THE WAY UP TO HEAVEN- The story is about a rich lady named Mrs.

Foster, who has

an "almost pathological fear of missing a train, a plane, a boat, or even a theatre curtain".
She is planning to fly to visit her daughter and grandchildren in Paris. Her husband, Mr.
Eugene Foster, a retired businessman, seems to enjoy taking his time while preparing for
this event, which distresses Mrs. Foster tremendously. Her husband intends to stay at a
club while she is away, and their servants are given six weeks off. The next day Mrs.
Foster is terrified she will be late, and expresses her worries to the butler, Walker, who
assures her that she will make her flight. She arrives at the airport on time and soon finds
that flights have been delayed because of bad weather. The taxi she arrived in has already
left, and she continues to wait in the airport for further news concerning her trip. Finally, it
is announced that her flight has been delayed until 11 am the following day. She calls her
husband, returns home and spends the night there. The following morning as Mrs. Foster
prepares to take the taxi to the airport, her husband announces that he wants to be
dropped off at the club on the way, which terrifies her, as the club is out-of-the-way. Before
they leave, he pretends to have forgotten a present he had intended for their daughter
Ellen, and to Mrs. Foster's despair he goes into the house in search of it. As she grows
increasingly impatient and anxious while waiting in the car, she notices the present –a
comb– hiding in the crack of the seat where her husband had been sitting and "couldn't
help noticing that it was wedged down firm and deep, as though with the help of a pushing
hand ". So she tells the chauffeur to go and tell him to come back. The chauffeur tries to
enter and notices the door is locked. She decides to go herself, but then, having already
put the key in the lock she suddenly freezes, as if listening intently. After a few seconds,
she returns to the car, says there is no time, and is driven off to the airport. She makes her
flight with a few minutes to spare. Things go well in Paris, and she writes to her husband
each Tuesday. When she returns from Paris, she is mildly surprised to find her husband
has not sent a car to meet her, but she gets into a taxi, arrives home, rings the bell but
there is no answer. She sees the mail has built up behind the door and smells a peculiar
odour. Noticing that the elevator is out of order, she calmly dials for a repairman and waits
at her husband's desk for his arrival. The implication is that Mr. Foster was stuck in the
elevator, and that despite hearing him begging for help, Mrs. Foster condemned him to
death by leaving as the house was going to be unoccupied for six weeks. She could have
waited or went to the house but rather she would be in time for her flight.

Character analysis: Mrs. Foster is neurotic about being on time for things. When her
husband gets stuck in the elevator at their home, Mrs. Foster leaves him there while she
goes on her six-week trip.

Mr. Foster likes to torment his wife by forcing her to be late. He is a cruel guy.

Climax: One of the main turning points is the moment when Mrs.Foster freezes at the front
door to listen to a sound which is coming from the house. The other one is when the
reader realizes that the elevator is stuck and Mr. Foster has been there for six weeks,
which the reader only learns at the very end of the story (a typical device of short stories,
especially those with an unexpected ending).Symbols: The elevator, which takes Mr.
Foster up, not only to the 3rd floor, but also to Heaven. Mr. Foster dies there precisely, in
the elevator.

THE GIFT OF THE MAGI is a well-known short story by American short story writer O.
Henry, the pen name of William Sydney Porter. The story first appeared in The New York
Sunday World on December 10, 1905 and was later published in O. Henry's collection The
Four Million on April 10, 1906.

The story tells of a young married couple, James, known as Jim, and Della Dillingham.
The couple has very little money and lives in a modest apartment. Between them, they
have only two possessions that they consider their treasures: Jim's gold pocket watch that
belonged to his father and his grandfather, and Della's lustrous, long hair that falls almost
to her knees.

It's Christmas Eve, and Della finds herself running out of time to buy Jim a Christmas
present. After paying all of the bills, all Della has left is $1.87 to put toward Jim's Christmas
present. Desperate to find him the perfect gift, out she goes into the cold December day,
looking in shop windows for something she can afford.

She wants to buy Jim a chain for his pocket watch, but they're all out of her price range.
Rushing home, Della pulls down her beautiful hair and stands in front of the mirror,
admiring it and thinking. After a sudden inspiration, she rushes out again and has her hair
cut to sell. Della receives $20.00 for selling her hair, just enough to buy the platinum chain
she saw in a shop window for $21.00.

When Jim comes home from work, he stares at Della, trying to figure out what's different
about her. She admits that she sold her hair to buy his present. Before she can give it to
him, however, Jim casually pulls a package out of his overcoat pocket and hands it to her.
Inside, Della finds a pair of costly decorative hair combs that she'd long admired, but are
now completely useless since she's cut off her hair. Hiding her tears, she jumps up and
holds out her gift for Jim: the watch chain. Jim shrugs, flops down onto the old sofa, puts
his hands behind his head and tells Della flatly that he sold his watch to buy her combs.

The story ends with a comparison of Jim and Della's gifts to the gifts that the Magi, or three
wise men, gave to Baby Jesus in the manger in the biblical story of Christmas. The
narrator concludes that Jim and Della are far wiser than the Magi because their gifts are
gifts of love, and those who give out of love and self-sacrifice are truly wise because they
know the value of self-giving love.