In "The Barrel of Amontillado", Montresor feels a brief, fleeting sense of guilt that he quickly recedes from his conscience. This can be seen in his lament about “the dampness of the catacombs” which made his heart “sick”. This comes right after Fortunato has finally fallen silent in death. Montresor goes so far as to blame his feelings on the catacombs and refocuses on revenge allowing him to free himself from the grip of guilt. This is juxtaposed in "The Tell-Tale Heart" as the main character reacts in quite a different way. He becomes so ill from his actions that he believes he can hear the old man's heart beating even though he is dead. The sound becomes deafening as his subconscious becomes increasingly guilty. In the end he can't take it anymore and confesses to the police what he did. One similarity between these two characters is their inability to consciously feel guilt. Both seem to find a way to place the blame on something else, like a dank catacomb or a beating heart. This exemplifies Poe's broad understanding of how criminals respond to their actions on a psychological level