tell-tale heart
Conscience's phantom drumbeat
A tell-tale heart is one that reveals guilt or hidden emotion through its beating—the idea that conscience manifests physically, that the body betrays what the mind conceals.
The phrase comes from Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 story in which a murderer imagines he hears his victim's heart beating beneath the floorboards, driving him to confess.
The expression now suggests any sign that exposes concealed wrongdoing or inner turmoil: His stammering was a tell-tale heart, giving away the lie.
- heartbeatRhythmic cardiac contraction
- unreliable narratorStoryteller whose credibility wavers
- paranoiaIrrational persecution fears
- guiltMoral self-reproach
- soundAudible wave phenomenon
madness · confession · conscience · suspense · hallucination · moral conflict · floorboards · sensory imagery · evil eye · obsession · Edgar Allan Poe · short story · compulsion · exposure · inner turmoil · anxiety · remorse · delusion
tell-tale heartclear conscience
Freedom from moral guilt
guiltlessness · remorselessness · sociopathy · hardened heart · peaceful sleep
tell-tale heartpoker face
Intentionally expressionless look
perfect crime · sealed lips · buried secret · hidden truth · dead silence
tell, tale, heart, tells, telling, teller, tellers, tales, hearts