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Simonetta was moving closer, studying the scratches on his face, and Ivo could see her eyes begin to narrow. When she spoke, her voice was frosty. ‘Who scratched your face?’
‘Tiberio,’ Ivo announced. From behind his back he produced a large, spitting, ugly grey cat that leaped out of his arms and raced off. ‘I bought it for Isabella, but the damned thing attacked me while I was trying to put it in its basket.’
‘Povero amore mio!’ Instantly, Simonetta was at his side. ‘Angelo mio! Come upstairs and lie down. I’ll get the doctor. I’ll get some iodine. I’ll –’
‘No, no! I’m fine,’ Ivo said bravely. He winced as she put her arms around him. ‘Careful! I’m afraid he’s clawed my back, too.’
‘Amore! How you must be suffering!’
‘No, really,’ Ivo said. ‘I feel good.’ And he meant it.
The front doorbell rang.
‘I’ll go,’ Simonetta said.
‘No, I’ll go,’ Ivo said quickly. ‘I – I’m expecting some important papers from the office.’
He hurried to the front door and opened it.
‘Signor Palazzi?’
‘Sì.’
A messenger, dressed in a grey uniform, handed him an envelope. Inside was a teletype from Rhys Williams. Ivo read the message rapidly. He stood there for a long, long time.
Then he took a deep breath and went upstairs to get ready for his guests.
Buenos Aires Monday, September 7 3 p.m.
The Buenos Aires autodrome on the dusty outskirts of Argentina’s capital city was crammed with fifty thousand spectators who had come to watch the championship classic. It was a 115-lap race over the almost four-mile circuit. The race had been running for nearly five hours, under a hot, punishing sun, and out of a starting field of thirty cars only a handful remained. The crowd was seeing history being made. There had never been such a race before, and perhaps never would be again. All the names that had become legend were on the track this day: Chris Amon from New Zealand, and Brian Redman from Lancashire. There was the Italian Andrea di Adamici, in an Alfa-Romeo Tipo 33, and Carlos Maco of Brazil, in a March Formula 1. The prize-winning Belgian Jacky Ickx was there, and Sweden’s Reine Wisell in a BRM.
The track looked like a rainbow gone mad, filled with the swirling reds and greens and black and white and golds of the Ferraris and Brabhams and McLaren M19-As and Lotus Formula 3s.
As lap after gruelling lap went by, the giants began to fall. Chris Amon was in fourth place when his throttle jammed open. He sideswiped Brian Redman’s Cooper before he brought his own car under control by cutting the ignition, but both cars were finished. Reine Wisell was in first position, with Jacky Ickx close behind the BRM. On the far turn, the BRM gearbox disintegrated and the battery and electrical equipment caught fire. The car started spinning, and Jacky Ickx’s Ferrari was caught in the vortex.
The crowd was in a frenzy.
Three cars were outpacing the rest of the field, Jorje Amandaris from Argentina, driving a Surtees; Nils Nilsson from Sweden in a Matra; and a Ferrari 312 B-2, driven by Martel of France. They were driving brilliantly, daring the straight track, challenging the curves, moving up.
Jorje Amandaris was in the lead, and because he was one of them, the Argentinians cheered him madly. Close behind Amandaris was Nils Nilsson, at the wheel of a red and white Matra, and behind him the black and gold Ferrari, driven by Martel of France.
The French car had gone almost unnoticed until the last five minutes, when it had started gaining on the field. It had reached tenth position, then seventh, then fifth. And it was coming on strongly. The crowd was watching now as the French driver started moving up on number two, driven by Nilsson. The three cars were travelling at speeds in excess of 180 miles an hour. That was dangerous enough at carefully contoured race tracks like Brands Hatch or Watkins Glen, but on the cruder Argentine track it was suicide. A red-coated referee stood at the side of the track, holding up a sign: FIVE LAPS.
The French black and gold Ferrari attempted to pass Nilsson’s Matra on the outside, and Nilsson inched over, blocking the French car’s way. They were lapping a German car on the inside track, moving up on it fast. Now it was opposite Nilsson’s car. The French car dropped back and edged over so that it was positioned in the tight space behind the German car and Nilsson’s Matra. With a quick burst of acceleration the French driver made for the narrow slot, forcing the two cars out of its way and shooting ahead into the number two spot. The crowd, which had been holding its breath, roared its approval. It had been a brilliant, dangerous manoeuvre.
It was Amandaris in the lead now, Martel second and Nilsson in third position, with three laps remaining. Amandaris had seen the move. The French driver is good, Amandaris told himself, but not good enough to beat me. Amandaris intended to win this race. Ahead of him he saw the sign being flashed – TWO LAPS. The race was almost over, and it was his. Out of the corner of his eye he could see the black and gold Ferrari trying to pull up alongside him. He got a glimpse of the driver’s goggled, dirt-streaked face, tight and determined. Amandaris gave an inward sigh. He regretted what he was about to do, but he had no choice. Racing was not a game for sportsmen, it was a game for winners.
The two cars were approaching the north end of the oval, where there was a high banking turn, the most dangerous in the track, the scene of a dozen crashes. Amandaris shot another quick look at the French driver of the Ferrari and then tightened his grip on the wheel. As the two cars started to approach the curve, Amandaris imperceptibly lifted his foot from the accelerator, so that the Ferrari began to pull ahead. He saw the driver give him a quick, speculative look. Then the driver was abreast of him, falling into his trap. The crowd was screaming. Jorje Amandaris waited until the black and gold Ferrari was fully committed to passing him on the outside. At that moment Amandaris opened his throttles wide and started to move towards the right, cutting the French driver’s path to the straight, so that the only choice was to head up the embankment.
Amandaris saw the sudden, dismayed expression on the French driver’s face and silently said, Salaud! At that instant the driver of the French car turned the wheel directly into Amandaris’s Surtees. Amandaris could not believe it. The Ferrari was on a crash course with him. They were only three feet apart and at that speed Amandaris had to make a split-second decision. How could anyone have known that the French driver was completely loco? In a swift, reflex action, Amandaris swung the wheel sharply to the left, trying to avoid the thousand pounds of metal hurtling at him, and braked hard, so that the French car missed him by a fraction of an inch, and shot past him towards the finish line. For a moment Jorje Amandaris’s car fishtailed, then went out of control into a spin, flinging itself wildly across the track, rolling over and over until it burst into a tower of red and black flames.
But the crowd’s attention was riveted on the French Ferrari, roaring across the finishing line to victory. There were wild screams from the spectators as they ran towards the car, surrounding it, cheering. The driver slowly stood up and took off the racing goggles and helmet.
She had wheat-coloured hair, cut short, and her face was sculptured with strong, firm features. There was a classic cold beauty about her. Her body was trembling, not with exhaustion, but with excitement, the memory of the moment when she had looked into Jorje Amandaris’s eyes as she sent him to his death. Over the loudspeaker the announcer was excitedly yelling, ‘The winner is Hélène Roffe-Martel, from France, driving a Ferrari.’
Two hours later, Hélène and her husband, Charles, were in their suite in the Ritz Hotel in downtown Buenos Aires, lying on the rug in front of the fireplace, and Hélène was naked on top of him in the classic position of la diligence de Lyon,