The residents of the Shady Rest boardinghouse gathered in the parlor at nearly one in the morning. All were dressed in their pajamas and robes, but none could sleep. Not with the peculiar happenings in the town below.

“It was strange enough with the phone dead all day,” Jessie Shively said, sitting on the arm of Ida Fleming’s chair and wringing her hands unconsciously. “But now, with someone lightin’ off fireworks at this hour—”

“Fireworks, you say?” Jim Taggart grunted without knowing what the hell they were talking about.

“Wasn’t fireworks, Jessie,” Hubert said as he peered out the window. “Those were gunshots. And those explosions . . . well, who knows what that was all about.”

George Bailey had a pretty good idea. But he sank into his chair and said nothing.

Why hadn’t he done something before now? he wondered. He knew what was happening, what was going to happen. But he just cowered and hid his head, just as he’d always done. It was just a matter of time now, he thought. Till his nightmares came up the hill. He and the others had been lucky so far—he figured those things had been too busy preying on their own families and friends to think of the old house on the hill and its forgotten lodgers. But that would change. Tomorrow we move, he decided. Tomorrow we get a car and we leave this place, this town, this entire state. . . .

“Hey,” Hubert said, leaning closer to the window. “I think I saw someone out there.”

Bailey’s eyes widened.

Jessie moved alongside the towering Mr. Ranall. “Where? I don’t see anyone.”

“Out there by the trees.” He turned toward the door. “I’ll just go see who it is.”

“NO!” Bailey snapped, lumbering out of his chair. His stridency gave them pause. He went to the window and pulled down the shade. “Nobody goes outside.”

“Why not, George?” Hubert wanted to know. “We can’t just stay in here. I just want to find out what the hell’s going on.”

“Just wait till morning,” the older man asked plaintively. “Please.”

The doorbell rang.

Avina Atchison came down the hall from the kitchen and poked her hairnetted head through the parlor doors. “Who on earth could that be at this hour?” She headed for the door.

“Don’t answer it!” Bailey wailed, racing to catch her.

He reached the hall just as the landlady was opening the door, nudging her aside even as he reached into his robe and drew forth his big rosewood cross. He thrust it through the open doorway at the figures there and commanded, “Get back! You are not invited, I do not invite you here! Get back!”

A hand reached out and plucked the crucifix from his grasp. “You won’t need this, Mr. Bailey,” Charlie Bean told him. “We just need to ask a few questions.”