The Devil And Tom Walker Summary

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In the story “The Devil and Tom Walker” by Washington Irving, it starts off with an old local legend about treasure buried by a pirate Captain Kidd in a swamp. Near this swamp lives a man named Tom Walker and his wife. These two were so greedy and that they even try to cheat each other and are constantly fighting. One day, going through the swamp, Tom comes across the remains of an old Indian place and discovers a skull and a tomahawk beside it. Tom kicks the skull, then hears a voice and looks up and sees a black man that sat upon a stump. He wore a red sash around his body and had a coal looking face, as if he working in some sort of fiery place. Tom recognized him to be the devil, Old Scratch. The devil confirms Kidd’s story about the buried treasure and offers it to Tom, but there is one condition, that the devil will have his soul. Old Scratch proves his identity and leaves the imprint of his finger on Tom’s forehead. …show more content…
Tom not wanting to change his mind, his wife goes and makes her own deal with the devil and wanting to keep the profits for herself. After Tom’s wife left with some of the household valuables, she did not come back for several days. Tom, uneasy for his valuables, he searches for her. After a long search Tom thinks that he then found all of the household valuables she took, opened up the apron and only found a heart and a liver. Supposedly the wife had died trying to make the deal that the devil that he gave Tom. Tom was relieved that his wife was now