We flew at an angle over the beach and followed it briefly over bright splashes of color that were swimmers and sunbathers. They stopped what they were doing and stared straight up at two helicopters speeding over them and out to sea. Half a mile over the ocean, Lucy began to slow down.

“We can’t keep this up,” she told me, and it seemed a pronouncement of doom. “We lose our engine, we’ll never make it back, and we’re low on fuel.”

The gauge read less than twenty gallons. Lucy pushed us into a sharp one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. The Schweizer was maybe fifty feet below us and head on. The sun made it impossible to see who was inside, but I knew. I had not a single doubt, and when it was no more than five hundred feet from us and coming up on Lucy’s side, I felt several rapid-fire jolts, like quick slaps, and we suddenly swerved. Lucy grabbed her pistol from her shoulder holster.

“They’re shooting at us!” she exclaimed to me.

I thought of the submachine gun, the Calico missing from Sparkes’s collection.

Lucy fought to open her door. She jettisoned it and it tumbled through the air, sailing down and away. She slowed our speed.

“They’re firing!” Lucy got back on the air. “Returning fire! Keep all traffic away from Wrightsville Beach area!”

“Roger! Do you request further assistance?”

“Dispatch land emergency crews, Wrightsville Beach! Expect casualty situation!”

As the Schweizer flew directly under us, I saw muzzle flashes and the tip of a barrel barely protruding from the copilot’s window. I felt more quick jolts.

“I think they hit the skids,” Lucy almost screamed, and she was trying to position her pistol out her open door and fly at the same time, her shooting hand bandaged.

I instantly dug inside my pocketbook, dismayed to realize my .38 was still inside my briefcase, which remained safe inside the baggage compartment. Then Lucy handed me her pistol and reached behind her head for the AR-15 assault rifle. The Schweizer swooped around, to pursue us inland, knowing we were cornered because we would not risk the safety of people on the ground.

“We’ve got to go back over the water!” Lucy said. “Can’t shoot at them here. Kick your door open. Get it off the hinges and dump it!”

I somehow managed, the door ripping away as rushing air blasted me and the ground suddenly seemed closer. Lucy made another turn, and the Schweizer turned, too, as the needle on the fuel gauge slipped lower. This went on for what seemed forever, the Schweizer chasing us out to sea, and our trying to return to land so we could get down. It could not shoot up without hitting the rotor blades.