** spoiler alert ** While I may have read this short story some time ago, I was reintroduced to it recently and I found it to be wonderfully scary.

The narrator arrives at the House of Usher to comfort his sick friend, Roderick, who has all sorts of diseases. Roderick also has a twin sister, Madeline, who is also ill. Madeline later dies (or so we think) and is entombed in a vault in the house before she can be buried. Things are rather uneasy around the house until a dark and stormy night when sounds are heard. Low and behold it is the sister who was entombed alive and she is standing right in the doorway. She dies, the brother is so scared that he dies and the narrator does the only reasonable thing and flees the house as soon as possible. He looks back while he is running to reveal the house broken in two by a bolt of lighting.

This might all sound a bit passé and formulaic now, but I bet it was pretty darn scary back in the day. Heck, I am glad I read it during the day even now.