The Murders in the Rue Morgue (Fort Raphael Publishing Company Edition) characters

Appears from the start

An unnamed visitor to Paris who meets Dupin in a small library and becomes his close companion and housemate. He narrates the case, admires Dupin's unusual powers of analysis, and accompanies him while he examines the murder scene and tests an explanation that the police have overlooked.

Also known as Dupin

Appears from the start

A young Frenchman from a distinguished family whose fortune has largely disappeared. He lives quietly in Paris with the narrator and delights in close observation and analytical puzzles. When the police confront a seemingly impossible double murder, he studies both the published testimony and the physical evidence, reasoning beyond the assumptions that have trapped the official investigators.

Appears from the start

An elderly woman who lives in seclusion with her daughter Camille on the Rue Morgue. She has recently withdrawn a large sum of gold from her bank. Her body is discovered in the courtyard behind the locked house, grievously mutilated, while the money remains in the rooms.

Also known as Mademoiselle L'Espanaye

Appears from the start

Madame L'Espanaye's unmarried daughter and companion. She shares her mother's secluded home and is found strangled and forced into the chimney after neighbors break into their locked fourth-floor room.

Appears from the start

A bank clerk who carries Madame L'Espanaye's withdrawn gold to her residence. The police arrest him despite the lack of a convincing motive and despite the money being left behind. Dupin's wish to clear him helps prompt the independent investigation.

Also known as G—

Appears from the start

The prefect of the Paris police and an acquaintance of Dupin. His officers search the Rue Morgue house minutely and arrest Le Bon, but the locked room, conflicting witness accounts, and extraordinary violence leave the official inquiry without a sound explanation.

Appears from the start

A sailor who captured an orangutan while abroad and brought it to Paris, hoping eventually to sell it. After the animal escapes with his razor and he follows it to the Rue Morgue, fear of blame keeps him silent until Dupin's carefully worded newspaper notice draws him out.

Also known as Ourang-Outang

Appears from the start

A powerful wild ape brought from Borneo by the sailor. Having watched its owner shave, it escapes carrying a razor and imitates the act in the L'Espanaye apartment. Its strength, agility, and inhuman voice account for evidence that witnesses and police could not reconcile with any human attacker.