Clutch Cassidy

Clutch remembers the stop

Clutch Cassidy remembered the day he found a gap that fit his Ford Escort RS1600 (Mk1) almost as well as he remembers the look Ferne gave him from the other side of it. He had asked her to come to a closed practice session so they'd have somebody to follow at a sensible pace. The approach ran between stacks of spare track that were meant to have moved in the morning. Clutch could put one side of the car close enough to slide it through while the other side stayed clear. He could tell Ferne's car would have to stop. For about three seconds he considered going ahead and checking what she'd done from the other end.

He set the parking brake and walked over. The worker at the gate found a dolly they could use. Ferne took a last look at the old gap before they cleared it. She said she had been waiting for him to notice the person who'd asked for the practice slot was also the one standing outside of it.

What Ferne meant

Ferne came to Marrow Creek for one pear harvest and still wonders how she ended up looking after the sellers' schedule at the cooperative. Clutch grades the fruit and sees her every afternoon outside the office with two sets of times in one hand. Whole loads arrive early because a grower expects a wait. The weigh station needs a yard clear before they can park. Clutch is the man who can look at a trolley and find a way to get two people through a door with it. He has spent a whole wet Wednesday proving how to do that to somebody who needed to get out to lunch.

At practice he watches the Ford's front corner when the gate narrows. He waits for what he can feel when the front catches up. If he hasn't chosen the next line by that point he'll lean on the steep part of the track too late. Ferne asks him to tell her where he expects to place the car before she watches. Some days he asks her to tell him what she expected to see first.

What went on the card

Nola Senn, the Green Barret driver, and Clutch have an unsettled argument about how much of a good start a person can put on a check card. They borrow from each other without putting the argument to a vote. Clutch used one item from Nola before an early practice and felt silly when he noticed he hadn't been doing that check every time. He asked whose answers were on Nola's card. On the next version she left a square for what she had felt in the car. Later, when Nick Torque asked where Clutch watched a second car enter, Clutch waited with him for a driver to come through. They stood at different points for the first pass.

Nick had already brought a pencil. Clutch borrowed it to mark the point where he lost sight of the other car's closest tire.

The practice Ferne wants

Ferne's next plan calls for her to go ahead of the Ford for most of the closed route. Clutch has agreed to leave enough room to see how she places herself. He wants a turn through the tricky gap afterward if she still has time. At the pear shed this week she left the gate wide enough for a dolly and let him stand for a while deciding what that meant.