The Running Man
by Stephen King
Contents
…Minus 039 and COUNTING… “My name is Amelia Williams. Benjami
Overview
Amelia Williams’s hostage statement turns the police roadblock into a public confrontation, and the crowd’s pressure forces the authorities to open a path instead of immediately killing Richards. The scene escalates into class-charged violence as police attack newsmen, civilians fight, and Richards recognizes how deeply divided and volatile the society around him has become.
Richards and Amelia escape the trap, but the passage through the crowd shows that Richards’s flight has become more than a chase: it is now a spectacle that exposes public distrust of authority and simmering resentment between rich and poor.
Summary
At the Rockland roadblock, Amelia Williams repeats Ben Richards’s message: Richards is holding Amelia hostage and will kill Amelia unless police give them safe conduct. The amplified police voice demands to speak with Richards and orders Amelia out of the car, but Amelia insists Richards will kill her and accuses the police of not caring who dies.
The watching crowd turns against the police response. A chant of “Let her through” rises, a rock cracks a police windshield, and the cruisers finally pull apart to create a narrow path. Police then order civilians to clear the area under threat of prison or fines, but the crowd refuses to move and openly accuses the police of wanting no witnesses.
A news crew arrives and begins setting up a camera, but police fight them for it, smash the camera, and club one of the newsmen. A small boy hits a policeman with a rock and is seized by other officers. Around the roadblock, violence spreads as slum-dwellers and well-dressed townspeople begin fighting each other.
Amelia, horrified, describes the chaos to Richards while Richards keeps his gaze low and tells Amelia to drive on. Amelia fears the police will disable the air car by shooting its air caps, but Richards believes they are too slow or stupid to do so. His judgment proves correct, and the car passes between the opened police cruisers.
As Amelia drives slowly through, Richards observes the crowd split by class: middle- and upper-class citizens on one side near the marina and country club, poor people on the other under heavier police watch. Richards sees the confrontation as a sudden exposure of class hatred and social polarization, with himself serving as a figure onto whom both sides project anger, fear, or hope.
Who Appears
- Ben RichardsFugitive contestant who uses Amelia’s hostage status to force passage through the roadblock.
- Amelia WilliamsHostage who relays Richards’s threat and is shaken by police violence and public chaos.
- Roadblock policeAuthorities who threaten Amelia, suppress witnesses, and fail to stop Richards’s car.
- Roadblock crowdDivided civilians whose pressure opens the road and whose unrest reveals class hostility.
- News crewLocal reporters whose camera is smashed when police try to prevent public documentation.