Prologue; Chapters 1-5 Summary

Prologue:

"On Sorry Night, just a few days before Christmas, you have to snuff the lamps, douse the flames in the fireplace, and spend the night in the cold and dark. If you don't, the Vours will get you." Prologue, p. 1

The author says that he saw the Vours one night as a child and has lived in fear ever since. The author's father had come into the house with empty and cold eyes, the look he often got when he drank. The cows had not been put in the barn and someone Would have to be punished. Jeremiah was the target. The man puts Jeremiah up on the scarecrow pole ordering him to scare with the crows even though Jeremiah states that it is winter and there is no corn. The girl cries for her ten-year-old brother. Jeremiah...