Shelby-American, the numbers on the head-up display just below the 140 line. Bond straightened the wheels and poured power through the engine.
The front of Luxor’s car must have just missed grazing the Saab’s rear as Bond overtook. For a moment, the low body and windscreen of the other car appeared to fill the Saab’s rear-view mirror. Then it dropped back a few feet. As they slowed to go into the Z bend, Luxor managed to stay close, as though attached by a cable. But as Bond cleared the final hairpin, he slammed through the gears, up to the fifth, his right foot smoothly depressing the accelerator.
With a clear road ahead at last, the Saab leaped forward. He touched 150 on the far straight, slowed for the two corners, and, at the start of the last lap, took the car right through its paces. At one point – before the chicane – the numbers hit the magic figure of 175, then a little higher on the final far straight. Luxor was now well behind by three or four miles.
It was only when Bond brought the car towards the last two bends, that he began to gear down, allowing the speed to drop away. Then he took an extra lap, at a relatively gentle pace, allowing the engine to settle and himself to readjust. He had seen Bismaquer’s face, dark and angry, as he brought down the chequered flag, proclaiming Bond the winner.
Yet, when the Saab finally coasted into the pits, with the grandstand crowd applauding even though their man had lost, Bismaquer seemed to have regained his temper.
‘A fair race, James. A fair and exciting race. That car of yours sure knows how to move.’
Bond, dripping with sweat, did not answer immediately but turned to watch Walter Luxor – the skull face more menacing than usual – coast in behind him.
‘I don’t know how fair, Markus,’ Bond said at last. ‘If that’s really a converted Shelby-American, I’ll eat my track suit. As for the firework display . . .’
‘Yes, what happened there?’ Bismaquer’s pink, scrubbed face was a mask of innocence.
‘I think Walter must’ve been having a quick cigarette and dropped a match. Look forward to my bonus, Markus. A great race. Now, if you’ll excuse me . . .’
He turned and walked back towards the Saab, which would certainly need his attention. But Bismaquer was at his heels.
‘We’ll settle all debts tonight, James – the money, I mean. And I’ll take the prints. But then, I’m afraid my hospitality has got to end. Dinner tonight – seven o’clock for seven-thirty, then we can clear up the business before we eat? Okay?’
‘Fine.’
‘I’m sorry, but I have to ask you to leave in the morning. You see, we have this conference . . . the first people are arrivi
ng tonight . . .’
‘I thought you kept clear of conferences?’ Bond was already half way into the Saab, pulling on the bonnet release.
Bismaquer hesitated, then laughed – not the booming guffaw, but a deep nervous rumble. ‘Yes. Yes, that’s true. I can’t stand conferences. Can’t really stand crowds any more. I guess that was what finally convinced me I should throw in the towel in politics. Did you know I had political ambitions at one time?’
‘No, but I can believe it,’ Bond lied.
‘I usually keep well clear of the conferences here.’ Bismaquer appeared to be searching for words. ‘You see,’ he went on, ‘well, these people coming tonight are all automotive engineers. Walter is an expert.’ His face shaped a slow, rather sly, grin. ‘I guess you know that by now. You realise he built that Shelby replica with his own hands?’
‘Extras and all?’ Bond’s eyebrows tilted.
Bismaquer boomed out a laugh, as if it was all a good joke. Either of us could have died out there because of that car, Bond reflected; yet Bismaquer thinks it’s funny.
The bear-like man hardly paused for breath. ‘Well, these people being engineers and . . . Well, Walter’s addressing them tomorrow morning: some very advanced talk on mechanics, I don’t know what. Like a fool – and to make him happy – I promised to be there too . . . So there won’t be much time for me to play host to Cedar and you.’
Bond nodded. ‘Okay. We’ll be away in the morning, Markus.’ Then he turned back to the car.
‘Help yourself from the barbecue,’ Bismaquer called back over his shoulder.
Bond wondered when the action would start, as he watched the big man walk away, flat-footed and heavy. Either Bismaquer was going to let them get off the ranch and then have them picked up outside, or he would see to it here, on the premises. If the latter, then everything could be blown. He needed to talk to Nena, among other things, and then go to ground in the Conference Centre, his last hope of gaining hard information. If Bismaquer pounced first the whole mission would be lost.