THE STORY OF AN HOUR

Mrs. Mallard has a heart condition, which means that if she's startled she could die. One
day, Mr. Mallard's friend, Richards, learns that Mr. Mallard has died in a railroad disaster.
Mrs. Mallard's sister Josephine tries to break the news to Mrs. Mallard softly because of her
heart condition.
Upon hearing the news, Mrs. Mallard begins weeping. Mrs. Mallard soon locks herself in a
room. Mrs. Mallard knows that she will mourn her loving husband's death, but she also
predicts many years of freedom, which she welcomes.
Outside the locked door to the room, her sister Josephine is pleading to her to open up and
let her in. Finally, she goes to her sister and they go downstairs. Suddenly, the door opens
and Mr. Mallard comes in. She shocks and immediately faints. Later, the medical people diagnose
she has died from "heart disease," of that joy that kills.


THE LOTTERY
Mr. Summers runs the lottery. He arrives in the square with the black box, followed by Mr.
Graves. Mr. Summers mixes up the slips of paper in the box. Before the lottery can begin,
they make a list of all the families and households in the village.
Tessie Hutchinson joins the crowd, flustered because she had forgotten that today was the
day of the lottery. Mr. Summers reminds everyone about the lotterys rules: hell read
names, and the family heads come up and draw a slip of paper. No one should look at the
paper until everyone has drawn. He calls all the names, greeting each person as they come
up to draw a paper. Mr. Summers finishes calling names, and everyone opens his or her
papers. Word quickly gets around that Bill Hutchinson has got it. Tessie argues that it wasnt
fair because Bill didnt have enough time to select a paper. Mr. Summers asks whether there
are any other households in the Hutchinson family, and Bill says no, because his married
daughter draws with her husbands family.
Mr. Graves dump the papers out of the box into the ground and then puts five papers in for
the Hutchinsons. As Mr. Summers calls their names, each member of the family comes up
and draws a paper. When they open their slips, they find that Tessie has drawn the paper
with the black dot on it. Mr. Summers instructs everyone to hurry up. The villagers grab
stones and run toward Tessie, who stands in a clearing in the middle of the crowd. Tessie
says its not fair and is hit in the head with a stone. Everyone begins throwing stones at her.

THE TELL-TALE HEART
Lorre goes to the old man's room every night, for seven days. Each night he opens the man's
door and puts in a lantern. Each night the old man doesn't open his eye, so Lorre feels that
he can't kill him.
On the eighth night, the old man wakes up as he peers his head into the room. The man
cries out wondering who is there, but Lorre does not respond. Instead, he stands in the
shadows of the dark room where the old man cant see him and waits there for a while. He
still does not kill him until he hears the loud beating of the old mans heart, growing louder
and louder by the minute. Fearing that one of the neighbors will hear the heartbeat, he
leaps forward and drags the man to the floor. He then throws the heavy bed over him,
waiting until the muffled heartbeat stops. He hides the corpse of the man in the
floorboards of the bedroom chamber.
Then three policemen come and knock at the door. They explain that they are there
because a neighbor called after hearing a loud shriek. The man tells them that it was simply
his shriek in a dream, and that the old man is out of town. He invited the police in, and even
leads them right up to the bedroom chamber. While chatting with the police, he begins to
hear the thumping sound of the old mans heart. Thinking that they must hear it too and
know his guilt, he confesses his murderous deed and stating that the sound is coming from
the old man's heart.

THE GIFT OF THE MAGI
Jim and Della lived in a shabby flat. She wants to buy a gift for her beloved husband, Jim,
because the next day was Christmas. She decided to sell her hair to buy Jim a gift. She left
the flat and walked to Madame Sofronies hair goods store, where she sells her hair. Then,
she searched all the stores for the perfect gift and finally found a beautiful platinum chain
that would be perfect for watching Jim.
When Jim arrived home from work he looked shocked at her appearance. She jumped on
the moment to tell him how fast her hair grows and that she had sold it to buy him a
beautiful gift. Jim told her that he would always love her but that she might want to look at
her present to understand why she had startled him. She opened her present to discover
that he had bought her a set of beautiful combs that she had long coveted.
Her sadness quickly turned to joy when she showed Jim the fabulous chain she had bought
for him. He took the chain and tumbled onto the couch. He smiled and told her that he had
sold the watch in order to buy the combs for her.