In the beginning of the story,  we hear of a man scheming to kill another elderly man for the mere fact that on of his eyes is kind of creepy. The main character sneaks into the old mans house at midnight for the whole week before the planned murder. Also, each night he took a lantern with him to check to see if the man's "vulture eye was open". On the eight night he breaks into the old man's house again, except this time he hears him and wakes up. neither of them move, they sit there for an hour, and the main character finally decides to open the lanter just enough for a ray of light to shine of the "vulture eye". The whole time it is so quiet, the main character claims he can hear the old man's heart beating. Finally, he leaps from the doorway and kills the old man, who only manages to get one quick yelp out before he is dead. He then dismembers the body and puts the parts under the floorboards. Then there is a knock on the door and the main character goes to the door. He feels he has nothing to fear, his work is already done. He invites them in and after talking for a while, he hears an ticking noise which seems to be getting louder but only he seems to hear it, the officers are oblivious. He finally cracks, ad tells the officers what he has done, and tells them to tear up the floorboards to find the man still alive. I think he might not have actually been alive ut it was his own conscience that was eating away at him as he and the officers talked.