The Story of an Hour

Mrs. Mallard had a weak heart, so her sister broke the news to her as gently as she could.There had been a train accident, and her husband, Brently, was among those who had died.

She began to cry at once, with sudden, wild sadness, in her sister’s arms.Then she went up to her room alone and asked everyone not to follow her.

She sank into a wide armchair in front of the open window.Outside, the tops of the trees were bright with new spring leaves, and the air smelled of rain.Here and there, patches of blue sky showed between the clouds.

As she sat there, a strange feeling came slowly toward her, and at first she was afraid of it.Then she stopped fighting it, and one word broke softly from her lips: “Free.”She saw a long line of years ahead that would belong to her alone.

She had loved her husband — sometimes. Often she had not.But that seemed small now beside this new sense of freedom.Her sister knelt outside the locked door and begged her to come out.

At last she opened the door, her eyes bright, and walked downstairs with her sister.Just then the front door opened, and Brently walked in, alive and well.He had been nowhere near the accident and had not even heard of it.Mrs. Mallard gave a sudden cry and fell. The doctors said her weak heart had stopped — killed, they said, by a joy too great to bear.