The Continental Supersports is Bentley's interpretation of a supercar. These aren't my words; this comes straight from Bentley CEO Christophe Georges, with whom I had the chance to speak a few days after I returned the car -- with extreme reluctance -- whence it came. Georges was in Boston, stopping over on his way to Bentley headquarters in Crewe, England. I asked him what had changed within the brand over the last 50 years, and what had remained constant. He said that technology and safety features had, of course, improved and evolved over that time, but that "as always, the manufacturing and the attention to detail in the cars is the best -- the best possible." Most importantly, "the spirit never changes; what it feels like to sit in a Bentley, to drive a Bentley, doesn't change."

And what exactly does that feel like? I have written about cars for a while, test-driven a bunch and chronicled some of the most expensive in the world at auctions and the like, but truth be told there's a difference between tooling a Porsche around a track for a couple hours and parking a $280,400 car in your driveway -- and the experience does start in the driveway. Friends and neighbors come running when you push the ignition button and the massive engine comes to life with a low, pavement-shaking rumble; a sound like Godzilla clearing his throat. They ply you with questions, then cajole, plead and, ultimately, beg for a ride.

Ah, yes, the ride. There's no doubt the Supersports has the right to call itself a supercar, albeit one with impeccable manners. Once you slide into the carbon-fiber-backed sport seats, you're in control of a revised Bentley W12 engine, a 6-liter twin-turbocharged beast putting out 621 horsepower and 590 lb-ft of torque that sprints the Supersports convertible from zero to 60 in an incredible 3.9 seconds -- that's as fast as a Tesla Roadster, and we're talking about a car that has a curb weight of almost 5,300 pounds. It accelerates as if it had warp drive. The big 4-seater also manages to dominate the corners -- even around the ruthless twists, turns and switchbacks of Los Angeles' Mulholland Drive and the Pacific Coast Highway -- thanks to its aggressively wide, low stance and an all-wheel-drive system with a 60:40 rear-power bias, not to mention a set of massive carbon-ceramic brakes that could stop a stampeding elephant on command. There's a reason the crew at Crewe calls this "the most extreme Bentley ever."

"This car, what this car can do, represents what Bentley is known for," Georges told me. "Bentley has a history of performance and racing, and the Supersports is important for what we stand for; it's not at all inconsistent with Bentley."

Which brings me back to the gawkers who seemed to materialize wherever I pulled up. I took to conducting quick surveys, and almost to a person everyone thought of Bentley as primarily a luxury brand and had little or no knowledge of the badge's long history of racing and performance. (Last year at Pebble Beach, while on assignment taking a sneak peek at the then yet-to-be-released Mulsanne, I encountered a 1930 8-Liter once owned by W.O. Bentley himself -- the first car to do 100 mph -- and was soon well-schooled in Bentley's historically driver-first mentality.) I asked Georges whether it bothered him that so few Americans seemed to recognize the performance aspect of the badge.

"Bentley is what it is, and it is our job to help people discover what we are," he said, before adding, "but it would be too presumptuous for us to insist on educating the customer."

With a sticker price that could buy both the family house and a vacation home in many parts of the country, I doubt Georges needs to worry too much about potential Supersports customers falling through the cracks -- the interested rich (my neighbors and I, sadly, not among them...though it's not the interest that we lack) will always come looking. As for a mere mortal whose too-short affair with the brand is over, I'm left pondering a question Georges told me lies at the heart of the no-limits feats of engineering, design and execution for which the marque is famous: "Once you reach Bentley, where does one go from there?"

Sadly, I now know exactly what he means.