title: The Tell-Tale Heart
author: Edgar Allan Poe
published: 1843
first line: TRUE! - nervous - very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?
The Tell-Tale Heart is the first story I read by Edgar Allen Poe when I was in high school, and it is still a favorite of mine. If you have never read Poe, I suggest starting with this one.
In this short story, the narrator tells about an old man that he decides to kill. The only reason being was that the old man had a creepy white eye.
After several nights of creeping into his room and watching the old man sleep, the narrator finally attacks and kills him. As he kills him, he thinks he can hear his heart beating loudly. He then dismembers the body and buries it underneath the floorboards.
The neighbors hear the old mans screams and call the police. When the police arrive at the front door, the narrator tells them that the screams the neighbors heard were his own and that the old man is out of town.
The narrator thinks he has the policemen fooled and he sits right above the floorboards where he hid the body. However, he beings to hear a sound, the beating of the old mans heart. When he feels he can't take it anymore and that the policemen can hear it too, he begins tearing at the flooboards and admits to his crime.
Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror. It was not a groan of pain or of grief - oh, no! - it was the low stifled sound that arises from the bottom of the soul when overcharged with awe. I knew the sound well. Many a night, just at midnight, when all the world slept, it has welled up from my own bosom, deepening, with its dreadful echo, the terrors that distracted me. I say I knew it well.
Read Poe's works for free here.
This read has been part of R.eaders I.mbibing P.eril…IV
