Eye of the Cobra (38 page)

He glanced down at his stop-watch. If Wyatt was still in the running, he’d be round now.

The black shape of the Shadow shot past the pits, leading the rest of the pack by a lap. Hoexter was nowhere to be seen.

Wyatt came around the Loews hairpin. The smoke had cleared and he saw the first cars, the flames and devastation. He saw the back of Hoexter’s McCabe in amongst the wreckage of a multitude of other cars - and he caught sight of a break in the Armco where several machines had careered into the crowd. There were stretchers everywhere. People were screaming.

He kept on driving.

This was the final lap.

He had to win.

Ricardo stared up at the crowd in the brilliant afternoon sunlight. This was what they waited for, he knew it. Not consciously, of course; no one would ever admit that the reason they watched motor sport was to see a serious accident. But danger was the magnet, all the same.

The arena, the gladiators, the blood . . .

Then, out of the flames and wreckage closer to the tunnel, came a man in a charred black jumpsuit. The face was black, the arms were carrying a body towards one of the ambulances. It was Hoexter.

Ricardo could not help himself, he just kept on shaking. He had pushed himself to the edge of the crowd and was looking down on the devastation.

You couldn’t blame the circuit for what had happened, he knew that. It was the two drivers, Kurt Kunstler and Toni Vignelli, who had died. They had gone into the Virage du Portier neck-and-neck, each trying to pass the other. As they swept around the corner their cars had collided and burst into flames. Neither of them had had a chance. Then the car immediately behind them had turned the accident into a catastrophe: it hit the other two, vaulted the Armco and went straight into the crowd like a Cruise missile. The driver was fine, but four people in the crowd lay dead and another twenty-one were seriously injured.

Ricardo could remember the whole accident in meticulous detail, even though the actual collision had happened so quickly. The other cars had come round the corner with no knowledge of what had happened, and had ploughed into the burning wreckage. Most of the drivers got out, but there was one, Yves Courtauld, a Brazilian, who couldn’t. He was trapped, and the crowd had watched in stunned silence as the flames advanced on his car.

Then Ricardo had seen the Shadow sweep round the bend. He had thought Wyatt would pull over, but he had carried on, determined to win. It was a cold-blooded, ruthless decision.

Hoexter had pulled over. He’d been out of his car in a second, and without waiting to consider the consequences of his actions, he had sprinted into the flames engulfing the Brazilian’s car and with great difficulty pulled the man out.

Ricardo didn’t want to see any more. He turned away, disappearing into the crowd, already late for his next appointment.

Vanessa clutched at the Armco as Sean kept filming. She felt sick. Why hadn’t Wyatt stopped? They’d actually caught him on videotape glancing at the accident, then powering his car on past it with a roar.

Her campaign was gathering momentum like an avalanche rolling down a snow-covered mountain. The tobacco com
panies, especially Jack Phelps Co., were putting pressure on the network to drop the story, but the owner of her station, Jay Levy, knew that the world reaction against smoking was growing, and that the audience figures for Vanessa’s show had rocketed higher than ever before. In his own words, she was media dynamite.

Vanessa breathed in deeply and then Sean started filming her, the flames in the background.

‘Is this a war zone?’ Vanessa began. ‘Four people are dead and twenty-one injured. No, this is Formula One racing. And with one lap to go, the race isn’t going to be stopped. Everyone agrees that Monaco is a potentially dangerous circuit, but no one in Formula One is prepared to take any action because the sponsors know that Monaco grabs the public imagination, grabs the public attention. The glamour is here. So this footage will no doubt notch up cigarette sales for those conscience-free entrepreneurs out there, but the question must be asked: Can we really support this? Should the cigarette companies be allowed to keep on sponsoring this carnage? This is Vanessa Tyson, live from Monaco.’

Sean gestured for Vanessa to relax, and she turned, gripped the Armco and leaned over the tarmac, sobbing.

What the hell was she doing? she asked herself.

She should have gone for Wyatt. She should have exploited the fact that he hadn’t stopped.

Wyatt powered across the finishing-line in first place, and there was a roar of applause. The crowd cheered as he took the stand and showered them with champagne, the second- and third-placed drivers at his side.

Then he stepped down, victory ringing hollow in his ears.

In the main operating theatre of the Monaco hospital, Dr Ian Tremaine looked up at the clock and saw that it was seven in the evening. He did not want to remember the Monaco Grand Prix; all he could think about was the operating-table, and the racing-driver, Yves Courtauld, who lay on it.

This had been the most difficult operation of his career. For over four hours he and his team had laboured over the patient attempting the impossible. Now Yves Courtauld hovered between life and death, his spine broken between the seventh and eighth vertebrae.

With Tremaine were two other doctors, an American anaesthetist, and one young, but extremely talented Scottish surgeon.

Tremaine leaned over Courtauld’s body once more. Before he began again, he muttered a silent prayer.

In Vanessa Tyson’s hotel room the phone started ringing, and reluctantly she picked it up. It was Jay Levy, the owner of WWTN.

‘Vanessa baby, it’s three hours after the accident, what are you doing?’

‘I’m lying down.’

‘But you said you were going to get hold of Chase.’

‘Don’t tell me what to do!’

‘Hey, cool it, babe. Remember you’re the one who’s usually pushing me. I’ve taken huge risks on this one - Phelps could sue me and try to close us down. You’ve got a great story, everything you wanted’s been handed to you on a plate. Now what’s the problem?’

‘All right, Jay. Relax. It just wasn’t very pleasant watching it all happen.’

‘So? You’re going to stop it from happening again. That’s a very laudable thing you’re doing.’

‘Oh Jesus, Jay, it’s not that simple.’

‘It’s Chase. Is that true, that rumour you were seen leaving his hotel room late one night in Rio? Are you lovers?’

‘No, damn it!’

‘Then get off your butt and get me some footage.’

Vanessa slammed down the phone, then got up off the bed and made for the door.

The men got up when they saw her, and she raised her hand. Sean O’Connor, her cameraman and editor, who’d worked for her for years, stared at her aghast.

‘Vanessa? What’s goin’ on? This story of Chase going past the accident is the big story you’ve been looking for. It proves everything you’ve said against Formula One.’

She gestured for him to follow her, and the two of them walked out of the conference room WWTN had hired at the hotel for the Grand Prix weekend, and stood in the corridor. The other members of the crew knew better than to get involved; Vanessa and Sean were famous for their stand-up fights.

She turned to face Sean, her features set.

‘I’m going to soften Chase up first,’ she said.

‘He’ll be expecting me to corner him - and I want to catch him with his defences down.’

‘Nail the bastard, he’s a cold-blooded murderer! That footage of him staring at the accident and then accelerating away says it all.’

Sean folded his big brawny arms.

‘So, how are we going to play this?’

‘You go to the hospital, get an interview with Hoexter. I’ll soften Chase up on my own, and then you can join me later and really catch him off-guard.’

Sean gave a satisfied smile and lumbered back into the conference room.

Outside the hotel, Vanessa caught a taxi. The streets were jam-packed with people, taxis and cars, but the usual after- the-race hysteria was strangely absent. The accident had affected everyone in Monaco.

As the taxi made its way up towards Wyatt’s hotel, she tried to think about how she’d question him. She ignored the many beautiful old buildings she passed, thinking only of what she’d got into. There’d been her so-called suicide attempt, then Max Senda had been murdered. There was something going on behind the scenes that she didn’t u
nderstand . . . And she had begun to understand that there was more to Formula One racing than she’d ever imagined.

She was at the hotel before she realised it. She made short work of the guard Bruce de Villiers had placed on Wyatt’s floor, who immediately took a fancy to her, and then moved quickly down the passage and tried the door to Wyatt’s room.

He was naked, sitting on the floor with his legs crossed, reading a book. She caught a glimpse of his latticed stomach muscles, aware for the first time of the power of his body.

As Vanessa came in, he looked up, annoyed. He stood up and pulled a towel round himself.

‘So,’ he said. ‘You’ve got what you wanted.’

She sat on the edge of his bed.

‘No, Wyatt.’

‘You’ll interview me and I’ll lose my cool. Your viewers will pass judgement on my actions, and . . .’

She broke into sudden desperate tears.

‘You bastard, you complete bastard! Yes, I’ve got the footage and the story, but I can’t do it . . .’

She knelt down next to him.

‘I can’t do it because I’m in love with you.’

Sean didn’t feel good about what he’d done, but Jay Levy had spoken to him over the phone and told him in no uncertain terms what he’d wanted. So Sean had broken into Vanessa’s room and taken the videotape of Wyatt driving past the accident.

Later that evening, Sean confronted Dr Ian Tremaine as he left the hospital.

Tremaine’s face was drawn. ‘In spite of our best efforts,’ he said, ‘the operation has not been a total success. Courtauld is alive, but is paralysed from the waist down.’

Sean gestured to the crew to keep filming.

‘Do you think the safety measures at the track were inadequate, Dr Tremaine?’

He looked at Sean a moment, and then replied, ‘I think your question is most inappropriate at this time.’

Sean smiled pleasantly.

‘And what do you think of Wyatt Chase’s behaviour?’

‘In my opinion, the man’s little better than a cold-blooded murderer. His victory is a shallow one.’

Two hours later Sean edited the footage, using Vanessa’s commentary from the race, then the interview with Dr Trema
ine -  capitalising on the grim expression on Dr Tremaine’s face. As the doctor pronounced his opinion that Wyatt was a cold-blooded murderer, Sean cut to the footage of Wyatt driving towards the accident, staring at it momentarily and then accelerating away. It was the most damning piece of reportage yet produced by WWTN on Formula One. And it looked as though it had been edited and coordinated by Vanessa Tyson.

A day later, a meeting was called between the Formula One Constructors’ Association and La Federation Internationale du Sporte Automobile. Although the meeting was deliberately kept secret, the press and television networks had been told to stand by at another venue for a press announcement concerning the Monaco Grand Prix.

Ronnie Halliday looked particularly concerned as he went into the conference room with some of the senior members of his association, and Alain Hugo also entered the room grim
faced.

The press headlines had been devastating, and the blame for the accident, most of the papers said, lay with the men who controlled Formula One. It was they who had let the Grand Prix be staged on a dangerous circuit, and clearly, they argued, Monaco should be scratched from the Grand Prix calendar.

The meeting lasted two hours, Halliday and Hugo leaving the room together and taking a car to the waiting press conference. It was Ronnie Halliday who made the announcement.

‘As you know, both Alain Hugo and I have campaigned tirelessly for safer circuits and safer machines. The decision against turbo-charging was the result of our wish to make the sport more competitive but less dangerous.

‘I am very upset, as we all are, by what happened here at Monaco. I cannot blame the circuit, because what happened here could have happened almost anywhere: you cannot stop drivers colliding with each other, that is an inevitable risk of the sport. However, we can move the crowds further back from the bends, and this we will do.

‘We should like to take this opportunity to praise Helmut Hoexter for his act of bravery - for saving the life of Yves Courtauld.’

There was applause at this point, but Halliday and Hugo remained grim-faced. There was clearly more to come.

‘As far as Wyatt Chase is concerned ... we prefer to keep our views to ourselves. But concerning his team, Calibre- Shensu, we regret that we have to make two announcements.’