Drag-Strip Racer Read Online Free PDF

one-thirty.
    There was really only one place that would do—the Candlewyck Speedway—and he promptly headed for it. He got there in half
     an hour, parked next to the bleachers, and for the next hour and a half he watched the Plymouths, Omnis, Chevies, Mustangs,
     Camaros, Hornets, Fords, Buicks, Oldses, Pontiacs, and a bristling white Chrysler run passes on the quarter-mile strip.
    “Snakeman” Wilkins was in a Plymouth, “Little Beaver” Applejack in a Mustang, “Battle-scar” Jones in a Ford, Jim “The Toad”
     in an Olds.Their names were printed in glowing colors across the sides of their cars, which themselves were painted in sharp, contrasting
     colors. The first thing you noticed about these cars was their owners’ pride in how they looked. And then, the way each car
     reflected the personality of its owner. Ken wondered if someday he’d be worthy enough to have earned a nickname and join that
     reputable clan. “Limp-along” Oberlin? “Wolfman” Oberlin? The possibilities were limitless.
    Dana was in the backyard working on his motorcycle when Ken finally went home. He was bare to his waist and his hands were
     black from grease and oil.
    “Nick give you the day off?” Ken found himself asking as he hobbled over to his brother.
    Dana straightened and shoved his long hair away from his forehead with the clean part of his arm. “I’m taking it off, brother.
     Where you been?”
    “At the track. But I went to see Dusty Hill first.”
    Dana eyed him expectantly. “What’s the verdict?”
    “He’s already sponsoring a driver.” Their eyes held. “Scott Taggart.”
    “Rat? Since when?”
    Ken shrugged. “Since two days ago. Another thing: somebody broke into Dusty’s place last night or early this morning and stole
     that three-fifty turbo engine he had sitting in his store.”
    “Oh, no.” Dana shook his head sympathetically, then narrowed his eyes as he grasped the full impact of what Ken had said.
    “Early this morning?”
    “Yes, or last night.”
    “Hm,” Dana muttered, shaking his head. Then he resumed work on his black and red Kawasaki, a KE125 model. The Takasago steel
     rims and Nitto tires were as clean and sparkling as if he had just bought them off the assembly line.
    “See ya,” Ken said, noticing that his brother seemed more interested in working on his bike than talking with him. Then a
     movement caught his eye toward the rear of their yard. He grinned amiably as he saw his father hoeing the garden. Dad was
     wearing that wide-brimmed, tattered straw hat that he had had for as long as Ken could remember.
    The girls weren’t around. They were probably in the house or playing with some of their neighborhood friends, Ken thought.
    He hobbled to the garden to talk with hisfather, and wasn’t there more than ten minutes when he heard the Kawasaki start up. Surprised, he turned and saw Dana tearing
     away on it, dirt squirting up like sparks behind its rear wheel.

FIVE
    F IVE MILES out of Wade, Dana turned off the highway onto a road that was flanked on one side by a cow pasture and on the other by tall,
     gangling palms. He reduced the speed of his motorcycle almost to idle so that the noise wouldn’t carry to the small ranch
     house nestled about an eighth of a mile off the road among a thick set of trees.
    Some one hundred yards from the highway the dirt road curved to the left, sweeping around a tall, sprawling grapefruit tree.
    Dana drove off the road to the left side of the tree, shut off the engine, dismounted, and leaned the motorcycle against the
     tree. Weeds were chest-high around the tree and he doubted that anyone who happened to drive by could see the bike.
    He ran across the road, hopped over a ditch, ducked through a wire fence, and headed toward a garage that was set away from
     the house.
    He kept bent over, not wanting to risk having someone at the house see him. He knew of at least five shotguns kept inside
     that he had seen with his own eyes, with the