He watched a neighbor go outside to get the newspaper, and that, perhaps, was the last act of normalcy Sunday on Royal Drive, where, 12 hours later, a coroner's van pulled away with the bodies of Mannon's neighbors, Mike and Cathryn Borden.

Neighbors are close in Oak Hill Perch, a Lititz-area neighborhood of about 40 homes where women meet monthly for a game night and families gather each fall for a party and each winter for a progressive dinner.

Sunday, neighbors huddled in yards as news crews arrived and police cordoned off the area around the Bordens' home. They helped each other piece together the story of what happened early Sunday morning after two of the Bordens' five children ran from their home to neighbors' homes for safety.

Jim Burkholder, who lives across the street from the Bordens, called several neighbors when he saw a police vehicle parked outside with a shotgun pointed at the Bordens' home. The barking of his Lab-mix, Max, gave the first indication that something was wrong Sunday morning, Burkholder said, as he prepared to welcome guests for his granddaughters' first birthday party.

Jennifer Stewart, a neighbor, stood in Burkholder's driveway, talking of her "really close neighborhood," where people take care of each other's dogs when they're on vacation.

"We all kind of look out for each other -- didn't think we had to to this degree," she said.

The story circulating among neighbors Sunday was that 14-year-old Kara Borden had told her parents she was going to a sleepover party Saturday night. But when she was dropped off Sunday morning by 18-year-old David Ludwig, her parents awoke and Ludwig was summoned back to the house.

The neighbors heard that when Ludwig arrived to talk, Michael Borden told him to leave outside weapons he had with him.

Then things went terribly wrong. Shooting ensued. Nine-year-old David Borden tried to escape from a side window of the home, neighbors heard, before running past his father's body in the foyer and out the front door to the neighbor's house across the street, where a boy his age lives.

The boy's father already had left for church, but his mother let David inside and called 911.

Their 15-year-old daughter, Katelyn, also ran to a neighbor's house. Police believe Kara left with the shooter. (Two of the Bordens' five children are grown and live out of state.)

Later, neighbors said, police retrieved the Bordens' dog from the house and took it to the children, who were with friends of the family.

Tom and Kim Mannon would learn Sunday that the shooter was a boy who was a lifeguard at Lititz Rec Center along with their 16-year-old daughter, Stephanie. They had substituted for one another and been friendly until Ludwig left the job this summer to work at Circuit City, Stephanie said.

"He was dedicated to saving people's lives. I mean, that was his job; then this happened," Stephanie said. "I never would have expected this ever. I knew they both kind of liked each other, but I knew both their parents didn't allow them to date each other."

Stephanie said Kara and Ludwig met through a homeschoolers group.

"He was a Christian and pretty strong about that," she said.

Ludwig has an outgoing personality and is into music, Stephanie said. Some neighbors said Ludwig often wore black and had a "goth" look.

Several neighbors said the Bordens were committed to their church, Monterey Chapel, near Leola, where Michael Borden was an elder.

David Sheaffer, another church elder reached by phone Sunday night, said the church had been in touch with the family.

"The two children are safe, and we pray that Kara is still well and safe," he said. "We've made contact with (family members) and let them know we'll be there to help for whatever they need us for."

Blinds at all of the second-floor windows of the large, relatively new house were askew. One pane of glass was broken, and the home's two garage doors were part way open. All of this was evidently done to clear the house of the tear gas police SERT teams were said to have fired into it when they first arrived on the scene Sunday morning, on the assumption the suspect was still inside.

That same fear caused police to urge people first to stay indoors, then seek protection in their basements.

As police continued to work into the night under the harsh glare of lights from TV news trucks, the bodies remained in the house. Then the electric candles in several windows of the Borden home came on, adding an eeriness to the already tragic scene.

Around 5:30 p.m., Lititz and Warwick Township police were issued a search warrant for Ludwig's home at 422 W. Orange St., Lititz. About 15 minutes later, two carloads of officers rolled up the long gravel driveway to the home. There, out of sight behind trees, using police car headlights, officers entered the home to conduct the search.

Neighbors living to either side of the Ludwigs reacted with shock at what had happened.

One neighbor, who preferred not to be identified, said the Ludwigs were a "churchgoing" family." He did not know David Ludwig well, but said he seemed quiet and was often seen helping his father do yard work.

"Such a tragedy for both families," he said.

Ann Hoellgobler, of 424 W. Orange St., said the Ludwigs were a quiet family who kept to themselves and were never a problem.

Hoellgobler, who moved to Lititz three years ago from New York City, was stunned by a second incidence of gun violence in the quiet town in one week.

"I moved here from New York to get away from that," she said.

Intell reporter Susan Lindt contributed to this story.