Skip to content

The Tell-Tale Heart

Ch. 1 · The Vulture Eye

Adapted from The Tell­Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe public domain

The narrator confesses from the dark of the old house, insisting on his sanity.
  1. Narration: TRUE! — nervous — very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad?
  2. Narration: Hearken! and observe how healthily — how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
  3. Narration: Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth.
The old man introduced; his vulture eye.
  1. Narration: I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. For his gold I had no desire.
  2. Narration: I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye for ever.
Midnight; the narrator creeps to the old man's door.
  1. Narration: I was never kinder to the old man than during the whole week before I killed him.
  2. Narration: And every night, about midnight, I turned the latch of his door and opened it — oh, so gently!
From inside the chamber: the narrator inches his lantern and head through the door.
  1. Narration: I put in a dark lantern, all closed, closed, so that no light shone out, and then I thrust in my head.
  2. Narration: It took me an hour to place my whole head within the opening. Ha! — would a madman have been so wise as this?
He opens the shutter a crack; the ray lands on the shut eye.
  1. Narration: I undid it just so much that a single thin ray fell upon the vulture eye.
  2. Narration: For it was not the old man who vexed me, but his Evil Eye.
  3. Narration: And this I did for seven long nights — but I found the eye always closed.
Morning; the narrator greets the old man heartily.
  1. Narration: Every morning I went boldly into the chamber, calling him by name in a hearty tone.
  2. Narration: He would have been a very profound old man, indeed, to suspect that every night, just at twelve, I looked in upon him.
The eighth night; he chuckles in triumph; the old man moves.
  1. Caption: Upon the eighth night.
  2. Narration: I fairly chuckled at the idea; and perhaps he heard me;
  3. Narration: for he moved on the bed suddenly, as if startled.
The thumb slips; the old man sits up.
  1. Narration: My thumb slipped upon the tin fastening,
  2. The Old Man: Who's there?
An hour of stillness; the old man groans in terror.
  1. Narration: For a whole hour I did not move a muscle.
  2. Narration: He was still sitting up in the bed listening.
  3. Narration: Presently I heard a slight groan, and I knew it was the groan of mortal terror.
The ray finds the eye wide open.
  1. Narration: It was open — wide, wide open — and I grew furious as I gazed upon it.
  2. Narration: All a dull blue, with a hideous veil over it that chilled the very marrow in my bones.
He hears the heart; it grows louder.
  1. Narration: There came to my ears a low, dull, quick sound. It was the beating of the old man's heart.
  2. Narration: It grew quicker and quicker, and louder and louder every instant.
  3. Narration: The sound would be heard by a neighbor! The old man's hour had come!
The old man's chamber at midnight, lit only by the lantern now thrown fully open. Until now the narrator stood frozen in the doorway at left, holding a single ray on the old man's eye. Now he yells and leaps from the door at left toward the
  1. Narration: With a loud yell, I threw open the lantern and leaped into the room.
  2. Narration: He shrieked once — once only.
  3. Narration: In an instant I dragged him to the floor, and pulled the heavy bed over him.
The heart ceases; he confirms death.
  1. Narration: At length it ceased. The old man was dead.
  2. Narration: There was no pulsation. He was stone dead. His eye would trouble me no more.
Concealment beneath the planks.
  1. Narration: I then took up three planks from the flooring of the chamber, and deposited all between the scantlings.
  2. Narration: No human eye — not even his — could have detected anything wrong. A tub had caught all — ha! ha!
Four o'clock; the officers arrive.
  1. Narration: It was four o'clock — still dark as midnight.
  2. Narration: There entered three men, who introduced themselves, with perfect suavity, as officers of the police.
In the old man's chamber by candlelight, the narrator, at left, explains away the shriek to the three officers at right, shows them the old man's treasures and seats himself over the hidden corpse.
  1. Narration: The shriek, I said, was my own in a dream. The old man, I mentioned, was absent in the country.
  2. Narration: I placed my own seat upon the very spot beneath which reposed the corpse of the victim.
The sound grows; he raves.
  1. Narration: It was a low, dull, quick sound — much such a sound as a watch makes when enveloped in cotton.
  2. Narration: I swung the chair and grated it upon the boards, but the noise arose over all.
  3. Narration: They heard! — they suspected! — they knew!
The confession.
  1. Narration: Villains! dissemble no more!
  2. Narration: — it is the beating of his hideous heart!
  3. Narration: I admit the deed! — tear up the planks! — here, here!

End of Chapter 1

Adapted from The Tell­Tale Heart by Edgar Allan Poe public domain

Rate the comic

The end

That's the whole story.

Every chapter of this adaptation is out. Rate it above, or tell the creator what you thought in the comments.

Back to The Tell-Tale Heart

Got a story of your own?

This comic was drawn from a written story. Paste one you wrote, or one in the public domain, and FicPal draws Chapter 1 in about ten minutes.

Adapt a storyor describe an idea instead

Comments