Part IV, Chapter 20 Summary

It is a night in January 1979, and through the peephole Robert watches as several men in dark suits and carrying spotlights emerge from dark cars and brutally kill seven vampires with guns, pick axes, and pikes. He surmises the killers are members of the new society. He has decided not to fight them when they come for him. Robert feels more sympathy toward the vampires than he does toward their killers, and he is worried that the new vampires may hunt down and kill Ben Cortman. He looks at the house across the street and as he watches Ben crawling on a roof to escape the gunfire, Ben's body is riddled with bullets from a machine gun. Robert's eyes fill with tears as he witnesses "the end of Oliver Hardy" and "the death of all comedy and all laughter...