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Emily's father dies, but she refuses to acknowledge his death and denies the doctor and townspeople entry to collect the body for three days.
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Colonel Sartoris invents an excuse for Miss Emily to no longer have to pay taxes because the town feels sorry for her after her father's death.
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Homer Barron, a construction foreman, comes to town and he and Miss Emily are seen riding around town together. This causes gossip because Homer Barron has admitted openly that he is not the marrying kind.
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The townspeople, nosy and "worried" about Emily's reputation, call for Emily's cousins to come visit her.
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Miss Emily bullies the pharmacist into supplying her with arsenic without giving him a reason why. The town assumes she will use it to commit suicide, and they think it's for the best, since she can't have Homer.
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Emily purchases a set of clothes and a silver toilet set engraved with "HB," Homer's initials. The town assumes Emily has convinced him to marry her.
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Homer leaves town. The townspeople assume he has gone to prepare to marry Miss Emily.
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Satisfied that they have protected her honor, the cousins leave. The town is glad because they were more stuck-up than Emily.
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Homer is seen entering Miss Emily's home one evening. He is never seen again. The town assumes Miss Emily has been abandoned and feel bad for her.
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A horrible smell begins to come from Miss Emily's house. Too polite to confront her about it, the town puts down lime and leaves her alone.
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Miss Emily, who no longer goes out, gives china painting lessons in her home. Her hair has grown grayer and grayer.
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The younger generation has risen to power and makes a visit to Miss Emily's house in order to get her to start paying her taxes again. Miss Emily bullies them into leaving.
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Miss Emily dies and the whole town comes to pay respects and snoop around her house.
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The town breaks into a room that had been shut up. They find the toilet set and clothes, a decomposing body in the bed that looks like it is embracing something, and, in the dent of the pillow next to the body, an iron-gray hair.
