Lorelle stood in the same window in which Robby had seen Karen earlier. She wore a red robe open just enough to bare a narrow strip of pale flesh down the front.
"Don't listen to him," she said. "He's a liar. A crazy liar! He'd be in a mental hospital if he didn't have his pulpit to hide behind!"
"Don't listen to her!" Pastor Quillerman shouted, raising his arms high. "Wear the armor of righteousness! Fend off the arrows of evil!"
"Listen to his holier-than-thou talk!" Lorelle shouted at them. "Have I talked to any of you that way? Have I done anything to any of you? I've done nothing!"
The crowd was silent. No one responded, but looks were exchanged, brows creased.
“If I've done anything at all, I've given you pleasure. You know that's true, each one of you. You know in your hearts that this lunatic is lying to you. And as for your friends and loved ones who are here with me… they are here because they want to be. You may not like it, but they are here by choice. " Over her shoulder: "Isn't that right?"
A chorus of voices rose in agreement from the darkness behind Lorelle.
George put his arms around Robby and Jen and said, "Go back to the house."
"That was Mom's voice!" Jen shouted, pulling away from him. “I heard her!” She took several steps toward Lorelle's house as she shouted, "Mom! Come home! Please come home! Mom?"
Silence. Everyone stared at the window, at Lorelle.
"I don't want to!" Karen shouted.
A whimper escaped Jen as she spun around and faced George. He embraced her and whispered in her ear, "Please, honey, please go back to the house now."
Before she could do as he had said, a frightened man's voice called, "Carl? Carl, your mom and I want you to come home now. We're sorry for what happened earlier and we'll -"
"Fuck off!" a young male voice shouted back.
"Marlene?" a man shouted. "Marlene? Hon? Please come out of -"
From behind Lorelle, a woman giggled drunkenly and the man who had called for Marlene whispered, "Oh, my God."
Lorelle said, "I don't care what he says – these people have chosen to be here and no matter what you do, they won't leave until they choose to leave. They don't want to come back to you right now." She paused, then: "Of course… you could always come join us.”
“No!" Quillerman roared, raising a hand in the air. "If you go in there with them, you'll all be lost!"
Laughter came from Lorelle's house. When they turned toward it again, she was gone and the window was black once again… but undefinable shapes moved in that blackness and laughter rang out now and then as if a party were going on, as if toasts were being made and jokes were being told…
"If they don't want to be with us," Mr. Weyland said, "why should we go in there and get them"
Everyone spoke at once and their voice blended into an incoherent babble, but the tone was unmistakably one of angry agreement.
"Wait a minute, please!" Pastor Quillerman shouted. "You're not hearing me!"
"We hear you fine!" someone sneered. "You're just not worth listening to!"
"Wait, please, aren't there any Christians here?" Quillerman asked.
Several voices rose affirmatively.
"But," Mrs. LaBianco said, "being a Christian doesn't mean I have to sit still for that woman, that-that… whore in there! She doesn't have any of my family with her, but I've been married for thirty-one years and I don't take kindly to some bitch coming into my life and screwing up my marriage!"
"But you allowed her to!" Quillerman said.
"Yeah," a woman replied angrily, "just like my husband is probably allowing that slut to do god knows what with him in there right now!"
Quillerman spread his arms and cried, "But most of you here allowed her to do these things! How can you pass judgment on -"
A heavy black flashlight flew out of the darkness and struck Pastor Quillerman with a sharp crack across the bridge of his nose. He fell back against the pickup and released a whimpering sigh as he slid limply to the ground.
George and Robby knelt beside him and George shouted at the crowd, "He was just trying to help you! Why did you do that?"
Quillerman, stunned and bleeding, rolled his head back and forth slowly as he groaned.
No one responded to George's question. They simply stared at the fallen pastor, moving their flashlight beams over him as they whispered and hissed to one another conspiratorially.
"That's probably going to need stitches," George muttered.
Robby whispered, "Dad, I don't like this. I'm scared. These people are getting… well, mean."
"I know." George looked around at them, snapping at one another and arguing. He tried to make out what they were saying.
" – should've listened to the pastor."
"I've been a Christian all my life, I don't need some lunatic telling me -"
" – say we just go over there and bring them out."
"Hey, I've got a can of Kerosene in the garage," Weyland said, "we can take it over there, empty it on her house and -
" – but what about all the others in the house with -"
"Fuck 'em if they want to be with her. What was that the old guy said? Something about wearing the armor of righteousness? Well, there's nothing righteous about anybody who wants to be with her!"
"My god," George breathed, closing his eyes. "This is insane, completely insane."
"Dad, what should we do?" Robby hissed. "Mom's in there, and these people are talking about burning the place down!"
George turned to the pastor, who was trying to sit up. He took a handkerchief from his back pocket and handed it to Quillerman, then asked, "You gonna be okay, Pastor?"
Quillerman nodded and waved him away with one shaky hand while pressing the handkerchief to his bleeding nose with the other.
George stood and looked around until he spotted Jen. She was standing in the middle of the street, staring at Lorelle's house. Quiet sobs shook her shoulders. George gripped Robby's arm and said, "I want you to get your sister, go into the house and wait there, okay?"
Robby nodded.
"Don't come out unless I call you and don't let anyone else but me into the house, got it?"
Another nod.
George patted Robby's back and the boy hurried to his sister and led her out of the street toward the house. Once they were inside, George looked around again, this time looking for nothing in particular… except, perhaps, for something to say to them, something that might get through to them. He spotted Alana and got an idea.
After jumping up on the pickup's hood, George shouted. "Hey, everybody, listen to me."
Silence. Shadowed faces looked up at him.
"What you're thinking of doing," he said, "is wrong. I understand how you feel, but it won't work. See these people over here?" He pointed at Alana and Will. "Well, they're reporters and they've got a television camera. If you torch that house with these people inside, it'll be on videotape. You’ll be on videotape.”
Alana stepped forward and said loudly, "The camera is rolling now. We have all of this on tape. Would anyone care to comment?"
There was a sudden stir as Mrs. LaBianco plowed through the crowd growling, "Aaarre yooouu stiilll heeere?" She shot out of the crowd with both enormous, flabby arms outstretched and -
– Alana screamed as Mrs. LaBianco threw herself on her and -
– that was the beginning of the bloodshed.