"I'm armed. I have you covered. I can see you but you can't see me. Drop your rifle."
Bluff? Hardesty wondered.
"I'll count three."
And fire on two, you shrew, Hardesty thought. He wondered again about the other girl, the one who was fleeing across the city now. A confederate of hers? It was possible. Double-dealing invited triple dealing. Hardesty thumbed the safety catch forward on his rifle and dropped the weapon at his feet. He still held the dead man's wallet in his left hand.
The woman appeared over the rear embankment of the crater. She wore a cap with earlaps, a tattered leather lumber-jacket, a heavy black skirt, rubble-boots and no gloves. She carried a sawed-off shotgun in the cradle of her bent left arm. She was pretty, but did not look mean enough to be really beautiful. Her eyes were piercing.
"What have you got in your hand?" she said.
"His wallet."
"Give it to me." The young woman came forward, kicked Hardesty's rifle out of reach with her left foot and held out her right hand.
Just then an air-raid siren began to wail. Hardesty looked up at the pale cold sky. He saw no jets. He heard none. The spotters didn't give you much warning these days. They knew of the raid in advance, of course. They had received word from the spotters up and down the coast. While they would be executed if they failed to report the raid entirely, there was no stipulation on the time limit and no way of proving it if there had been. As a consequence, the spotters were rich men. You hardly had time to lock up or hide your valuables with only seconds to reach shelter.
"Think it's for real?" the woman asked Hardesty.