Harlan's Race

a few ounces. Russell will get them made up for us.”
    My stomach clenched with tension.
    “A body-armor shirt doesn’t stop a head shot,” I said. Chino looked pained. ‘You can’t ever eliminate all the risk Harlan. Only some of it.”
    “I know. That’s what spooks me.”
    “Got any other ideas how we can cut risk?”
    I looked back through the trees at Hide A. What he’d said about the line of fire gave me an idea.
    “I’ll run with Vince,” I said. “Pace him the whole way.” Chino narrowed his eyes and looked at me.
    “If your hunch about LEV. liking me is right,” I said, “I could block the head shot, and he won’t hit me. As we come into view of Hide A, I’d be ahead of Vince, on the line of fire. As we come even with him, I drift back to his side. As we pass, I fall back more, staying on the line of fire. I’m taller than Vince — that handles the downhill angle.”
    ‘You can stay up with your joto boy?”
    “He’s going to run a conservative race. I could handle
    it.”
    ‘You spent three years trying to disappear ... now you’re ready to jump in front of the crosshairs?”
    I grinned. “Hey, skipper... never set a pattern, right?” Chino grinned back. “Okay. You’re on.”
    If Vince was going to be in the crosshairs, I wanted to be there with him.
    “Everything depends on how the race develops,” I said. “If I block his shot, or if a bunch of guys kick with us and LEV. just can’t get a clear shot, will he have a plan B?”
    “He won’t have time to take another position during the race. But the awards ceremony worries me.”
    “He can’t assume that Vince will be in the awards.” “But he’ll know Vince is race director. And the race director will probably get up on the platform.”
    “LEV.’s disguise will have to be real good,” I said. “Something that looks normal in a park on Sunday. Even a mother with a baby buggy ...”
    “Think he’ll have a spotter?”
    “We have to assume he will.”
    ‘Will he shoot just once?”
    “One shot, one kill. The first shot gives you away, and you have to bug out.”
    It was sinking in that I had volunteered to stick my own head in the path of that speeding .22 round. I could almost feel it spiraling through my brain. Life was sweeter, suddenly — as fragile as those roses I’d laid on Vince.
    That night, when Vince found out I was going to run the Memorial with him, he was very shook up at first. “Listen,” I said. “I’ve always been the kind of coach who does what his runners do. I don’t stand around on the sidelines in a suit and tie. I never ask somebody to bust quarter miles if I can’t bust them myself.”
    Vince looked into my eyes for a minute. “Chino and Harry okayed it?”
    “They’re professionals. They won’t argue with a volunteer.”
    I hit him gently on the shoulder, and said, “Hey ... we’re a pair of shoes, remember?”
    Slowly he nodded. Finally he hit me back, very gently.

    bout this time, my ex-wife discovered that Michael and
    I had moved to the West Coast. She was more
    desperate than ever to win her war with me over Michael’s love. Now Maiy Ellen showed up in L.A. First she checked into the Beverly Hilton. Next, her chauffeured car was parked across the street from the duplex where Michael and Astarte were living. Her own bodyguard rode shotgun in the car. She left spooky tearful messages taped to Michael’s security gate.
    We took her new move very seriously — her stalking us, her open display of armed readiness. Russell still believed she was a contender, and I had to agree.
    June
    Michael and Astarte tried to ignore his mother. They were gung ho to run the Memorial, and asked me to train them. Astarte was ambitious enough to talk of winning her age-group. Feeling queasy about my inability to tell them what was afoot, I put them both on a program.
    Russell was also in and out of L.A. He and Harry weren’t openly squiring each other, but they were tight. The old soldier had his network going, tracking the movements of Denny and my ex-wife, still trying to spot if she too had any connections to Joshua Force. And he was going to help us tell some of the noble gay war stories. He sold a few of his high-priced horses, and put the money into Valhalla.
    We hoped to start shooting Angel in 1982.
    That same month I finally figured out what to do with Billy’s gold ring. Nothing else had seemed right. Vince heard my plan, and agreed. So one day he and I drove together to