After Twenty Years Short story by O. Henry : A Summary

 

Jimmy Wells and Bob were both brought up in New York and were close friends. One day Bob decided to go to the West to make a fortune. The previous day the two friends--Jimmy and Bob-met at 10 O’clock at night in a restaurant called “Big Joe” and decided that they would meet at the same place exactly twenty years from that day and time-- no matter what their conditions might be or from where they might have to come.

The story begins when Bob-after twenty years came to the spot where “Big Joe” used to be and waited anxiously for his friend, Jim. A policeman on his beat met Bob there and was told by the latter about the appointment made twenty years before. While talking to the policeman, Bob mentioned that he had become rich in the West and he wondered whether Jimmy did half as well. The policeman proceeded on his beat. After Jimmy had waited for another twenty minutes for his friend, a tall man in an overcoat came directly to Bob and told him that he was Jimmy. Looking for a place to sit and talk, the two men started walking up the street. When they reached a drug store, Bob-in the glare of electric lights-found that the other person was not Jimmy.

The story reaches a climax or a point of revelation when the other person revealed his identity as a policeman and informed Bob that he was there to arrest Bob, the gangster-who was wanted by the Chicago police. This revelation is followed by another revelation when Bob, from the little piece of paper handed over to him, comes to know that the patrolman whom he had met first at the appointed place was Jimmy, who had come to keep the appointment. But recognizing his old friend Bob as gangster wanted by the police, Jimmy did not have the heart to arrest him. Nor could he let him go. So he sent yet another police man to do the job. With this revelation the story ends.