"Niter?" he asked, at length. "Niter," I replied. "How long have you had that cough?" "Ugh! ugh! ugh--ugh! ugh! ugh!--ugh! ugh! ugh!--ugh! ugh! ugh!--ugh! ugh! ugh!" My poor friend found it impossible to reply 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 can not be responsible. Besides, there is Luchesi--" "Enough," he said; "the cough is a mere nothing; it will not kill me. I shall not die." "True--true," I replied; "and, indeed, I had no intention of alarming you unnecessarily--but you should use all proper caution. 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 row of its fellows that lay upon the mold. "Drink," I said, presenting him the wine. He raised it to his lips with a leer. 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." "I forget your arms." "A huge human foot d'or, in a field azure; the foot crushes a serpent rampant whose fangs are imbedded in the heel." "And the motto?" _"Nemo me impune lacessit."_ "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. I paused again, and this time I made bold to seize Fortunato by an arm above the elbow. "The niter!" 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--" "It is nothing," he said; "let us go on. But first, another draft of the Medoc." I broke and reached him a flagon of De Grave. He emptied it at a breath. His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He laughed and threw the bottle upward with a gesticulation I did not understand. I looked at him in surprize. 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." "Yes, yes," I said, "yes, yes." "You? Impossible! A mason?" "A mason," I replied. "A sign," he said. "It is this," I answered, producing a trowel from beneath the folds of my _roquelaure_. "You jest," he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. "But let us proceed to the Amontillado."