Fortunato laughed in my face. "Lucresi cannot tell Amontillado from vinegar."

I smiled to myself and said "But some people say that he is as good a judge of wine as you are."

Fortunato grabbed my arm. "Take me to it," he said. "I'll taste the Amontillado for you."

"But my friend," I protested, "it is late. The wine is in my wine cellar, underneath the palace. Those rooms are very damp and cold and the walls drip with water."

"I don't care," he said. "I am the only person who can tell you if your wine man has cheated you. Lucresi cannot!"

Fortunato turned, and still holding me by the arm, pulled me down the street to my home. The building was empty. My servants were enjoying carnival. I knew they would be gone all night.

I took two large candles, lit them and gave one to Fortunato. I started down the dark, twisting stairway with Fortunato close behind me. At the bottom of the stairs, the damp air wrapped itself around our bodies.

"Where are we?" Fortunato asked. "I thought you said the cask of Amontillado was in your wine cellar."

"It is," I said. "The wine cellar is just beyond these tombs where the dead of my family are kept. Surely, you are not afraid of walking through the tombs.

He turned and looked into my eyes. "Tombs?" he said. He began to cough. The silver bells on his cap jingled.

"My poor friend," I said, "how long have you had that cough?"

"It's nothing," he said, but he couldn't stop coughing.

"Come," I said firmly, "we will go back upstairs. Your health is important.You are rich, respected, admired, and loved. You have a wife and children. Many people would miss you if you died. We will go back before you get seriously ill. I can go to Lucresi for help with the wine."

"No!" he cried. "This cough is nothing. It will not kill me. I won't die from a cough."

"That is true," I said, "but you must be careful." He took my arm and we began to walk through the cold, dark rooms. We went deeper and deeper into the cellar.

Finally, we arrived in a small room. Bones were pushed high against one wall. A doorway in another wall opened to an even smaller room, about one meter wide and two meters high. Its walls were solid rock.

"Here we are," I said. "I hid the cask of Amontillado in there." I pointed to the smaller room. Fortunato lifted his candle and stepped into the tiny room. I immediately followed him. He stood stupidly staring at two iron handcuffs chained to a wall of the tiny room. I grabbed his arms and locked them into the metal handcuffs. It took only a moment. He was too surprised to fight me.

I stepped outside the small room.

"Where is the Amontillado?" he cried.

"Ah yes," I said, "the cask of Amontillado." I leaned over and began pushing aside the pile of bones against the wall. Under the bones was a basket of stone blocks, some cement and a small shovel. I had hidden the materials there earlier. I began to fill the doorway of the tiny room with stones and cement.

By the time I laid the first row of stones Fortunato was no longer drunk. I heard him moaning inside the tiny room for ten minutes. Then there was a long silence.

I finished the second and third rows of stone blocks. As I began the fourth row, I heard Fortunato begin to shake the chains that held him to the wall. He was trying to pull them out of the granite wall.

I smiled to myself and stopped working so that I could better enjoy listening to the noise. After a few minutes, he stopped. I finished the fifth, the sixth and the seventh rows of stones. The wall I was building in the doorway was now almost up to my shoulders.

Suddenly, loud screams burst from the throat of the chained man. For a moment I worried. What if someone heard him? Then I placed my hand on the solid rock of the walls and felt safe. I looked into the tiny room, where he was still screaming. And I began to scream, too. My screams grew louder than his and he stopped.

It was now almost midnight. I finished the eighth, the ninth and the tenth rows. All that was left was a stone for the last hole in the wall. I was about to push it in when I heard a low laugh from behind the stones.

The laugh made the hair on my head stand up. Then Fortunato spoke, in a sad voice that no longer sounded like him.

He said, "Well, you have played a good joke on me. We will laugh about it soon over a glass of that Amontillado. But isn't it getting late. My wife and my friends will be waiting for us. Let us go."

"Yes," I replied, "let us go."

I waited for him to say something else. I heard only my own breathing. "Fortunato!" I called. No answer. I called again. "Fortunato!" Still no answer.

I hurried to put the last stone into the wall and put the cement around it. Then I pushed the pile of bones in front of the new wall I had built.

That was fifty years ago. For half a century now, no one has touched those bones. "May he rest in peace!"

·Anger: a strong feeling which makes you want to hurt someone or be unpleasant because of something unfair or hurtful that has happened
·Weak spot: a weak part in something: - Targeting the opponent's weak spots is a typical technique in politics.
·Cask: a strong, round, wooden container used for storing liquid
·Tomb: an excavation in which a corpse is buried
·Bell: a hollow metallic device that gives off a reverberating sound when struck
·Glad: experiencing pleasure, joy, or delight
·Entire: whole or complete, with nothing missing
·Grab: to take hold of something or someone suddenly and roughly
·Damp: slightly wet, especially in a way that is not pleasant or comfortable
·Drip: If a liquid drips, it falls in drops, or you make it fall in drops
·Cheat: to behave in a dishonest way in order to get what you want
·To twist: to turn something, especially repeatedly, or to turn or wrap one thing around another
·To wrap: to cover someone with material in order to protect them
·To jingle: to make a repeated gentle ringing sound, or to make things do this
·Cellar: a room under the ground floor of a building, usually used for storage
·Bone: any of the hard parts inside a human or animal that make up its frame
·Handcuffs: two metal rings joined by a short chain which lock around a prisoner's wrists
·Pile: objects positioned one on top of another
·Shovel: a tool consisting of a wide square metal or plastic blade, usually with slightly raised sides, fixed to a handle, for moving loose material such as sand, coal or snow
·Moan: to make a long low sound of pain, suffering or another strong emotion
·Scream:  to cry or say something loudly and usually on a high note, especially because of strong emotions such as fear or excitement or anger
·Throat: the front of the neck, or the space inside the neck down which food and air can go