1) The narrator visits the house of his friend Roderick Usher, who lives in a dark, mysterious house surrounded by rotting trees and murky ponds. 2) Roderick's sister Madeline has fallen ill with a mysterious sickness and eventually dies. Roderick has her body buried in the tombs below the house. 3) After burying Madeline, the narrator realizes Roderick and Madeline were twins. Roderick then shows the narrator a bright gas surrounding the house, which he believes makes the house haunted. The story uses Gothic elements like the gloomy house and landscape to portray the house as becoming "The Haunted Palace."