The Cask of Amontillado

In this episode, we offer up the second of two classic tales of the macabre from the master himself, Edgar Allan Poe - and just in time for the Halloween season.

Theme written by Bernard Kyer for this podcast. Follow the link for more info. https://www.bardmediamusic.com/

Transcript

0:04

Hello again folks, and welcome to another fine episode of Forward Into the Past. I'm JC Rid Renee, your host and narrator, and today we're going to continue with the spooky stories for the Halloween season offering up the second of two stories from the master of the Macab, Edgar Allen Poe, the cast of a mania, as suggested by you, the listening audience for the show. Nowadays we consider telling ghost stories part of Halloween tradition. But as I mentioned in the last episode, ghost stories were primarily told around the Christmas Hearth and not as much around a Halloween bonfire. There are a few thoughts why, but I'm guessing it was because people living in those early centuries were a very superstitious lot. If you have a day that is dedicated to spirits and goblins, Why would you tempt fate by bringing them closer to home with the telling of stories about them? Now, remember, the tradition of dressing up in a costume for Halloween stems back to those early days when people would wear masks and costumes in order to confuse any wandering evil spirit that may cause them harm. Jack Lanterns were used for the same reason. you know, and those have a very interesting backstory that I will more than likely share with you in the next episode, especially considering the story I'm going to read. So stay tuned for that. Halloween in America, really came into its own thing right around the middle of the 19th century, around the time of the American Civil War. And around the same time that story papers and dime novels really hit their strides. Ironically enough, it was around this time that the US got a huge wave of immigrants from Europe. In the former New England colonies. Up until then, Halloween was really not celebrated at all due to the strict puritan rules that had been in place there and just became everyday life for them.. Halloween celebrations were much more common in the southern states, but not as we know them today. More of a harvest celebration than anything else. Now it was due to the wave of Scottish and Irish immigrants that flooded the Eastern seaboard and elsewhere that really started our American Halloween traditions. They brought with them the customs of dressing up in costume to trick ghosts from the Pagan celebration of Samhain, Jack o'lanterns, of course, came from the Irish story of Stingy Jack, and again, stay tuned for that. And trick or treating came from a European custom of going from house to house in a village and asking for treats or money by children to pray for the souls of the departed of the family. Now there's a lot more to tell, but I don't want to take any more time away from the story at hand Pose, Classic Tale of Vengeance, the Cas of a Miato. Enjoy. Ed Gar pose the cas of a manto, The thousand injuries of four nato. I had born as best I could, but when he ventured upon insult, I vowed revenge. You who so well know? The nature of my soul will not suppose however, that I gave utterance to a threat. At length, I would be avenged. This was a point definitively settled, but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk. I must not only punish but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed. When retribution overtakes, its redresser. It is equally unaddressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such. To him who has done the wrong, it must be understood that neither by word nor deed had I given Fornado cause to doubt my goodwill. I continued as was my want to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his emulation. He had a weak point this Fortune Auto, although in other regards, he was a man to be respected and even feared. He prided himself upon his connoisseurship in wine. Few Italians had the true virtuoso spirit. For the most part, their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the time and opportunity to practice imposture upon the British and Austrian millionaires in painting and gemmery Fortunato like his countrymen. Was a quack, but in a matter of old wines. He was sincere. In this respect I did not differ from him materially. I was skillful in the Italian vintages myself and bought largely whenever I could. It was about dusk. One evening during the supreme madness of the carnival season that I encountered my friend, he accosted me with excessive warmth while he had been drinking much. The man wore Motley. He had on a tight fitting, partially striped costume, and his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells. I was so pleased to see him that I thought I should never have been done ringing his hand. I said to him, my dear Fortunato, You are luckily met!. How remarkably well you are looking today, but I have received a pipe of what passes for Amontillado and I have my doubt. How said he Amontillado? a pipe? Impossible. And in the middle of the carnival, I have my doubts. I replied, and I was silly enough to pay the full Amontillado price without consulting you in the matter. You were not to be found. And I was fearful of losing a. A tdo. I have my doubt a Mondo, and I must satisfy them. A Mondo. As you are engaged, I am on my way to Lu Casey. If anyone has a critical turn, it is he. He will tell me, Lu Casey cannot tell a tdo from Sherry, and yet some fools will have it. That his taste is a match for your own. Huh? come let us go. Uh, wither to your vaults. Oh, my friend. No, I will not impose upon your good nature. I perceive you have an engagement. Luke, Casey, I have no engagement. Come my friend. No, it is not the engagement. Oh. But the severe cold with which I perceive you are afflicted. The vaults are insufferably damp. They are encrusted with nitre. Let us go. Nevertheless, the cold is merely nothing. A Mondo you have been imposed upon. And as for Lu Casey, he cannot distinguish Sherry from Amando. Thus speaking, Foro possessed himself in my arm, putting on a mask of black silk and drawing a roquelaire closely about my person. I suffered him to hurry me to my Palazzo. There were no attendance at home. They had absconded to make Mary in honor of the time I had told them that I should not return until the morning and had given them explicit orders not to stir from the house. These orders were sufficient. Well, I knew to ensure their immediate disappearance one at all. As soon as my back was turned, I took from their SCOs to flam bow and giving one to fortune. NATO bowed him through several suites of rooms to the archway, which led to the vaults. I passed down a long end winding staircase, requesting him to be cautious as he followed. We came at length to the foot of the descent and stood together on the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montes souls. The gate of my friend was unsteady, and the bells upon his cap jingled as he st str the pipe said he Oh, Oh. It is farther on, said I. But the white WebWork, which gleams from these cavern walls. He turned towards me and looked into my eyes with two fill me orbs that distilled the room of intoxication. Nighter. He asked at length. Hmm, nighter. How long have you had that cough? my poor friend. Found it impossible to apply for many minutes. It is nothing he said at last. Come. I said With decision, we will go back. Your health is precious. You are rich, respected, admired, Beloved. You are happy. As once I was, you are a man to be missed for me it is. No matter we will go back, you will be ill and I cannot be responsible. Uh, besides there is Luke Casey enough. He said the cough is a mere nothing. It will not kill me. I shall not die of a golf. True. True. I replied, and indeed I had no intention of alarming you unnecessarily, but you should use all proper caution. Ah, a draft of this medoc will defend us from the damps. here. I knocked off the neck of a bottle, which I drew from a long rove. Its fellows that lay upon the mold drink. I said presenting in the wine. He raised it to his lips with Alia. He paused and nodded to me familiarly while his bells jingled. Now I drink. He said to the buried, that repo around us and I to your long life. He again took my arm and we proceeded, Oh, these volts are extensive. He said, The mantra saws. I replied, What a great and numerous family. I forget your arms. A huge human foot door in a field. Azure, The foot crushes a serpent rampant whose fangs are embedded in the heel, and the motto, NI translation, No one as sails me with impunity. Huh, Good. He said The wine sparkled in his eyes and the bells jingled my own fancy grew warm with a medoc. We had passed through walls of piled bones with casks and punch ins intermingling into the inmost recesses of the catacombs. I paused again and this time I made bold to seize fortune auto by at arm above the elbow. The Nier. 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 and it's too late your cough. It is nothing. He said, Let us go on hope. But, but first, another draft of the medoc. I broke and reached him a flag of degra. He emptied it at a breath. His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He laughed and threw the bottle upwards with a gesticulation. I did not understand. I looked at him in surprise. He repeated the movement Agrow test one. You do not comprehend. He said, Not. I replied, Then you are not of the brotherhood, how you are not of the mason. Oh, oh, yes, yes. I said, Yes. You impossible. A Mason. A Mason. I replied a sign. He said, Ah, it is this. I answered producing a troll from beneath the folds of my Roku. you just, he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. Ah, but let us proceed to the amount yato, be it so, I said, replacing the tool beneath my cloak and again, offering him my arm. He leaned upon it heavily. We continued our route in search of the Iman. We passed through a range of low arches, descended, passed on, and descending again, arriving at a deep crypt in which the fallous of the egg caused off Lambo rather to glow than flame. At the most remote end of the crypt there appeared another less spacious. Its walls had been lined with human remains piled to the vault overhead in the fashion of the great catacombs of pat. Three sides of this interior crypt were still ornamented in this manner. From the fourth, the bones had been thrown down and laid promiscuously upon the earth, forming at one point a mound of some size. Within the wall, thus exposed by the displacing of the bones. We perceived a still interior recess, in depth, about four feet in width, three in height, six or seven. It seemed to have been constructed for no special use in itself, but formed merely the interval between two of the colossal supports of the roof of the catacombs, and was backed by one of their circumscribing walls of solid granite. It was in vain that fortune, nato uplifting his dull torch, endeavored to pry into the depth of the recess its termination. The feeble light did not enable us to see. Proceed. I said, Here it in is the I tto. As for Luke Casey, he is an ignoramus. Interrupted my friend as he stepped steadily forward while I followed immediately at his heels. In an instant, he had reached the extremity of the niche and finding his progress. Arrested by the rock stood stupidly bewildered a moment more, and I had fed at him to the granite. In its surface with two iron staples distant from each other of about two feet horizontally from one of these depended, a short chain from the other, a padlock throwing the links about his waist. It was, but the work of a few seconds to secure it. He was much to astounded, to resist withdrawing the key. I step back from the recess. Pass your hand. I said over the wall, you cannot help feeling the nighter. Indeed, it is very damp. Once more, let me implore you to return. No. Then I must positively leave you. But first I must render you all the little tensions in my power, the the TDO ejaculated, my friend, not yet recovered from his astonishment. True. I replied via Mondo as I said these words. I busied myself among the pile of bones of which I have before spoken. Throwing them aside, I soon uncovered a quantity of building stone and mortar. With these materials and with the aid of my tr, I began vigorously to wall up the entrance of the niche. I had scarcely laid the first tier of my masonry when I discovered that the intoxication of Fortune Auto had in great measure worn off. The earliest indication I had of this was a low moaning cry from the depths of the recess. It was not the cry of a drunken man. There was then a long and obstinate silence. I laid the second tier and the third and the fourth, and then I heard the furious vibration of the chains. The noise lasted for several minutes during which that I might hark into it With more satisfaction, I ceased my labors and sat down upon the bones. When it lasts, the clanking subsided. I resumed the trial and finished without interruption, the fifth, the sixth, and the seventh year. The wall was now nearly upon a level with my breast. I, again, paused and holding the flam O over the mason, work through a few feeble rays. Upon the figure within a succession of loud and shrill screams, bursting suddenly from the throat of the chain form seemed to thrust me violently back. For a brief moment, I hesitated. I trembled un sheathing my rape here. I began to grope with it about the recess. But the thought of an instant reassured me. I placed my hand upon the solid fabric of the catacombs and felt satisfied. I reapproached the wall. I replied to the yells of him who clammed. I reechoed. I ate it. I surpassed them in volume and in strength. I did this, and the clamor grew still. It was now midnight and my task was drawing to a close. I had completed the eighth, the ninth, and the 10th tier. I had finished a portion of the last and the 11th. There remained, but a single stone to be fitted and plastered in. I struggled with its weight. I placed it partially in its destined position, but now there came without the niche, a low laugh that erected the hairs upon my head. It was succeeded by the sad voice, which I had difficulty in recognizing as that of the noble fortune Auto. The voice said Um, a very good joke indeed. An excellent, just, we will have many a rich laugh about it at the Blaz. So over our wine, the Ito, I said. Yes, Yes, the Ito But is it not getting late? Will they not be awaiting us at the Palazzo? The lady fora and the rest? let us be gone. Yes. I said, let us be gone. For the love of God butchers soul. Yes. I said for the love of God. But to these words, I heared in vain for a reply. I grew impatient. I called aloud fortunato, no answer. I called again, Fortunato, no answer still. I thrust the torch through the remaining aperture and let it fall within. There came forth in return, only a jingling of the bells. My heart grew sick on account of the dampness of the catacombs. I hasten to make an end of my labor. I forced the last stone into its position. I, I plastered it up against the new masonry. I rear erected the old Rampart bones for the half of the century. No mortal has disturbed them In pace, requiescat!

J.C. 19:25

Well folks. That concludes our latest episode. I hope that it brought you some enjoyment. Um, as for me. I'm going to take a small break to prepare for the next episode. Washington Irving's classic Honda tale, the legend of sleepy hollow. And I hope you will join me again. For now. I'm going to enjoy the small cheese plate and partake of this. Wine. I hope you will indulge me this small break. Mm, well, Until next time as always. Thank you for listening. Keep sharing the stories and BIA. Good human. Bye for now.