'How did your uncle know me?' Wut asked.
'The world knew you, Wut! The Grand Prix of Italy, 1930. What a killing!'
'You said that before,' Wut complained.
'My uncle was teaching me, Wut. My uncle said I had all the moves. But I lost my nerve, you see. It would take a master to have me riding again.'
'There's a war now, you fool,' said Wut. 'What are you anyway?'
'Croat, I guess - if it matters,' Vratno said. 'But motorcycles are international!'
'But there's a war now,' said Wut. 'I'm the scout-outfit leader of Motorcycle Unit Balkan 4.'
'That's the team I want!' my father said.
'It's not a team!' said Wut. 'It's a war!'
'Are you really in the war, Wut?' Vratno asked. 'What will the war do to NSU?'
'Set us back ten years,' said Wut. 'There won't be any racers made, there won't be any improvements made. There might not be a factory to go back to, and all my drivers could lose their legs. Everything will come back, covered with camouflage paint.'
'Oh, you're surely right that these politics have no place with motorcycles,' my father said. 'Wut, is there any way I can overcome my fear?'
'My God!' said Wut. 'You can't have anything to do with a German military unit.'
'You can help me, Wut, I know you can. You could make me a driver again.'
'Why are you speaking German?' said Wut.
'Do you speak Serbo-Croat?' my father asked.
'Of course not,' Gottlob said.
'Then I'd better speak German, don't you think? I was driving all over the continent, you see - mostly amateur events, sure. But I was an alternate for the 1939 Grand Prix races. Pity that NSU wasn't a winner in '39 - a bit heavy, your racer model that year, wasn't it? But I picked up some languages when I was touring.'
'Before you lost your nerve?' said Wut, who was lost.
'Yes, before poor Uncle drowned with the Norton.'
'And you were only eleven at the 1930 Grand Prix of Italy?'
'Eleven, Wut. Merely an admiring child.'
'And you found out I was here?'
'I found out, Wut.'
'How did you ever find that out?' Gottlob said.
'The world knows you, Wut - the motorcycle world.'
'Yes, you said so before,' Wut agreed.
'How would you go about overcoming such a fear?' my father asked.
'You're crazy,' said Wut. 'And you'll frighten the children.'
'Please, Wut,' Vratno said. 'I had all the right impulses, and now I'm frozen.'