Vault of Horror #24

In the chilling tale "...And All Through the House...", a woman returns to her home after a violent act, her husband Joseph lying dead with a fireplace poker nearby. As she tries to clean up, her young daughter Carol asks about Santa, and she lies to soothe her—only to hear a knock at the door. Outside stands a figure in a Santa suit, matching a radio report of a killer on the loose, dressed as the jolly man. With her husband’s body hidden and no way to call for help, she locks every exit, barricades the windows, and frantically searches for her daughter—only to find Carol missing, and then, in horror, standing by the door, having just let Santa in.

In "Beauty Rest," the Vault-Keeper introduces a chilling tale of deception and macabre consequence. When Helen tricks her roommate Joyce into taking sleeping pills so she can impersonate her in the bizarre "Miss Corpse of 1954" contest, she doesn’t realize the prize demands a very specific kind of winner—someone already dead. Her plan unravels when she discovers too late that the contest’s true nature is far more sinister than she imagined.

In "Shoe-Button Eyes!", a grieving boy’s Christmas miracle takes a dark turn when his stepfather’s cruelty pushes him to the brink. After his mother’s death, the boy finds a strange new sight—only to realize the truth behind the eyes he now sees. The Old Witch recounts this haunting tale of loss, mistaken identity, and the price of seeing too clearly.