If he was still annoyed about it, though, it didn’t show when he emerged from the hauler. His angelic face wore its usual expression of smoldering seriousness, and the opaque sunglasses ensured that his expression would give nothing away. The firesuit did wonders for his image: He actually looked taller when he was wearing that thing. He looked, in fact, wise and powerful and devastatingly competent. Even Tuggle, who knew better, was impressed by the sight of him.
He shook hands solemnly with each of the waiting passengers, and when most of them insisted on hugging him, he bore that with grave politeness as well, although Tuggle noticed that he kept his hands at his sides and endured the embraces like a child ambushed by maiden aunts. She supposed that celebrities had to become accustomed to being hugged by people who didn’t realize that they were total strangers, because they felt that they knew you. Any Cup driver too squeamish to put up with such familiarity would be branded by fans as temperamental and stuck-up, so most of them did endure it with good grace. She didn’t envy them that part of the job. Tuggle wasn’t close to many people, and she reserved the right to choose who she’d hug and who she wouldn’t. Come to think of it, she couldn’t name a single person that she would hug voluntarily.
She took a long look at Badger. Well, maybe one person…
Whether or not Badger minded the embraces of his starstruck employers and their guests, he was polite about it, and he even posed for pictures longer than Tuggle thought he would. She noticed, though, that during the staging of the photos, he didn’t put his arm around anybody. Badger didn’t talk about feelings much, so you got into the habit of observing his body language for cues to his emotions. The fact that he was careful not to touch any of the guests meant that he was none too pleased to see them. In each photo he stood between two ladies, arms at his sides, facing the camera dead-on, with a look of proud intensity. The women on either side of him might have been trees for all the notice he took of them.
“Hercules and the villagers,” muttered Tuggle.
“What?” said Sark, who had been deputized to snap the official group portrait with her own camera and then with half a dozen others belonging to the ladies. There was talk of posting the photo on the team Web site, which meant that she would have to get everyone’s name and do an accompanying write-up as well. “Did you say Hercules?”
Tuggle nodded. “That’s what he looks like,” she said. “Badger. Like some Hollywood hero posing with a passel of anonymous walk-on types in the cast for the publicity photos. Like he’s the star of the movie.”
Sark shrugged. “Well, isn’t he?”
“Maybe so. But I have a suspicion that those women don’t think he outshines them. Remember they’re rich and prominent their own selves. I reckon they think of him as a cuddly pet they picked up at a dog pound. I just hope two things. One, that they don’t insult him, or hug him anymore for that matter. He’d hate that just as much. And two, that he remembers that one of these mud hens signs his checks.”
“Insult him?” said Sark.
“Oh, you know how people are about race car drivers. They might think it was cute to call him a redneck or say that he was dumb. You know how city people are about anybody who doesn’t live in a concrete anthill. Or they might make the sort of raunchy remark to him that they themselves would never put up with coming from a man.”
“Well, a lot of people think sexual harassment is a one-way street,” said Sark. “I doubt if any of them would consider a sexual proposition to him as an insult. These women are all rich and well-preserved. Maybe they’d think he’d be flattered if they hit on him.”
“More fool they then,” grunted Tuggle. “He’s got more pride than sense, does Badger, and they’d better show him some respect.”
Sark put the camera back up to her eyes, waving for the group to pack in closer together. A tall storklike blonde used this instruction as an excuse to slip her arm around Badger’s waist and pull him closer. “I always wanted a boy toy!” she declared.
Badger’s smile did not waver, but Sark noticed a glint in his eyes that had not been there before. She snapped pictures in rapid succession, varying the shots by changing her angle and proximity to the subjects, rather than by giving them any further instructions on how to pose. She thought they’d better get the photo session over with before things got any worse. “He sure photographs well,” she murmured to Tuggle.
“He damn well better,” said Tuggle. “There’s a couple thousand guys can drive a race car, and only forty-three slots in Cup, give or take a Bodine. Back in my daddy’s day you could look like a small-town insurance agent and make it out there, but not now. Not anymore.” She remembered a photo taken at a motorsports banquet back in the early sixties-half a dozen of the greatest drivers of the time posed together, all heavy-set, middle-aged men in loud sports jackets. They were indistinguishable from any small town newspaper photo of the local bigwigs; any school board grouping, any Moose Lodge membership portrait would have looked the same. Not anymore, though. Now there were drivers with image consultants and maybe even makeover specialists, for all she knew. Most of the young ones could pass for movie stars these days, or at least for country singers. Well, not the Busch brothers, of course. Sometimes talent did take you places without any help from charm or beauty.
She raised her voice and gestured to the crowd. “One more shot with Badger, folks, and then it’s time to get this show on the road. You’ll be riding one at a time, couple of laps around the track, and remember that the only way in or out of the car is to crawl through the window. I would also ask that anyone who has heart problems or a tendency toward motion sickness to please excuse themselves now.” She paused and scanned the crowd. One older woman pulled the helmet off and shook an equally hard helmet of tight gray curls. Tuggle nodded her thanks. “All right,” she said. “Who’s going first?”
Badger surveyed the eager passengers with solemn intensity; then he grinned at the blond stork who had called him her boy toy. “You look brave enough to take it on, ma’am,” he said, motioning her forward. “Heck, you could probably do the driving yourself, Miz-what was your name again?”
The woman bridled at the unexpected praise. “Katharine-with-a-K,” she said, patting her hair. “You want me to go first, honey? Well…maybe just once around the track.”
Tuggle and Badger looked at each other for a long, silent moment in which volumes of information were exchanged between crew chief and driver. Asked and answered.
Then Badger smiled at Katharine-with-a-K. “Well, ma’am,” he said, “I reckon we’ll get started.” He ushered her over to the car. “I’d open the door for you, but like Tuggle said, there isn’t one, so why don’t you climb on in the window there and let’s get started.”
In one graceful movement, he swung himself up and through the driver’s side window, making the process look easy, but his passenger’s awkward clambering on the other side of the car suggested otherwise. She bumped the helmet trying to go in head-first, straddled the window frame, and then hung there for a moment with one leg outside the car until one of her cohorts put both hands under her dangling foot and boosted her in.
“Puts me in mind of Michael Waltrip,” Tuggle murmured to Sark. “Tall, gangly people have a hell of a time getting into race cars.”
“What worries me is how much trouble they’d have getting back out in a hurry,” said Sark. “If they had to.”
They exchanged looks, and with some trepidation, they turned to watch Badger begin the first ride-along.