“Hey, wait ...!” Williams shouted, and promptly pursued, dashing through the sagebrush, acting without a care, chasing the boy relentlessly until they both burst into a clearing in which another campfire burned and a battered police car sat with its hood propped up—at which instant a woman barked, “Freeze! Drop it!” and he trained his rifle upon her ... only to see a revolver pointed directly back at him.
III
“Who are you? What do you want?” she snapped, and shuffled forward a step. “I’ll fire this thing, don’t think I won’t!”
Williams didn’t budge, only continued to sight her. “Yes, I believe you would ... if you had to. But you don’t have to. I—I heard the boy foraging ... it woke me up. I wanted to tell him he had nothing to fear, but he was already gone. I’d suggest just now ... we
