The Book of Fantasy

by Jorge Luis Borges

  ‘You would reply, “I see your kind at the club every night”.’

  ‘Don’t talk nonsense,’ replied Adhemar, who was very sensible when other people became imaginative.

  ‘I prefer the idea of the gift,’ said his nephew. ‘But for whom? Most of my friends are here and even if they haven’t seen it, they soon will . . .’

  Eduardo Adhemar remembered. ‘I know! Send it to Olegario! He isn’t here. He went to his farm yesterday and is getting married in a fortnight.’

  When Eduardo Adhemar arrived a fortnight later at Olegario M. Banfield’s house, he had already forgotten the matter. Perhaps that’s why—probably for no other reason—he got a fright when he came face to face with the bust when going from one room to another, having checked to his satisfaction that the presents received by the couple were not as expensive as those received by his niece and nephew. The bust was in a corner of the room and yet seemed to be the centre of the lighting and decor. Adhemar greeted two or three people and left.

  A month later, when it was already summer, he went to another reception; the company chairman’s son was getting married. He felt a bit uncomfortable in the Banking and Stock Exchange environment. He knew that the chairman—a very deserving man, hardworking, but with no background—boasted about being his friend, and that the owner of the house was going to introduce him enthusiastically to a number of rich bourgeois women. But the tyranny of business conventions didn’t allow him to think up any excuses. He turned up with his usual propriety, which sometimes sparkled in a light youthful display—a flower, a novel tie—and his undoubtedly distinguished air. He greeted the hosts and the bride and groom, and then, allowing no time for the introductions which were already pouring forth from the chairman’s wife, expressed with almost childish impatience his desire to see the presents. They climbed up a stairway bordered with baskets of flowers to the first floor. The bust was in the centre of the large room, under the crystal chandelier.

  During the summer and later, in the autumn, Eduardo Adhemar attended two or three more weddings. At all of them he came across the bust. He spaced out his social commitments and restricted himself to going to the club in the afternoon and sometimes at night.

  One unsettled night at the beginning of winter he was comfortably installed drinking his whisky and reading the paper when a conversation behind him made him sit up and listen. Two members were talking excitedly. Judging by the few words he was able to make out, he realized they were talking about the bust. ‘Luckily they had time to . . .’ The sentence was unfinished because a waiter went by rattling a tray of glasses. What had to be done in time? wondered Adhemar. A trace of humour, an incident arising in a moment of joviality on his nephew’s wedding day, seemed to have had unforeseeable consequences. He had set something in motion, a habit, a fashion, a force. He didn’t know what, but decided to find out. Unfortunately he wasn’t on speaking terms with either of the gentlemen. They had fallen out on the day of the renewal of the board. He decided to be alert during the next few days in case he heard other allusions to the bust. One afternoon he got to the lounge just at the end of a conversation amongst several friends. He thought he understood that someone had held that there existed several busts. But that idea was triumphantly refuted by Pedrito Defferrari Marenco, the young lawyer and politician, who was fast becoming one of the new names in the Traditional Party. It was a single bust, which everyone nervously got rid of as soon as they received it. Adhemar, in a sort of dizzy state, kept quiet.

  From then on he started feeling deeply worried. The reasons for his disquiet did not respond to an egotistic feeling; he understood—sitting in his usual armchair in the club, he analysed his situation in detail—that a generous impulse, although still hidden, was increasingly and silently taking over. He started to think constantly about his nephew, his happiness, his profession, aspects of his married life. The couple had not yet returned from a long trip to Europe and Adhemar suffered real anxiety during the weeks prior to their return. When they finally arrived, he had to restrain himself for a few days. One afternoon he invited the young man to have a whisky at the club. After talking about trivia related to the trip, he carefully explored the topics which interested him. Everything was fine; his nephew and his wife were happy, they had plenty of money and his profession as an engineer was the young man’s fulfilled vocation. Adhemar smiled imperceptibly, satisfied, like a conspirator.

  But two or three days later he noted with alarm that he began to be interested in the fate of Olegario Banfield, the friend to whom his nephew had given the bust. The problem was rather more difficult, because his friendship with Banfield was limited and there weren’t many excuses to see him. He started, nonetheless, to visit friends they had in common in order to obtain details; he invented innumerable subterfuges and excuses to find out everything about the life of young Olegario and his wife. He achieved his aim, of course, and was satisfied once again. The next few investigations turned out to be more complicated, because as he went on he came across people virtually unknown to him. He therefore resorted to a private investigation agency. At first he found it difficult to overcome Inspector Molina’s professional distrust. The latter, an experienced man, naturally thought of affairs of the heart. It is normal for a gentleman of means to have an expensive liaison and to yearn for relative faithfulness; it is also normal for him to try to obtain proof of that faithfulness. But when the investigation had to extend to ten or fifteen newly created households, the inspector finally accepted the reasons put forward by Adhemar. All the work, the gentlemen explained, was to be done with a view to creating a file; a large credit company, whose identity had to be kept secret for the time being, was preparing an enormous moral and financial register of the country. Adhemar noticed a hint of irony in the inspector on two or three occasions, but since the man carried out his work conscientiously he immediately forgot about that. The inspector for his part received a considerable monthly instalment for his activities, so he soon abandoned all considerations irrelevant to his routine work and cooperated most efficiently.

  After some time Adhemar realized it was impossible to get a picture of somebody’s life, starting from possession of the bust, without knowing about their previous life. Only by comparison could he get a precise picture. This spread infinitely complicated the investigations. In order to assist the inspector, Adhemar himself decided to take action. For days and nights he held interviews, requested reports, followed unknown people along the street for long periods. After a few months, one misty night when he was wandering around the Recoleta district, he got a fright. A slight form, almost a shadow, half-seen as he turned his face, made him suspect that he also was being followed. The blood throbbed at his temples; a feeling of horror was about to paralyse him. He managed to quicken his step, turned two or three corners unexpectedly—or what he thought was unexpectedly—and finally reached his house. A few hours later, he had calmed down. He had pried into the lives of others; did he have the right to prevent somebody spying on him? But he didn’t think any more about it because he was very tired; his physical state and his energy had flagged over the past few weeks.

  For a month he continued his work, always with the feeling of being closely observed, until an upset stomach and a slight stitch in his left side forced him to go and visit the doctor. It was nothing to worry about, the latter explained. A diet, reduced alcohol intake, a series of injections and he would be as good as new. He returned to his flat in Calle Arenales and got into bed. The following day was his birthday and he wanted to be well enough to receive his friends. But when he woke up, he realized that his gathering was doomed. A sharp pain, rheumatism or whatever it was, made all movement impossible. His slight discomfort had turned into lumbago.

  He spent the day in bed. His manservant let in two or three friends who came to wish him well; a few presents also arrived. At nine o’clock that night he left, having asked permission to go to the cinema. Adhemar suggested that he leave the door ajar in case any
more friends turned up. Half an hour later he heard a knock and a messenger came in without waiting for a reply. He was struggling under a very heavy parcel, which he left on the hall table. Then he approached the bed, handed him a letter and left. In the next room, the parcel was a dark shadow. Bent double by the pain, unable to sit up, Adhemar opened the letter and took out a card. He had never seen the name before. Yes, he had seen it before: the night of his nephew’s wedding, on the card accompanying the bust! Anxiously, he stretched out his arm and picked up the telephone. He put the earpiece to his ear; it was dead. He made another painful, fruitless effort to sit up. A growing oppression, like a tide, filled his chest and rose and rose.

  Under the archway of the hall, darkness spread like spilt coffee and advanced into the bedroom.

  The Cask of Amontillado

  Edgar Allan Poe, American writer. Born in Boston in 1809, died in hospital in New York in 1849. The inventor of the crime fiction genre, who revived the gothic fantasy genre. He influenced writers as diverse as Baudelaire and Chesterton, Conan Doyle and Paul Valéry. His works include The narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym (1838), Tales of the Grotesque and the Arabesque (1839), Tales (1845), The Raven and Other Poems (1845), Eureka (1848). His works have been reproduced in almost all the other media.

  (ROME)

  The thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best 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 definitely 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 unredressed 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 Fortunato cause to doubt my good will. I continued, as was my wont, to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my smile now was at the thought of his immolation.

  He had a weak point—this Fortunato—although in other regards he was a man to be respected and even feared. He prided himself on his connoisseurship in wine. Few Italians have the true virtuoso spirit. For the most part their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the time and opportunity—to practise imposture upon the British and Austrian millionaires. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack—but in the 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, for he had been drinking much. The man wore motley. He had on a tight-fitting parti-striped dress, 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 done wringing his hand.

  I said to him—“My dear Fortunato, you are luckily met. How remarkably well you are looking to-day! But I have received a pipe of what passes for Amontillado, and I have my doubts.”

  “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 bargain.”

  “Amontillado!”

  “I have my doubts.”

  “Amontillado!”

  “And I must satisfy them.”

  “Amontillado!”

  “As you are engaged, I am on my way to Luchesi. If any one has a critical turn, it is he. He will tell me—”

  “Luchesi cannot tell Amontillado from Sherry.”

  “And yet some fools will have it that his taste is a match for your own.”

  “Come, let us go.”

  “Whither?”

  “To your vaults.”

  “My friend, no; I will not impose upon your good nature. I perceive you have an engagement. Luchesi—”

  “I have no engagement;—come.”

  “My friend, no. It is not the engagement, 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. Amontillado! You have been imposed upon. And as for Luchesi, he cannot distinguish Sherry from Amontillado.”

  Thus speaking, Fortunato possessed himself of 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 attendants at home; they had absconded to make merry in honour 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, I well knew, to insure their immediate disappearance, one and all, as soon as my back was turned.

  I took from their sconces two flambeaux, and giving one to Fortunato, bowed him through several suites of rooms to the archway that led into the vaults. I passed down a long and 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 Montresors.

  The gait of my friend was unsteady, and the bells upon his cap jingled as he strode.

  “The pipe,” said he.

  “It is farther on,” said I; “but observe the white web-work which gleams from these cavern walls.”

  He turned towards me, and looked into my eyes with two filmy orbs that distilled the rheum of intoxication.

  “Nitre?” he asked, at length.

  “Nitre,” 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 cannot be responsible. Besides, there is Luchesi—”

  “Enough,” he said; “the cough is a mere nothing; it will not kill me. I shall not die of a cough.”

  “True—true,” I replied; “and, indeed, I had no intention of alarming you unnecessarily—but you should use all proper caution. A draught 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 mould.

  “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 catacombs. 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—”

  “It is nothing,” he said; “let us go on. But first, another draught 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 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.”

  “Yes, yes,” I said; “yes, yes.”

  “You? Impossible! A mason?”

  “A mason,” I replied.

  “A sign,” he said, “a sign.”

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

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

  “Be it so,” I said, replacing the tool beneath the cloak and again offering him my arm. He leaned upon it heavily. 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.

  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 Paris. Three sides of this interior crypt were still ornamented in this manner. From the fourth side the bones had been thrown down, and lay 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 especial use within 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.