Poe's "The Cask of Amontillado": Page 3

The Story

Questions and Comments

Here I knocked off the neck of a bottle which I drew from a long row of its fellows that lay upon the mould.

"Drink," I said, presenting him the wine. 3.1

He raised it to his lips with a leer 3.2. He paused and nodded to me familiarly, while his bells jingled.

"I drink," he said, "to the buried that repose around us."

"And I to your long life."

He again took my arm, and we proceeded.

"These vaults," he said, "are extensive."

"The Montresors," I replied, "were a great and numerous family." 3.3

"I forget your arms." 3.4

"A huge human foot d'or, in a field azure; the foot crushes a serpent rampant whose fangs are imbedded in the heel." 3.5

"And the motto?"

"Nemo me impune lacessit." 3.6

"Good!" he said.

The wine sparkled in his eyes and the bells jingled. My own fancy grew warm with the Medoc. We had passed through walls of piled bones, with casks and puncheons intermingling, into the inmost recesses of the catacombs 3.7. I paused again, and this time I made bold to seize Fortunato by an arm above the elbow.

"The nitre!" I said; "see, it increases. It hangs like moss upon the vaults. We are below the river's bed. The drops of moisture trickle among the bones. Come, we will go back ere it is too late. Your cough--" 3.8

"It is nothing," he said; "let us go on. But first, another draught of the Medoc."

I broke and reached him a flaçon of De Grâve. He emptied it at a breath. His eyes flashed with a fierce light 3.9. He laughed and threw the bottle upwards with a gesticulation I did not understand.

I looked at him in surprise. He repeated the movement--a grotesque one.

"You do not comprehend?" he said.

"Not I," I replied.

"Then you are not of the brotherhood."

"How?"

"You are not of the masons." 3.10

"Yes, yes," I said, "yes, yes."

"You? Impossible! A mason?" 3.11

"A mason," I replied.

"A sign," he said.

"It is this," I answered, producing a trowel from beneath the folds of my roquelaire. 3.12

"You jest," he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. "But let us proceed to the Amontillado." 3.13

"Be it so," I said, replacing the tool beneath the cloak, and again offering him my arm. He leaned upon it heavily 3.14. We continued our route in search of the Amontillado. We passed through a range of low arches, descended, passed on, and descending again, arrived at a deep crypt, in which the foulness of the air caused our flambeaux rather to glow than flame. 3.15

3.1 Why would the narrator want Fortunato to drink some of his wine?

3.2 Why might Fortunato look at the narrator "with a leer"?

3.3 What does this comment tell us about the narrator?

3.4 Fortunato is referring to the narrator's coat of arms, a symbolic depiction of ancestry and family distinctions.

3.5 How does this coat of arms relate to other aspects of the story?

3.6 "No one can injure me with impunity" (Latin)

3.7 "Puncheons" are heavy timbers. Notice the setting: the "inmost recesses" of the "extensive" catacombs.

3.8 The narrator nearly insists that Fortunato leave the catacombs. Why?

3.9 What does this description tell us about Fortunato?

3.10 Masons are members of a fraternal organization with secret rites and signs.

3.11 Fortunato finds it "impossible" to believe that the narrator is a mason. What does this fact tell us both about Fortunato and the narrator? Also, if Fortunato finds it impossible to believe that the narrator is a mason, why would Fortunato give the narrator a secret sign that only another mason would understand?

3.12 A trowel is a tool used to spread cement or mortar. (A "mason" is also someone who works with stone or brick.)

3.13 Why does Fortunato "recoil" when the narrator produces the trowel? Why do you think Fortunato does not ask, and apparently does not wonder, why the narrator is carrying a trowel beneath his cloak?

3.14 What does Fortunato's leaning "heavily" suggest?

3.15 Literally, the scene is getting darker. What might this detail suggest on a symbolic level?

	THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO
	by Edgar Allan Poe Page 3