Once Mr. White has gotten possession of the monkey's paw and their visitor Sergeant-Major Morris has left the family to themselves, the old man feels tempted to make a wish.
"I don't know what to wish for, and that's a fact," he said, slowly. "It seems to me I've got all I want."
"If you only cleared the house, you'd be quite happy, wouldn't you?" said Herbert, with his hand on his shoulder. "Well, wish for two hundred pounds, then; that 'll just do it."
When the man from Maw and Meggins appears next morning to inform the Whites of the accidental death of Herbert at the textile mill, it comes as a shock, not only that the company is compensating them for their son's death with the exact amount Mr. White had wished for, but because it was Herbert who had suggested that sum himself. Herbert's mother shrieks because it seems to her that they are being paid the money through the magical power of the monkey's paw. She is beginning to understand--though too late--why Sergeant-Major Morris had such a dread of the thing. Her husband does not hear her shriek as he too reacts with horror to the visitor's answer to his question, "How much?"
"Two hundred pounds," was the answer.
Unconscious of his wife's shriek, the old man smiled faintly, put out his hands like a sightless man, and dropped, a senseless heap, to the floor.
Early in Part II, the author W. W. Jacobs had established that when people's wishes appeared to be granted by the monkey's paw, the outcome could always be interpreted as a coincidence.
"Morris said the things happened so naturally," said his father, "that you might if you so wished attribute it to coincidence."
It could certainly be seen as a coincidence that Herbert would be killed in an industrial accident the very morning after his father had wished for the two hundred pounds. The men had stayed up late the night before because of their visitor, who did not leave until he had to catch the last train. Morris drank a lot of their whiskey, and Herbert and his father undoubtedly drank more with him than they were accustomed to. That would mean that Herbert would be tired and hung-over when he went to work. Understandably, he could be slow, sluggish, and less attentive. He was caught and pulled in by the machinery. The fact that the company paid two hundred pounds as compensation was not unusually low considering that they disclaimed any responsibility for the accident. In other words, the exact same thing could have happened if there had never been a monkey's paw involved. Herbert would have stayed up late, gotten inadequate sleep, gone to work with a hangover, and gotten mangled in the machinery. The person who comes knocking at the door in the middle of the night may be a complete stranger and not the horrible monster the reader visualizes. And the fact that the knocking ceases in immediate response to Mr. White's third and last wish may only be another coincidence. The stranger gives up and leaves just before Mrs. White opens the door. The effect achieved by the story would best be described as "uncanny" and not "horror."
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