The novel opens with Hester being led to the scaffold where she is to be publicly shamed for having committed adultery. Hester is forced to wear the letter "A" on her gown at all times, showing to all who see her that she had an affair. The scarlet “A” that she wears on her chest is stitched with gold, making the mark very prominent in a town of poverty.  Hester carries Pearl, her daughter, with her. When asked who the father is she refuses to answer, and which only brings more shame to herself.  Looking off into the crowd, she spots her husband, who was supposedly in Amsterdam, Roger Chillingworth. 
    Chillingworth visits Hester after she is returned to the prison.  He swears to her that he will find the identity of the man who put her there, and bring him to justice. Then he forces her to swear to secrecy of his true identity.
    After her sentence is served, Hester decides to still live in the town, she moves to a small cottage bordering the woods.  Hester earns money by doing magnificent stitchwork for local dignitaries.  Pearl grows up in solitude, and is often thought to be involved with witchcraft.
    Chillingworth gets transferred into the same home as Arthur Dimmesdale, and ailing minister.  Chillingworth eventually discovers that Dimmesdale is the true father of Pearl. When he discovers this, Chillingworth tries everything in his power to make the minister miserable.
    One night Dimmesdale becomes so ashamed of his secret, that he goes to the scaffold where Hester was publicly humiliated.  He imagines what Hester must have gone through with the whole town looking at her.  As he is standing there, Pearl and Hester arrive.  He asks them to stand with him.  Pearl then asks him to stand with her the next day at noon.  
    Suddenly a meteor lights the sky, and illuminates the three people standing on the scaffold.  Chillingworth is standing in the square watching them.  Dimmesdale then confides to Hester that he is afraid of Chillingworth; Hester offers to walk him home.  Hester begins to realize that Chillingworth is slowly killing Dimmesdale, and that she must do something about it, or he will surly die.
    A few weeks later Hester spots Chillingworth in the woods and tells him that she is going to reveal to the town that he is truly her husband, and that he is plotting to kill Dimmesdale.  She tells him that their fate is now in the hands of the town. 
    Hester then takes Pearl into the woods and they wait for Dimmesdale.  When he arrives, she tells him Chillingworth’s true identity.  He is furious, but is soon convinced by Hester that they should run away together. They both return to the town.
    The day after Dimmesdale is scheduled to give his Election Sermon, Hester arranges for a ship to carry all three of them out of town.  Yet unbeknownst to Dimmesdale and Hester, Chillingworth arranges passage on the same ship with the captain.  Hester soon finds out, and doesn’t know what to do. 
    After Dimmesdale has completed his Election Sermon, he moves across the square to the scaffold.  He calls up Hester and Pearl, with Chillingworth helpless to stop it.  
He tells the people that he is also a sinner like Hester, and that he should have assumed his rightful place beside her seven years earlier, when she was given her punishment.  Dimmesdale then rips open his shirt to reveal a scarlet letter on his flesh.  He falls to his knees and dies while still on the scaffold.
    Hester and Pearl leave the town for a while, and several years later Hester returns. No one hears from Pearl again, but it is assumed that she gets married and has children in Europe. Hester never removed her scarlet letter, and when she passes away she is buried in Kings' Chapel.

Bibliography:
http://www.gradesaver.com/ClassicNotes/Titles/thescarletletter/shortsumm.html