Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart

A quotation of Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart...

"The officers were satisfied. My manner had convinced them. I was singularly at ease. They sat, and while I answered cheerily, they chatted of familiar things. But, ere long, I felt myself getting pale and wished them gone. My head ached, and I fancied a ringing in my ears: but still they sat and still chatted. The ringing became more distinct: --It continued and became more distinct: I talked more freely to get rid of the feeling: but it continued and gained definiteness --until, at length, I found that the noise was not within my ears."

Maybe what the author of this short story tried to depic in this part was how does it feel when somebody is about to discover that you did something bad. Paranoia is starting to affect the main character, he thinks he got away with it, but sooner or later your mind plays tricks on you and you don't have control over it. Hearing things that are not there, acting paranoic makes him vulnarable and finally the horrible truth comes out, because it is eating him from the inside.