Eye of the Cobra

by Christopher Sherlock

  Bruce relaxed. Perhaps Phelps had relented on the other matter.

  ‘Bruce, we’re on the same side,’ Phelps said quietly, but with a distinct edge in his voice. ‘Let’s get one thing straight, buster. Without my sponsorship, you’re dead.’

  At that moment Bruce wanted to smash his fist into Jack’s nose. The trouble was that Phelps could break him.

  Bruce breathed in deeply and looked down at his hands - cracked and dirty, though he hadn’t worked on a car for years. He thought about how he’d fought to get where he was. He thought of the vineyard, of the sun setting over the mountains and his father irate because he’d spent his weekend racing cars and not supervising the pruning of the vines. There was a time for losing one’s rag and a time for holding on to it.

  ‘All right, man. What do you want?’

  ‘That’s better, Bruce. I knew you’d come round to my way of thinking. Now, I can’t have you talking to Zenith about tyres . . .’

  Phelps turned away from him and stared down the long straight. There was something in his attitude that told Bruce that the full punch was still to be delivered.

  ‘I own Carvalho tyres,’ Phelps said. ‘I want them on our cars, and Aito agrees with me.’

  Bruce didn’t hesitate. ‘I’ve done my research. Zenith are the only choice with Mickey’s chassis - if you want to win.’

  ‘Carvalho have the best technical people in the world. I employed them.’

  ‘Last year. They haven’t had a chance to develop any new tyres yet. What will you say when we don’t win because of the tyres?’

  ‘Cool it, Bruce. You’ve got a chance here to develop your own tyres in complete secrecy. Almost everyone who raced last year used Zeniths, and this year it’s going to be the same. Don’t you see the advantages of what I’ve arranged? You’re Carvalho’s only customer.’

  Bruce dug his hands into his pockets, desperately trying to control his temper.

  ‘The tyres come direct to you,’ Phelps went on. ‘As many as you like for each race, not a set amount.’

  He had to agree with what Phelps was saying. He just didn’t like being dictated to.

  ‘All right, we’ll use Carvalho tyres. But I want to do extensive pre-testing. And if they’re not good enough, we’ll have to look for an alternative.’

  Phelps pursed his lips, then relaxed. He scratched behind his right earlobe and avoided Bruce’s eyes. ‘Now let’s talk drivers,’ he said.

  Phelps was going through every area of the operation. Of course, he had a right to, it was just very, very irritating.

  They walked over to the pits. Bruce pulled himself up onto the concrete side-wall and sat upright, staring down at Phelps.

  ‘Drivers?’

  Phelps nodded, pulled out a cigar and trimmed it with a silver cutter. He lit up, blowing smoke in Bruce’s direction.

  ‘Sartori is going to stay,’ Bruce said.

  ‘That’s very generous of him, for twenty million dollars.’

  ‘He was your choice, Jack. You can’t bargain with a man like Sartori. He’s an arrogant son-of-a-bitch. He knows we need him more than he needs us.’

  Phelps contemplated the glowing end of his cigar. ‘And your number two driver?’

  ‘Johan Claus.’

  ‘He finished fourth in this year’s season?’

  ‘Correct. An excellent driver, precise and controlled. The ideal second man.’

  ‘Hardly a glamour-boy.’

  ‘And just what’s that supposed to mean?’

  Bruce was losing his cool again, and he knew that this was a mistake. If he allowed Phelps to get to him now, it would affect him for the whole season.

  ‘Listen,’ Phelps said. ‘I buy Sartori. But Claus! Come off it. That’d give us two egoists. You know Sartori’s attitude to commercial appearances; he’s an old-style driver, and that means he does as little work as possible off the track. He’s not into the promotional side - he doesn’t understand its importance. Now, you may think I’m being difficult but let me again emphasise that what we’re talking about here is sponsorship. Everything is paid for here because two people, myself and Aito Shensu, believe that this little effort can substantially enrich us.’

  ‘Winning will put you on all the front pages.’

  ‘Yes, but don’t you understand, Bruce? People don’t just want to see machines coming in first, they want to see the men who are doing the driving. Personalities. Claus comes across with as much pizzazz as a Nazi storm-trooper. The public want a man they can relate to, like Jackie Stewart. Now Shensu has the final say on the second driver and he doesn’t want Claus. He’s actually thinking of someone the Japanese people can relate to.’

  Bruce got down from the concrete side-wall where he’d been sitting. The American was nearly a foot taller than he was - and he’d got him by the balls. He couldn’t argue, not after he’d accepted the Sartori deal. And he was still worried about the design of the Shadow, she might just be pushing a little too far against the regulations.

  ‘Claus is one hell of a driver,’ Bruce said, ‘even if his personality isn’t to everyone’s liking.’

  ‘Listen, people were actually jeering last year when he led the field at Monaco for the first three laps. That guy isn’t going to sell Shensu cars or my cigarettes - if anything, he’s going to put people off them. From what I hear Johan hates product endorsements.’

  Bruce breathed in deeply a few times. ‘So I’ve got a problem. Drivers don’t just fall out of trees. Money can bring them in, but only a certain amount of the way. Everybody’s signed up for 1991, and to get another top-rated driver is going to be a bastard. Once the announcement gets out about Sartori, everyone’s going to be watching us. To be honest, Claus is about the only choice I have.’

  ‘Shensu is no fool. He wants to win as much as you do, if not more. But he doesn’t need a big-name driver, he just wants a potential champion.’

  Bruce wondered if he was hearing straight. It was almost unheard of for a driver to stand a chance in the championship if he didn’t have a track record.

  ‘So I suppose you told Shensu to make his choice from the top Formula 3000 drivers?’

  ‘No, Shensu will make his own choice. I want you to think some more about it. We need someone who’s showing promise.’

  Bruce squared up to face Phelps. If he gave in on this he’d be on a losing ticket for the rest of the season.

  ‘To take an unranked driver would mean that we’d only have one chance of winning, and that would be Sartori.’

  ‘Listen to me straight, Bruce. Shensu also wants someone who is acceptable to the Japanese people.’

  ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake! A Japanese driver!’

  ‘I feel our conversation is at an end. Either you agree to work with me on this or you’re out.’

  ‘You can’t do this to me.’

  Phelps moved in close to him, and Bruce smelt his expensive after-shave. ‘Without Shensu we’re going nowhere. Understand?’

  ‘Ja. I’ve got no fucking choice.’

  ‘You can always pull out. I’m going now. If I don’t hear from you . . . Well, I’ll know you’ve decided to co-operate.’

  De Villiers watched Phelps’s back as the man walked calmly off the track. He wanted to run after him, wind him one in the

  side of the jaw and then kick him in the balls. However, age had given him wisdom.

  He walked back to his office and looked through the driver file.

  Wyatt had been on the phone since early that morning. There was no way he was going to give up, but as each conversation turned out to be negative, he felt himself growing more and more despondent.

  A season in Formula 3000? It wasn’t what he wanted at all. He had nothing to prove in that arena. He’d been in Formula One for only a year: that was where he had to prove himself.

  Each year out of Formula One would be a year lost. It was a race against his age more than anything else. He knew that there were a lot of other contenders for a seat in a For
mula One car, coming up through the ranks in Formula 3 and Formula 3000.

  At eleven thirty he put the phone down, having called Ferrari headquarters and got yet another negative response. Almost as the phone hit the receiver it started to ring. He picked it up angrily.

  ‘Chase.’

  ‘Hallo, Wyatt.’

  Then he recognised Bruce de Villiers’ voice with its flat South African vowels.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I suppose you think I’m about to give you some advice?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Well, you’re wrong. One of our sponsors would like to talk to you.’

  He felt his spirits soar. ‘When and where?’

  ‘In Tokyo. He said you’d know where.’

  The coldness began to creep over him. ‘Aito Shensu?’

  ‘That’s correct. You know him?’

  He could not escape the past. He had to come to terms with it, just as he had to accept his part in his father’s death.

  ‘Is there a problem, Wyatt? The tickets are waiting for you at Heathrow. He said you’d know where to stay in Tokyo.’

  ‘I want to think about this . . .’

  ‘Wyatt, I told you that you only get one chance in Formula One. Now you’ve got a second one. Take it.’

  The first-class cabin was almost empty, leaving him alone with his thoughts. He’d said he’d never come back, and now here he was returning. He remembered this same flight ten years before. Then he’d been at the back, crushed in amongst the tourists and lower-echelon businessmen. He had been as alone as he was now.

  Then he’d been seventeen. He’d come back from Yosemite knowing what he had to do. It had been only a few weeks after the accident in Monaco, after his father’s death. He remembered that Estelle had refused to speak to him. She had blamed him for the accident - of which he could remember nothing. They’d both loved his father, each in their own different ways. And there was nothing to fill the void after he’d died.

  Yes, those times, ten years ago, seemed as if they were yesterday.

  It had been in the London dojo, in the karate class, that he lost himself in the controlled moves of the martial art. He had pushed himself hard, because it was during the class that he forgot about what had happened. And in that forgetting he found freedom.

  At seventeen he already had his black belt. In the free-fighting competitions six months before the Monaco accident, he had caught the attention of the Shihan, the chief instructor who was out on a tour from Japan. Wyatt had been invited to travel to Japan with six other karate-ka, the youngest six years older than himself. At the time he had turned the invitation down, but after the accident in Monaco he decided to give up driving and accept it. He had known even then that the experience would be an escape from the hell he was enduring. A week later he had been on a plane with the six others, bound for Tokyo.

  Then he had been apprehensive, uncertain. He’d had no idea of what to expect or of how he would survive. He had felt apart from the group of six who travelled with him, both in age and experience.

  So, ten years ago, the plane had landed at Narita airport on a grey, overcast day. They had milled around the arrivals hall, waiting to be met. But there had been no one there to meet them, so they had walked outside. A small van was standing next to the kerb and the driver hooted when he saw them. He gestured for them to climb into the back.

  They were in a strange city, heading for an unknown destination. Eventually they had been dropped outside the dojo, and their driver disappeared without a word. Unsure of what was happening, they watched the last of the karate-ka leave. Then the Shihan stepped from the dojo and welcomed them inside. Wyatt remembered how rustic the place seemed, how primitive. Just a simple wooden building.

  The place was virtually bare except for the tatami mats on the floor, and pairs of padded quilts - futons, but totally unlike what passed in England for futons. Here there was one for warmth, one to lie on.

  Wyatt could sense the shock they all felt, but for him there was no disappointment. He enjoyed the harshness and the rigour of the dojo - it helped him to forget the past.

  Japan. There he had come so far and been given so much. Why had he walked away from it all? That was a question that reverberated around his head now, as the Boeing 747 began its approach to Narita airport. The wheel had turned full circle, and now he was being drawn towards the culture he had tried to escape.

  The plane landed smoothly, and he disembarked with his small kit-bag. Apart from that he had nothing. Outside the airport, the truck was waiting. He bounded into the back and relaxed, watching the lights flashing past in the darkness. They were all so familiar, the landmarks - the measured expanse of land around the Emperor’s Palace, the illuminated Tokyo Tower, as elegant as ever. He felt that Tokyo breathed the life back into him. He found the place intoxicating, fascinating, because it was so unlike his own country and yet felt like a place that had always been part of him. For Wyatt, it could not be compared to any other place in the world.

  When he arrived at the dojo there was no one to greet him.

  A solitary candle burned in the centre of the floor next to some unrolled futons. He showered under one of the cold-water taps outside, then towelled himself dry and lay down to sleep.

  Before the morning sun fell in broken lines across the floor of the dojo, he was up. He rolled up the futons, changed into a black Japanese smoking-jacket and pants, took his towel and toilet bag and walked outside.

  On the street he stood out from the majority of pedestrians because of his size and height. Yet he did not feel a stranger in this place; in a way, it was more like a home than England. He paid for his ticket at the washroom and went inside.

  He stripped, then went into the main area, joining the many men who sat facing the wall on tiny wooden stools. He moved over to a stool and sat down in front of one of the taps. He brushed his teeth and spat on the floor, looked into the mirror above the tap and studied his face. Then he opened one of the spigots and filled a bucket with hot water, lathering his face and shaving at a leisurely pace. Pouring the water away, he refilled the bucket with hot water, and then filled another with cold. He mixed the two and lathered himself all over, completely cleaning his body. Then he took the longer of the two hoses attached to the spigot and showered himself down. His ablutions finished, he stepped into the communal bath and soaked himself in the nearly boiling water with everyone else.

  He was back at the dojo at six thirty. Usually it would have been full of students, but today it was empty. He changed into his karate-gi and performed a succession of warm-up exercises. He was charged with a new energy.

  The door to the dojo slid back and in stepped a lean Japanese in karate-gi and wearing a black belt. Wyatt drew himself up and bowed. He recognised the man. Naoko, his former pupil.

  ‘We fight,’ Naoko said simply, in Japanese.

  Wyatt understood perfectly. He had left the dojo, and that was a disgrace. Now, to return to it, he must prove himself worthy of the honour. But to fight, they should be under the supervision of the master.

  The Shihan stepped through the door and Wyatt bowed to him. It was then he understood that Naoko had taken his job, that of personal assistant to the Shihan. His return was a challenge to Naoko.

  They bowed to each other again, then began the eye-contact and the waiting. The blow came before Wyatt could react, striking him hard in the solar-plexus. The breath burst from him and he staggered forwards to receive a hammering blow across the head that sent him flying across the floor. The anger rose up in him, but he fought it back, knowing that he must master his own emotions before he could outwit his opponent. Gradually he regained his self-control.

  He felt blood running from his lip. His mind emptied, concentrating totally on anticipating the movements of his opponent. He had made the mistake of underestimating Naoko; he would not make it again. Naoko could have killed him, but in the controlled movements of kumite the intention was merely to prove that the opening had be
en left, not to cause serious injury. Kumite meant sparring, loose fighting in which both opponents held back from delivering the killing blows they were capable of.

  Now they both moved with absolute precision, circling each other, striking and warding off the blows. Wyatt felt his confidence building, when a well-placed kick caught him hard between the legs.

  He screamed out and toppled over. He wanted to crawl, regain his breath and wipe the tears from his eyes. Instead he rose again, controlling the pain and the anger, moving in on Naoko and timing three expert strikes against Naoko without hurting him. Each strike was carefully aimed to cause maximum injury, but each was held back a fraction in the controlled movements of kumite.

  The Shihan called for them to stop. They both bowed, and then Naoko walked out of the room. Wyatt knelt down on the floor, ignoring the pain, and the Shihan sat opposite him. He spoke in English.

  ‘You still train, Wyatt. You are still as expert as when you left here. I thought you would not train. You showed your superiority to Naoko by not striking him. I need you here. You were the finest of my pupils and I invested everything I had in your training. Then you left me. The void has not been filled. There was the other one, but he went on the path of evil.’

  Wyatt was filled with guilt. He had had to leave to satisfy his need to race. That need still existed.

  ‘I did not want to return here,’ he said quietly.

  ‘You still cannot accept your father’s death?’

  ‘I ran away. I have not proved myself yet.’

  ‘You want to win the Formula One championship?’ The words seemed out of place in the simple atmosphere of the dojo.

  Wyatt nodded. ‘I have to win to prove myself.’

  ‘Then you will return.’

  ‘Then I will return.’

  ‘Aito Shensu says that you must meet him in his office.’ Wyatt rose and bowed to the Shihan. His body ached, but in his mind he was free from the guilt he had felt on leaving the dojo.

  ‘Listen, Wyatt. Can you work with me? I mean, can you take orders and apply them? I’m hard. Fucking hard.’