The Man Who Drove the Car Part 8

Well, I was driving for an English company at that time, the Vezey they called themselves, though Wheezy would have been the better name. Such a box of tricks I do believe was never put upon a cha.s.sis before or since. It took two of us to start the engine in the morning, and the same number to persuade her to leave off firing at night. The works manager, Mr. Nathan, whose Christian name was Abraham, said that she'd done eighty miles an hour with him easily; but the only time I got her over fifty she broke her differential by way of an argument, and nothing but a soft place in a hayfield saved me from the hospital. All of which, of course, was good advertis.e.m.e.nt for the firm--and, truly, if it came to making a noise in the world, why, you could hear their car a good quarter of a mile away.

This was the flier I took over to France and tried to break in upon the fine roads we all know so well. As I finished the race almost before I began it, the less said about the affair the better--but I shall never forget that Paris to Vienna meeting, and I shall never forget it because of my friend Ferdinand,[1] one of the best and bravest who ever turned a wheel, and the right winner of that great prize, but for the woman who said "No," and said it so queerly and to such effect that a magician out of the story-books couldn't have done it better.

I liked Ferdinand, liked him from the start. A better figure of a man I shall never see; six feet to an inch, square set and wonderfully muscular. His hair was dark and ridiculously curly, so much so that talk of the "irons and brown paper" was the standing joke amongst the racing men in Paris, who knew no more of him than that he was an Italian by birth and had spent half his life in America. For the rest, he spoke English as well as I did, and I never knew whether Ferdinand was his real name, or one he took for the racecourse--nor did I care.

They say that there is no cloud without a silver lining--a poor consolation in a thunderstorm when your hood is at home and the nearest tree is three miles away. There had been a thunderstorm, I remember, on the morning I met poor Ferdinand, and my batteries had refused to hand out another volt, notwithstanding the plainest kind of speech in which I could address them. Just in the middle of it, when the rain was running in at the neck and out at the ankles, and I was asking myself why I wasn't a footman in yellow plush breeches, what should happen but that a great red car came loping up on the horizon, like some mad thing answering to the lightning's call--and no sooner was it a mile distant than it was by me, so to speak, and I was listening to my friend Ferdinand for the first time.

"Halloa, and what's taken your fancy in these parts?" he asked in a cheery voice. I told him as plainly.

"This musical box don't like the thunder," said I; "she's turned sour."

"Are you stopping here for the lady, or do you want to get back to Paris?"

"Oh," says I, "I haven't taken a lease of this particular furlong, if that's what you mean."

"Then I'll give you a tow," says he, and without another word, he got down from his seat and began to make a job of it. We were at Vendreux half an hour afterwards, and there we breakfasted together in the French fashion. That meal, I always say, was the luckiest friend Ferdinand ever ate.

He told me a lot about himself and a lot about his car; how he had been everything in America, from log-roller in the backwoods to cook in the Fifth Avenue palaces; how he met Herr Jornek, the designer of the Modena car, on a trip to St. John's to explore Grand River, and how he had come back to Europe to drive it in the big race. His luck, he said, had been out in New York because of a woman; to get far away from that particular lady was the inducement which carried him to Europe.

Here was something to awaken my curiosity, as you may well imagine, and I asked him all sorts of questions about the girl; but to no good purpose. His interest was in the car, one of the first made by the famous Herr Jornek, and called the Modena after the factory in that town. He told me it was unlike any car on the market, and that new features of gearbox, ignition, and engine design would certainly stamp it a winner if no bad luck overtook him. This persistent talk about misfortune set me wondering, and I fell to questioning him a little more closely about his story, and especially that part of it which concerned the woman.

"Who is the lady, and how did she interfere with you?" I asked. He would say no more than that he had known her by half a dozen names over in America, and that she was formerly a dancer at the old Casino Theatre in New York.

"She's done everything," he said: "gone up in balloons, ridden horses astride at Maddison Square Gardens, played the cowboys' show with Buffalo Bill, and sailed an iceboat on the Great Lakes. Whenever she's out to win I'm out to lose. Make what you like of it, it's Gospel truth. As certain as I'm up for one of the big prizes of my life, the girl's there to thwart me. If I were what my schoolmaster used to call a fatalist, I'd say she was the evil prophetess who used to play ducks and drakes with the soldier boys at Athens. But I don't believe anything of the sort--I say it's just sheer bad luck, and that woman stands for the figure of it."

I was troubled to hear him, and put many more questions. How did the girl thwart him? Was it just an idea, or had he something better to go upon? He did not know what to say; I could see it troubled him very much to speak of it.

"She puts it into my head that I shall lose, and lose I do," he said; "it's always been the same, and always will be. When I rode that great leaping horse, Desmond, and put him over the fences, she was in the arena with a bronco, and she just looked up to me as sweetly as a child, and said, "Ferdy, your horse is going to fall next time," and fall, sure enough, he did, and laid me on my bed for more than a month.

After that I rode the bicycle match against the Frenchman, Devereux, and there she was, dressed like a picture amongst the crowd, and smiling like an angel in the Spanish churches. When I nodded to her she called me back a moment, and just put in her pretty word.

"Ferdy," she said, "that Frenchman can't ride straight; he's going to run into you, Ferdy." Will you believe it, we cannoned together at the last corner, and I was thrown so badly that although he walked his machine in I couldn't beat him."

He was serious enough about it all, and I must say that his talk put some queer ideas into my head. I've never been a believer over-much in luck myself, holding that we make it or mar it for ourselves, and that what some call misfortune is nothing more or less than misdoing; but here was a tale to make a man think, and think I did while he ate his breakfast and went on to speak of his car almost as lovingly as a man speaks of the new girl he met for the first time yesterday. Just as we were leaving the hotel and he was getting back to his doleful manner a bit, I put in my word and I could see that he took it well enough.

"All said and done," said I, "there's a little matter of three thousand miles between you and the lady just at present. Whatever may have happened over yonder is hardly likely to happen in La Belle France, look at it how you like. You should think no more about it, Ferdinand.

You're to win this great race, and win it you certainly will if I'm a judge. Why, then, think about a woman at all?"

"Because," he replied, and he was as grave as a judge at the moment, "because I must; I've been thinking of her ever since I picked you up.

It's queer, Britten, but I do believe you're going to bring me luck, and that's as true as Gospel."

"And true it shall be," said I, "if good wishes can do it, my boy.

Let's go and get the cars. My box of tricks will be melted down if I leave it in the sun any longer. Let's get back to Paris and have some fun; I'm sure that's what you're wanting."

He did not object; and the storm having pa.s.sed, and my coil behaving itself properly now that the damp was off the contacts, we jogged along the road to Paris in company with many who were returning from their morning practice, and just a few amateurs out to see the fun. We had gone a mile, I suppose, when we met a girl driving one of the De Dion motor tricycles, and no sooner had I seen her than she went by with a flash and a nod; and I knew her for little Maisa Hubbard, of whom the town had been talking for three days past. Then I ran my car alongside Ferdinand's just to make a remark about it--but, will you believe me?--he was as pale as a sheet, and his eyes were staring right into vacancy, as though a ghost stood in his path, and he didn't know how to get by it.

"Why," cried I, "and what's up now?"

He brought himself to with an effort, closed his hand about the wheel, and then answered me:

"That's the girl, right enough," he said; "you saw her for yourself."

"Oh, look here, I can't take that. Don't you know Maisa Hubbard, who drove the big Panhard last autumn?"

"I know Maisa Hubbard who used to dance at the Casino Theatre in New York, and she's the same. Didn't I tell you she'd follow me to France?"

"You told me a lot of things," I retorted; "perhaps you dreamed some of them."

"Perhaps I did," he answered, and then I was sorry I had spoken, for his face was as sad as a woman's in sorrow, and just as pitiful.

"You want cheering up, my boy," said I; "wait till we get back to Paris, and I'll take you in hand myself. It's over-driving that's done it; I've known the kind of thing, and can understand what you feel; but you wait a bit, and then we'll see. Didn't you say I was going to bring you luck?"

"I did, but not while Maisa Hubbard's in France. There's no man born could do it."

He was down enough about it, I must say, and a more melancholy driver never steered a car into Champigny--the place where the great race was to start from, and our destination for the time being. When we had done the necessary tuning up and had cleaned ourselves, I took Ferdinand back to Paris, and gave him a bit of dinner at a little restaurant near the Faubourg St.-Honore.

When we had eaten five shillings' worth for three-and-sixpence, and drunk a good bottle of sour red wine apiece, I took him round to "Olympia," and there we saw the famous show they called the "Man in the Moon." This didn't cheer him up at all, and once during the evening he told me that he thought he'd soon be in the moon himself, or any place where they have a job for damaged racing drivers. This made me laugh at him, but laughing wasn't any good, and I had it in my mind to take him off to supper at a little place I knew on the Boulevards, when what should happen but that Maisa Hubbard appeared suddenly in the promenade where we stood, and immediately came up to him with such a smile as might have brought a saint out of a picture to say "Good evening" to her.

"Why, it's Ferdy!" she cried, "and he's trying to turn his back on me.

Oh, my dear boy, whatever do you look like that for?"

He shook hands with her quite civilly, and made some excuse about the show and his not feeling very funny about it. She had another girl with her, and her brother, Jerome Hubbard, the "whip" who used to drive with Mr. Fownes. When I had been introduced, she asked me to come to supper at a place I'd never heard of, and declared that her brother would have a fit if we didn't disburse some of his savings immediately.

The little girl who was with her (I shan't write her name down) was a lively bit of goods, and I was ready enough to go if only to cheer up "Ferdy," who, to be sure, had become a different man already, and was talking and laughing with Maisa just as though they had been first "cousins" for a twelvemonth or more. In the end we ate Mr. Jerome's supper, and got back to our little beds at two in the morning: not an over-good preparation for a great race, as any driver will admit; but my friend seemed himself again, and I would have eaten half a dozen suppers to bring that about.

This was two days before the meeting, I should tell you, and I saw little of Ferdinand until that memorable June morning, when, at half-past three precisely, Girardot got away on his C.G.V., and was followed two minutes later by Fournier on his Mors. I have taken part in many a big race since, but never one which excited me more than that famous dash from Paris to Vienna, which was to make the fortune of more than one English house, and to bring the Gordon Bennett Cup to England for the first time in the motor story.

I firmly believed my friend Ferdinand was to win the race, and presentiment goes farther in this world than many folks think. Such a dashing, daring driver I never saw. His car was a wonder. I took several trips with him before the race, and I do believe that we made eighty or ninety miles an hour upon her--a miracle for those days, though not thought so much of in this year 1909. What was more, he seemed to have forgotten all about that little devil of a Maisa Hubbard and her prophecies, and when we breakfasted together upon the morning of the start I would have said that he was fit to race for his life.

And what a start it was, notwithstanding the hour! What a roaring and racing of engines, cars tearing here and tearing there, gendarmes everywhere, men with silver on their heads and silver on their toes; jabbering officials telling you to do twenty things at once, and quarrelling because you did them. The enclosure itself was like the meat-market at Smithfield on a busy morning. I never heard so much noise in any one place before; and if there was a man, woman, or child who slept through it in the peaceful village of Champigny, well, he, she, or it ought to go into a museum.

Of course, all this was exciting enough, and I caught something of the fever when twenty soldiers pushed my old rattle-trap into the roadway, and a very fine gentleman gave the signal to "Go." Upon my word, I do believe there was just a moment when I thought I could get to Vienna before the others; and, letting my clutch in gently, and telling Billy, my mechanician, to make himself fast, I soon had her upon third speed, and was racing as fast as the bad road would let me towards Provins.

This was a b.u.mpy bit, to be sure, and if I had put her on the "fourth,"

some one would have had to sweep up the pieces quickly. But I kept her steady, though the great cars began to go by like roaring locomotives on a down incline, and really she was doing very well when the offside front tyre asked for a change of air, and we knew that it was No. 1, so far as punctures were concerned.

Well, this was twenty miles from Provins, upon a long and desolate stretch of a poor road, with a distant view of the hills and a couple of sleepy peasants out among the hay. We had been lucky with our draw, and started early in the list, and you can imagine my surprise when a car flashed into view and I recognised Ferdinand, who was almost the last to get off, and must have pa.s.sed any number of cars to overtake us as he did. My word, and he was driving, too! His great machine frightened you to watch it, leaping over the b.u.mps as it did, and threatening every moment to be flung sheer off the road into the hayfield on the other side of the d.y.k.e. But there was a master at the wheel, and with a cheery wave of the hand to us Ferdinand went by, and was lost immediately in a mighty cloud of dust which rose clear above the poplars.

I need hardly tell you how glad I was to see him doing so well, and how I laughed at all his foolish ideas about Maisa Hubbard. Win I felt he would, though all the ladies of the Casino ballet came out to tell him not to; and when old Dobbin, my own particular turn-out, condescended to move again, I pushed on for Belfort, no longer deluding myself that I was to be within a hundred miles of the winner, but hoping that I should get to Vienna in time to shake "Ferdy" by the hand and to tell him what a fool he had been.

If I didn't say this at Belfort, where Herr Jornek, the designer of the car, stood in between us and took Ferdy away for the evening to talk to him, it was well enough said at Brigenz. There a second halt was made; and although we turned in at an early hour, I had plenty of time to put the idea of winning into his head, and the idea of Maisa Hubbard out of it. All the world knows that we had to go through France, Switzerland, Germany, and Austria for that big race, and the Swiss part was slow enough, since no racing was allowed by the timid old gentlemen at the capital. Indeed, if there is one country in Europe a motorist does well to keep out of at any time, it is Switzerland. We simply rolled through the place on that particular journey, and at Brigenz my friend Ferdinand was high up in the list, none but De Knyff, Jarrott, and the Farmans being ahead of him. I told him that if he got over the Arlberg Mountains as his car ought to get, he was winner for a certainty. And that was the point we stuck to until it was time to turn into our little beds and dream about to-morrow.

"I hear that the devil himself might be frightened to drive across that pa.s.s at any speed," said I, "and there's your chance, Ferdy. You say it will be the making of you to win this race. Well, you give your mind to it, and don't shirk the risks, and you're as good as a winner already. There isn't a car in the bunch can hold you on the mountains, and you know it."

"You're right," said he, "and I wish I could say the same to you. But Lal, my boy, it isn't exactly a war-horse that you've got under you, and I can't say it is. I'm not frightened of the mountains, and can break my neck as well as most; don't think otherwise. If my luck holds, Lal Britten has fixed it up, and I shan't forget him when the shekels are paid out. You may think me a bit dotty, but this I will say, that I never felt so sure of myself or of the car as I do this night, and if confidence and a good engine won't win across the Arlberg, then we'll give it up, Lal, and take to perambulators."

"Not meaning any reference to the lady," said I; but his face clouded, and I wished I hadn't spoken.

"She's in Paris, and thank G.o.d for it," he exclaimed, rising to go up to bed; "if she were here in Brigenz to-night, I wouldn't give sixpence for my chances, and that's the whole truth. Now, let's go to by-by; if we don't, I'll be dreaming of her, and dreams won't win laurel-wreaths, as even you will admit."

I let him go, and followed some ten minutes later to my own room. It was just cussedness, I suppose, which kept me back, for, as I went across the corridor of the first floor of our hotel I heard a woman with a laugh which struck sparks off you; and turning round, there was Maisa Hubbard herself in a fine Paris gown and a great straw hat, with a pink feather in it large enough to decorate the Shah. She just gave a pleasant nod to me and then went downstairs, while I made for my bedroom, wondering what Ferdy would have said if he had seen her, and what real bad luck brought her to Brigenz at such a time.