Montresor seems to be bragging about his cleverness in planning his perfect crime and his success in bringing it off as planned. First he takes pains to ensure that everyone will think he and Fortunato are the best of friends, including Fortunato himself. He refers to Fortunato as "my friend," "my good friend," and "my poor friend" repeatedly throughout the story.
He prepares the materials he will need for Fortunato's "immolation." The stones for the wall are piled in front of the recess. The mortar is already mixed and covered with human bones dripping water to keep it from drying and hardening. He keeps the trowel on his person because he doesn't want it rusting in that damp atmosphere.
He takes plenty of time to hone his story to perfection. He not only tells Fortunato that he has purchased a pipe (125 gallons) of Amontillado at a bargain price, but that he is on his way to Luchesi to get him to sample it, since he has been unable to find Fortunato. This is important. Fortunato is interested in the bargain and in showing off his connoisseurship. He has a bad cold and might beg off going to Montresor's palazzo that night--but he doesn't want Luchesi to hear about the Amontillado.
Montresor ascertains that Fortunato is not expected anywhere on that fateful night. He wants to leave a cold trail. Tomorrow morning no one will remember much because everybody on the streets is drunk and will be hung-over. Fortunato is extremely conspicuous in his gaudy jester's costume, but Montresor is like a shadow in his black cloak and black mask. There will be no one to say they saw Montresor and Fortunato together on the night of Fortunato's disappearance.
Montresor has made sure his servants will all be gone. There will be no witnesses to say they saw him bring Fortunato home. He says:
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.
This does not mean that all domestic servants would do the same thing. Montresor doesn't have first-class servants. They don't respect him. They aren't afraid of getting fired.
Montresor keeps Fortunato drunk while they are underground. Fortunato is already drunk when Montresor finds him in the street, and Montresor gives him two bottles of French wine.
Montresor walls Fortunato up in a remote place where there is no chance of his being heard when he screams for help. Montresor does a perfect job of building the stone wall and then plastering it over with the same mortar he used in building the wall. He makes the plastered-over wall look like part of the granite wall of the catacombs, and then he covers it over with what he calls a "rampart" of human bones. Even if the authorities were to search his premises, they would not be likely to find Fortunato's body--but Montresor has had the foresight to be sure he was above suspicion when Fortunato disappeared. Everybody believes that Montresor and Fortunato were the very best of friends.
It is not certain how long Fortunato remained alive. Montresor used big, heavy stones rather than bricks in building his wall. Fortunato would not be able to hear anyone approaching through the wall, the mortar-plaster, and the bones. If he screamed for help, no one would hear him on the other side. It was extremely unlikely that anyone would come down there anyway.
The crime was perfect. Montresor concludes his narrative with these words:
I forced the last stone into its position; I plastered it up. Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones. For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them. In pace requiescat!
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