Sharyn McCrumb - St. Dale

“I guess I can understand them not referring to Earnhardt’s death on the tour,” said Ray Reeve, when the Number Three Pilgrims had assembled again in the parking lot, with yet another speedway pin affixed to hats and tote bags. “But they didn’t talk about Neil, either.”

“I guess we ought to talk about Neil,” said Harley.

Bill Knight saw the somber faces of the others. “Neil?”

“Yeah,” said Cayle softly. “Dale Earnhardt’s best friend. The other guy who died on turn 4.”

Harley thought this was a sadder story than Dale, but you couldn’t stand there at Daytona talking about grief and loss and not mention Neil. So he told them. Neil Bonnett had been a pipefitter back in Alabama, before he decided to become a race car driver. He was part of the Alabama Gang with the Allisons. If there were any ghosts in the voices at Talladega, they should have been telling Neil to slow down and be careful. Not that he’d have listened. Neil and Earnhardt were the Butch and Sundance of motor sports, for what? Fifteen years or more? They competed on the track. They tried to catch the biggest fish or shoot the biggest buck in the woods. They were either the most macho pair who ever lived or else neither one of them could spell death, because they went at everything full tilt. They both went into the wall more than their share of times, but Earnhardt got away with it. Neil didn’t. He’d come out of the wrecks with broken bones, injuries that would sideline him for weeks. One multicar crash at Darlington in 1990 gave him a head injury that wiped out his memory for months. So he retired. Became a TV announcer. But life in the slow lane didn’t suit him, and he was itching to get back in the show. So Earnhardt helped him out. Got him a job test driving the Monte Carlos that would replace Earnhardt’s Lumina beginning in 1994. So Neil started driving again, and if he was driving, he might as well be racing. A farewell tour for a 46-year-old daredevil who already had enough money to stop taking risks. Five races in the 1994 season, just to go out in style. But in a butt-ugly car: a garish pink and yellow Country Time Lemonade Lumina. Car owned by Earnhardt. The farewell tour would begin, of course, with the first race of the season: the Daytona 500.

Only he never made it to the race. On February 8, 1994, in a practice run, Neil Bonnett crashed in turn 4 and died. Some people say Earnhardt never got over it, but he drove in that year’s Daytona 500, and he came in seventh.

Ten years and seven days later, he would also die at turn 4 at Daytona.

Harley’s voice trailed away. He didn’t trust himself to say anything else. He had known Neil.

Nobody said anything. Not even Justine, who wiped a tear away with the back of her hand, but did not speak. The others looked at the ground, doubly solemn now.

“Okay,” said Harley. “Anybody have anything they want to say?”

Nobody did.

“Then let’s say our good-byes. Speaking of goodbyes, four of our group are getting off here. The newlyweds and Terence and Sarah have had a change of plans, so make sure you take time to wish them well at dinner tonight before they head off down a different road.”

Shane stood there holding the wreath, trying to think of something to say. He was excited about the prospect of a new future that might someday bring him back here, but saddened, too, at the memory of the loss of his hero.

“This place is so…what’s that thing Lincoln said in the Gettysburg address? So consecrated, that what we say here has to be special. I didn’t write a speech or anything, but I can’t just say any old thing. Not here. I thought about a poem that Karen put on a quilt for me last year, but then I remembered something even better. Hey, Karen, what’s that thing your mother’s club says sometimes? The ‘bright flame’ thing they say?”

Karen blinked. “Well, it’s an old Gaelic prayer, Shane. I don’t remember all the Gaelic. Besides, it’s a prayer. Well, not a prayer, I guess. I think it’s actually addressed to a guardian angel, but still.”

“To an angel. That’s it. But it says what I want to say. You know it in English. Just say it in English. Please.”

Karen glanced doubtfully at Rev. Knight, as if she expected him to pronounce it blasphemous to utter a prayer at a speedway, but he simply smiled and looked eager for her to begin. There was nothing for it, then. She hoped she wouldn’t get so nervous she’d forget the words. Probably not. She’d told Shane about the college letter, and now that he had the chance to go somewhere, too, he was okay with that. They were finally checking out-which is what NASCAR drivers say when they’re making a burst of speed to leave the rest of the field back in the dust.

She nodded for Shane to place the wreath at the foot of the Earnhardt statue, and then she said:

“Be thou a bright flame before me,

Be thou a guiding star above me,

Be thou a smooth path below me,

And be ever a kindly shepherd beside me,

Today, tomorrow, and forever.”

“For Dale,” said Shane, touching the wreath.

“And for Neil,” whispered Harley.

Darlington Raceway

“Are we there yet?”

Nobody said “Shut up, Justine,” for a change, because they had all been thinking more or less the same thing for many a mile. Harley supposed that putting together a ten-day bus tour that would encompass two NASCAR races was quite a feat, and that you could not in good conscience skip Daytona on a tour devoted to Dale Earnhardt, or on any NASCAR tour for that matter, but the distances involved were still brutal. It was one thing to drive 500 miles around an oval track in an afternoon at 180 miles per hour, and quite another to dodder along I-95 at considerably lower speeds for the nearly 400 miles between Daytona Beach, Florida, and Darlington, South Carolina. Rest stops. Food stops. Stretch-your-legs breaks. Four hundred-plus miles from the Atlanta Speedway to Daytona, and then turn right around and go almost that far again to get to Darlington.

At least they’d had two days for the last leg of the journey. They visited Daytona on Friday, and they’d had until Sunday to reach Darlington. So they’d stayed Friday night in Daytona, and taken their time on Saturday heading north again to Darlington. Harley thought that he would have been less tired if he could have made the trip in a Monte Carlo alone, nonstop, but coddling a group of strangers over more than a thousand miles in a week made him feel like he’d walked the whole distance in wet boots.

He thought about all the fools who considered racing monotonous. Had they ever driven I-95?

The bus was quiet now, not only because four of the Number Three Pilgrims had gone their own way in Florida. Harley didn’t take it personally. It had been a long trip, and the itinerary could use a little work. The remaining passengers were feeling the effects of the long haul, which meant there was much less banter than usual. Everyone read or slept, just wishing for the traveling to be over. They were subdued by the visit to Daytona, too, of course. Someday maybe-a few races down the road-the Speedway would again be just another place to race, but right now it was still haunted by the image of the Intimidator’s last race, and it had saddened them all to be there. Despite the punishing distance of this last leg of the journey, Harley was glad that the tour had not ended in the sadness of Daytona, but with the pageantry and excitement of a race day in Darlington. Of course, they might someday look back on that race with regret and nostalgia if the fools in charge of NASCAR ever made good on the threat to take the Labor Day race away from Darlington, but for now it was an exciting time in a happier place, and for all their sakes he was glad.