Tell Tale Heart

TRUE!---- nervous---very,--- very dreadfully nervous I had been -- and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses- not destroyed - not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in heaven and on earth. I heard many things below the earth. How, then am I mad? Harken! and observe how healthily, how calmly I can tell you the …

…minutes, the heart beat on with a muffled sound. This, however, did not vex me; it would not be heard through the wall. At length it ceased. The old man was dead. I removed the bed and examined the corpse. Yes, he was stone, stone dead. I placed my hand upon the heart and held it there for many minutes. There was no pulsation. He was stone dead. His eye would trouble me no more.