Student Question
Where was the narrator when he heard the noise in "The Night the Ghost Got In"?
Quick answer:
In "The Night the Ghost Got In," the narrator hears the noise of footsteps circling the dining room table while he is in the upstairs bathroom. He has just exited the bathtub and is drying himself with a towel. Despite the bathroom light illuminating the stairs, he cannot see the table downstairs. The story unfolds with comedic chaos, involving the police and the narrator's family, but ultimately no evidence of an intruder is found.
The comic short story "The Night the Ghost Got In" by James Thurber is part of his collection My Life and Hard Times. It is an exaggerated account of an incident that took place in his youth.
One night, he hears noises downstairs and alerts the household. Afterwards, his mother throws a shoe through the neighbor's window, the police arrive, and they search the house. One of them even gets shot by the narrator's grandfather. In the end, nobody can find any evidence that anyone was ever there at all.
When the narrator first hears the noise of footsteps circling the dining room table downstairs, he is in the upstairs bathroom. He has just stepped out of the bathtub and is drying himself with a towel. Although the light from the bathroom shines down the steps, he can't see the table.
As he goes to get his brother Herman, he has only a bath towel around his waist. In fact, he remains naked except for the bath towel until the police arrive, which is when he pulls on some trousers and then puts on one of his mother's blouses.
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