Charlie and Me. The Saga Continues

Charlie and Me. Chapter 24

Charlie and Me. Chapter 24

Charlie finally gets to drive her racecar, and acts a bit crabby. Rick gets nervous.

*****

The ’57 Bel Air had turned out to be a bit more of a project than we bargained for. It really had taken quite a while to get that one off the ground, what with all the scheming we’d been doing for our friends as well. Originally we intended for it to be a very fast version of a road car. Take the car, rip out its mechanicals, lighten it up a bit, then screw in a ludicrously big engine for Charlie to play with in the bath.

This idea evolved, and we pretty much lost control of things. The car became death on wheels. By the time we’d had a very highly specialised company near Woking do their stuff, there was hardly an original part of it left. I do know it had been barely worth buying the damned thing in the first place. The problem was that with the sort of power Charlie was demanding, the car would twist itself into a knot. So we resold it, but kept the already outrageous 454 cubic inch engine that the one previous careful lady owner had fitted to drive to church on Sundays. That too went eventually, sighing to itself with relief; it’d had a hard life of it at Charlie’s hands and leaden right foot.

The titanium tubeframe chassis for the racecar was lovingly hand woven by the Men of Woking. The replica bodyshell was absolutely standard in shape. No chopping, no sectioning. Charlie and I had insisted on this, except for a huge inlet scoop on the bonnet to feed air to the carburettors. Charlie had kindly suggested that I had a rhinoplasty and we use the offcuts for the airscoop. She is such a charmer, isn’t she?

The bodywork consisted of lots of panels of fibreglass and carbon fibre composite, nearly all of which could be removed for easier access to the mechanicals. We kept the original doorhandles and tail lights for authenticity. The brakelights worked too. I insisted on that. I felt it was a nice touch given Charlie would be trying to anchor up from the best part of 300 mph if things went to plan.

I won’t bore you with the technical details, but I will tell you the enormous alloy-block 601 cubic inch V8 race engine, with the nitrous oxide injection that Charlie craved, made Nora look like a clapped-out Skoda. Just looking at the motor in the Bel Air could frighten me. Charlie on the other hand was in her element. She loved it. Quite an unusual engagement ring. Except we were married by now. That’s romance for you.

Charlie had put in some wildly out-of-shape shakedown sessions on a disused airfield near the engineering place at Woking, first using the 454 engine that she regarded as a slightly ladyboy source of power. Then she had several goes with the monster motor, and things got even more unpredictable. She’d idle the car back to the waiting Men of Woking, leap out, and start yelling. She’s really very good at yelling.

‘Fuck me! I’ve driven sodding Citroens that handle better than this fucking thing! It’s all over the fucking shop. It’s like a fucking shopping trolley with a fucked wheel. Why won’t it go in a fucking straight line? Is that too much too ask for, given that’s what this fucker is designed for and supposed to do for a fucking living? It’s supposed to run in a fucking straight line! Make it do that you fuckwits! I don’t mind a fucking fight on my hands, but I do fucking mind fighting something that doesn’t do its fucking job!’

The Men of Woking would trailer the car back to their place, scratch their heads a bit, and do some more sums.

Charlie was at last racing the Bel Air for the first time, and she eased our recently acquired motorhome into a space next to the other recently acquired motorhome that was housing our four mechanically talented but somewhat hairy-arsed and flatulent pitcrew. There was no way Charlie and I were sharing accommodation with that lot, and anyway she and I had planned some pre-race stress relief and we didn’t want an audience.