Driven by Toby Vintcent Read Free Book Online Page B

and which, in any case, might only be needed when you’re coasting, and certainly not when you’re racing.’
    Backhouse said nothing but looked at Sabatino. Very gently, he nodded, simultaneously indicating his assent and assurance.
     
    ‘S orry about that,’ said Backhouse to Straker after the meeting broke up. ‘Drivers are notoriously focused people. They don’t like anything that can possibly distract them.’
    Straker patted Backhouse on the shoulder, and went straight back to work.
    By mid-morning, nifty negotiation had resulted in two rooftopsin different parts of Monte-Carlo being rented, on which a number of direction-finding dishes were quickly erected and tuned to the activation frequency of the bug. Two more dishes were installed on the superstructure of Quartano’s yacht, out in the marina.
    An hour before the start of Qualifying, Straker was checking his network of equipment. Sitting in the Intel area of the Ptarmigan headquarters truck, he was wearing a pair of headphones, with Sabatino’s radio net in one ear, and Helli Cunzer’s in the other. In front of him was a computer screen displaying the networked output from the dishes. This showed a wire diagram of the principality – outlines of the buildings in line-of-sight of the Grand Prix circuit, as well as all the boats berthed in the harbour.
    Straker’s set-up meant that any transmission to activate the bug in Sabatino’s helmet ought to be picked up by one or more of his direction-finding receivers. Each detection would then be vectored and instantly shown as a line on his display. Where any two or more such lines triangulated – crossed – that would give him the location, to within a few square metres, of any signal trying to jam their radios. Straker would then be able to plot out, and print off that location on his wire diagram of Monte-Carlo.
     
    A t one o’clock that afternoon, Qualifying started.
    Straker felt he was ready.
    His trap was set.

NINE
    I mmediately after Qualifying started, there was a surprising lack of activity. For all the anticipation, it felt like an anticlimax. Few cars were in a hurry to get out, and only a handful were even out of their garages. Everyone seemed to be waiting to see what the others would do. This was not unexpected, though. Q1 was not the high-pressure session. For this first round of Qualifying, the drivers only needed to finish in the top sixteen.
    Eight minutes in and the level of activity was a very different story. Most of the cars were then out on the track or ready to leave the pit lane. England’s Paddy Aston in one of the Lambourns, the current Championship leader on 44 points, set a challenging time. Simi Luciano from Italy, Massarella’s number one driver, soon went six tenths faster, while the Argentinean Adi Barrantes in the other Massarella was clearly struggling with a poor set-up. Straker, watching the main TV broadcast pictures, saw a fleeting shot from a camera zooming in for a close-up of team boss Eugene Van Der Vaal’s face. The Afrikaner was clearly not impressed by the way one of his cars was performing.
    Midway into the qualifying session Remy Sabatino headed out onto the circuit. The air was warm and humid. She put on a burst of acceleration up through Beau Rivage to bring the car up to temperature, and felt content. Aerodynamically, the car was performing well. And by the time she rounded the corner at Mirabeau, she was reassured their adjustments of yesterday afternoon were mitigating the understeer. It hadn’t gone completely, though.
    Straker switched his TV channel to the on-board camera above Sabatino’s helmet. As she coaxed the car round the out-lap, he saw her rolling her head gently, flexing her neck and relaxing her shoulders. The car accelerated and braked in rapid succession; he then sawSabatino weave extra violently left and right through the Chicane – trying to work temperature into her tyres and brakes.
    As Sabatino approached Tabac in the middle