Harley smirked. “Try three years.”
The tour bus was easy to spot: a full-size silver cruiser with the Winged Three emblazoned on the side and the slogan “The Number Three Pilgrimage.” Harley shook his head at the sight of it, wondering if the driver would be expected to knock cars off the road while trying to pass them. He didn’t plan to suggest it.
He rapped on the glass of the passenger door, and waited while the driver cranked it open.
“Harley Claymore,” he said, shoving his leather duffel bag into an overhead bin. “I’m the NASCAR guide.”
The man behind the wheel was red-faced and barrel-shaped. Not a former racer judging by the look of him. Good thing this bus has a door, Harley thought, picturing the fellow trying to get in and out of a stock car through the window as drivers always did since race car doors are welded shut for safety.
“Ratty Laine,” said the driver, making no attempt to stir from his seat. “Bailey Travel. Here to drive this bus and help you out with the touring bits any way I can.”
“Are you connected to racing?”
Ratty Laine rubbed his chin while he considered this. “I can be,” he said at last. “Cousin of the Pettys, maybe, or a former member of somebody’s whatchacallit-pit crew, maybe?”
Harley blinked. “What do you mean ‘I can be’? Don’t you know?”
“Well, it’s up to you, really. If you think this tour group will have a more rewarding experience thinking that I’m an old racing guy, then that’s what we’ll tell them.”
“But are you really?”
“Oh, really. I never talk about really. That’s why they call it private life, you know. ’Cos it’s private. Like I said, I’ll drive the bus and get you where you want to go, but the way I see it back story is your job. Just tell me who you want me to be.” He stretched and yawned. “Sorry. Long drive in this morning.”
“Where from?” asked Harley.
“Home,” said the driver.
“Where’s that?”
“Where do you want it to be?”
“Can’t you just be yourself?” asked Harley.
The driver shrugged. “No percentage in that. Well, you think it over. You’ve got an hour or so before the plane lands. My schedule says they all met up in Charlotte and took the same connecting flight up here.”
“But what am I supposed to tell them about you?”
“Look,” said Ratty Laine, “I’ve been driving for Bailey Travel for umpteen years now. When we go to Opryland, I’m the ex-mandolin player for the Del McCoury Band; on Civil War tours, my great-great-grandaddy fought at Gettysburg-which side he was on depends on the home states of the people on the tour; at Disney World, I was the voice of Goofy or a talking teapot in the latest movie, or something; then at-”
“Okay. I get it.” Harley shook his head. “Look, I really was a race car driver, so why don’t we forget the fake identity for you this time, and tell the folks you’re the bus driver, all right?”
Ratty shrugged. “Whatever. But I could say that I was the guy who changed Richard Petty’s mufflers.”
Harley sank down in the front seat next to the driver. It was going to be a long trip. “Stock cars don’t have mufflers, Ratty,” he said. “Now, where can I put this?” Harley held up a bulky canvas bag. “Won’t fit in the overhead. I won’t be needing it very often.”
“What is it?”
“My firesuit. Driving boots. Helmet.”
The driver raised his eyebrows and looked from the canvas sack to Harley’s face, now tinged pink with embarrassment. “What and where will you be driving?” he asked.
“Well,” said Harley. “I just thought I’d come prepared. You know, in case somebody gets food poisoning or something and they need a replacement driver toot sweet. Drivers carry their own gear. It’s like jockeys with saddles, I guess.”
“You mean you brought gear to drive a stock car? On the off chance?”
“Well, yeah. I mean, just in case. You never know.”
Ratty gave him a look that mixed pity with scorn, but he made no comment except to haul himself out of the driver’s seat and amble down the steps to the pavement. “Help me open the hold,” he said, tugging at the door to the outside luggage compartment. “It ought to fit in there. Way toward the back.” ’Cause you won’t be needing it. The unspoken words hung in the air.
“Thanks,” said Harley, shoving the bag into the hold. He never went anywhere without it.
Ratty slammed the door to the luggage compartment, and wiped his hands on his khaki trousers. “You sure you don’t want me to have a racing connection?”
Harley shook his head. All they needed was to get caught in a lie and lose the trust of the tour group. Mr. Bailey would probably dock their pay back to lunch money. “Look, Ratty,” he said. “I’ll handle all the NASCAR patter. You just worry about getting these folks from one place to the next, and feeding them, and scheduling pit stops.”
“What?”
“You know-trips to the toilet.”
“Oh, sure. No problem. And, you know, that reminds me, if race car drivers go for three straight hours without ever getting out of the car, how do they-?”
Harley sighed. Sooner or later everybody asked that question. “It’s hot in a stock car,” he said. “If you sweat enough, you don’t have to pee.”
The airborne contingent of the tour, eleven people as diverse as any other group of airline passengers, wore expressions that ranged from barely contained excitement to a polite wariness that might have been shyness. The exception was one well-dressed woman who looked as if she had been brought there at gunpoint.
Justine elbowed her sister in the ribs. “Stop looking like a duchess at a cockfight!” she whispered. “There’s some perfectly nice people here. I told you there would be. Check out that hot young guy in the yellow Brooks Brothers sport shirt with the little dead sheep emblem-bet you ten bucks he’s Ivy League. And look at that distinguished fellow in the clerical collar. Oh, isn’t that sweet? He has a little boy with him. Oh, Lord, I hope they’re not on their honeymoon!”
“Shut up, Justine,” Bekasu hissed back, edging away.
Spotting their fellow tour members had been easy. Along with the tour itineraries the Bailey Tour Company had sent Winged Three caps to match the one worn by the guide and the driver. Several of the travelers had dutifully worn the headgear on the flight, in addition to various other items of Dale-bilia currently displayed about their persons: Intimidator tee shirts, sew-on patches featuring a replica of Earnhardt’s signature, and, in the case of one enterprising matron, a hip-length cotton vest featuring a montage of black Monte Carlos, made of the special Dale Earnhardt fabric sold at Wal-Mart.
There were more women than one might expect to find on a NASCAR-themed tour. At least on a tour that wasn’t dedicated to Jeff Gordon. Funny that so many women liked Earnhardt, Harley Claymore was thinking. You’d think he’d remind them of their ex-husbands. You’d think women would see Earnhardt as the weasely redneck version of the Type-A executive: the man who puts his career first, his hobbies and his buddies second, and his family a distant third. Except for all that money and fame, Earnhardt seemed to Harley an unlikely sex symbol. Wonder if he’d even managed to snag a date for the high school prom. Ah, no. Scratch that. Dale had dropped out in junior high, before the social pressures of adolescence became much of an issue. The glad-handing imperatives of his future success must have come as an unpleasant surprise for him, but he had made the transition as gracefully as he took the turns on the track. If he hadn’t, he’d have been left in the dust years ago.
Harley would like to have mused on the whole charisma aspect of the Earnhardt mystique in a group discussion on the bus, but he half suspected that the driver was under orders to report any heresies to Bailey Travel, so if he wanted his paycheck, he had better not get caught letting in daylight on the magic.