'The Murders in the Rue Morgue,' by Edgar Allen Poe, Part Three

 

We present the third of five parts of the short story "The Murders in the Rue¹ Morgue," by Edgar Allen Poe. The story was originally² adapted and recorded by VOA Learning³ English.

My housemate in Paris, August Dupin, was an interesting young man with a busy, forceful mind. This mind could, it seemed, look right through a man's body into his deepest soul.

After reading in the newspaper about the terrible murder of a woman and her daughter, Dupin was consumed⁴ with the mystery. He questioned the ability of the Paris police to solve the crime⁵. I told Dupin that it seemed to me that it was not possible to explain the strange details surrounding the killings⁶.

"No, no. I think you are wrong. A mystery it is, yes. But there must be an answer. There must! Let us go to the house where it happened and see what we can see. I know the head of the police, and he will permit⁷ our visit. It will be interesting and give us some pleasure."

I thought it strange that Dupin thought the activity would give us pleasure. But I said nothing.

It was late in the afternoon when we reached the house on the Rue Morgue. It was easily found, for there were still many persons — in fact, a crowd, standing⁸ there looking at it. Before going in, we walked all around it, and Dupin carefully looked at the neighboring houses as well. I could not understand the reason for such great care.

Finally, we entered the house. We went up the stairs to the room where the daughter's body was found. Both bodies were in the room now. The police had left the room as they had found it in every other way. I saw nothing beyond what the newspaper had told us.

Dupin looked with great care at everything, at the bodies, the walls, the fireplace¹⁰, the windows. Then we went home. Dupin said nothing. I could see the cold look in his eyes, which told me that his mind was working, working busily, quickly.

Dupin said nothing about our exploration¹¹ until the next morning when he suddenly asked me a question.

"Did you not notice something especially strange about what we saw at the house on the Rue Morgue?"

"Nothing more than what we both read in the newspaper, which was unusual indeed. How shall we explain the horrible¹² force, the unusual strength used in these murders? And whose were the voices that were heard? No one was found except the dead women; yet there was no way for anyone to escape. And the wild condition of the room; the body which was found head-down in the chimney¹³; the terrible broken appearance¹⁴ of the body of the old lady, with its head cut off-- these are all so far from what might be expected that the police are standing still; they don't know where to begin."

"These things are unusual, indeed, but they are not deep mysteries. We should not ask, ‘What has happened?' but ‘What has happened that has never happened before?' In fact, the very things that the police think cannot possibly be explained are the things which will lead me to the answer. Indeed, I believe they have already led me to the answer."

I was so surprised that I could not say a word. Dupin looked quickly at the door.

"I am now waiting for a person who will know something about these murders, these wild killings. I do not think he did them himself. But I think he will know the killer¹⁵. I hope I am right about this. If I am, then I expect to find the whole answer, today. I expect the man here — in this room — at any moment. It is true that he may not come, but he probably will."

"But who is this person? How did you find him?"

"I'll tell you. While we wait for this man we do not know — for I have never met him — while we wait, I will tell you how my thoughts went."

Dupin began to talk. But it did not seem that he was trying to explain to me what he had thought. It seemed that he was talking to himself. He looked not at me, but at the wall.

"It has been fully⁹ proved that the voices heard by the neighbors were not the voices of the women who were killed. Someone else was in the room. It is therefore certain that the old woman did not first kill her daughter and then kill herself. She would not have been strong enough to put her daughter's body where it was found. And the manner of the old lady's death shows that she could not have caused it herself. A person can kill himself with a knife, yes. But he surely¹⁶ cannot cut his own head almost off, then drop the knife on the floor and jump out the window. It was murder, then, done by some third person — or persons. And the voices heard were the voices of these persons. Let us now think carefully about the things people said about those voices. Did you notice anything especially strange in what was told about them?"

"Well, yes. Everybody agreed that the low voice was the voice of a Frenchman¹⁷, but they could not agree about the high voice."

"Ah! That was what they said, yes, but that was not what was so strange about what they said. You say you have noticed nothing that makes their stories very different from what might have been expected. Yet there was something. All these persons, as you say, agreed about the low voice, but not about the high hard voice. The strange thing here is that when an Italian, an Englishman¹⁸, a Spaniard, and a Frenchman tried to tell what the voice was like, each one said it sounded like the voice of a foreigner. How strangely unusual that voice really must have been! Here are four men from four big countries, and not one of them could understand what the voice said; each one gave it a different name.

"Now, I know that there are other countries in the world. You will say that perhaps it was the voice of someone from one of those other lands — Russia, perhaps. But remember, not one of these people heard anything that sounded like a separate¹⁹ word.

Here, Dupin turned and looked into my eyes.

"This is what we have learned²⁰ from the newspaper. I don't know what I have led you to think. But I believe that in this much of the story there are enough facts to lead us in the one and only direction to the right answer. What this answer is, I will not say...not yet. But I want you to keep in mind that this much was enough to tell me what I must look for when we were in that house on the Rue Morgue. And I found it!

"What did I first look for? The path of escape, of course. I mean, we agree the killers²¹ were not ghosts; they could not move through walls. So, how did they escape?

"At first I saw no way out. It had been necessary for the neighbors to break down the door in order to enter the room. There was no other door. The opening above the fireplace is too narrow for even a child to go through. That leaves only the windows. We must make that exit somehow possible.

"Remember, there are two windows in the room. Both of them, you will remember, are made of two parts; to open the window one must lift up the bottom half. One of these windows is easily seen; the lower²² part of the other is out of sight behind the big bed. I looked carefully at the first of these windows. It was firmly closed, fastened, like the door, on the inside. To keep the window closed, to fasten it, someone had put a strong iron²³ nail²⁴ into the wood at the side of the window in such a way that the window could not be raised. At least it seemed that the nail held the window closed. The nail was easy to see. There it was. And the people who discovered the killings used their greatest strength and could not raise the window. I, too, tried to raise the window and could not.

"I went to the second window and looked behind the bed at the lower half of the window. There was a nail here, too, which held the window closed. Without moving the bed, I tried to open this window also, and again I could not do so. But I did not stop looking for an answer there."

Now it's your turn to use the words in this story. What kinds of skills do you possess²⁵ that might help the police solve crimes²⁶? Should private citizens help the police, or should the police alone work to solve crimes? 

Words in This Story

housemate – n. a person who lives in the same house with another person but is not a part of that person's family

consume(d) – v. to take all of a person's attention, energy or time

neighboring – adj. near or next to something or someone

moment – n. a very short period of time

certain – adj. used with it to say that something is known²⁷ to be true or correct

notice – v. to become aware of something or someone by seeing or hearing it

perhaps – adv. possibly but not certainly

ghost(s) – n. the soul of a dead person thought of as living in an unseen world or as appearing to living people

fasten(ed) – v. to attach²⁸ something or join two things or two parts of something especially by using a pin, nail or something else

nail – n. a long, thin piece of metal that is sharp at one end and flat at the other end and that is used chiefly to attach things to wood

1 rue   

n.懊悔，芸香，后悔；v.后悔，悲伤，懊悔

参考例句：

• You'll rue having failed in the examination.你会悔恨考试失败。
• You're going to rue this the longest day that you live.你要终身悔恨不尽呢。

2 originally   

adv.本来，原来，最初，就起源而论，独创地

参考例句：

• Originally I didn't want to go.我本意不想去。
• After much discussion they settled on the plan originally proposed.他们讨论了很久，然后确定了原来提出的那个计划。

3 learning   

n.学问，学识，学习；动词learn的现在分词

参考例句：

• When you are learning to ride a bicycle,you often fall off.初学骑自行车时，常会从车上掉下来。
• Learning languages isn't just a matter of remembering words.学习语言不仅仅是记些单词的事。

4 consumed   

v.消耗( consume的过去式和过去分词 )；烧毁；大吃；使充满（强烈的感情）

参考例句：

• Arguing about details consumed many hours of the committee's valuable time. 争论细节问题耗费了委员会数小时宝贵的时间。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The fire had consumed half the forest away before it was stopped. 大火在熄灭之前毁掉了树林的一半。 来自《简明英汉词典》

5 crime   

n.犯罪，罪行，罪恶

参考例句：

• You'll have to pay for your crime.你得为你的罪行付出代价。
• Crime in our big cities is on the increase.在我们大城市里犯罪率正在增长。

6 killings   

谋杀( killing的名词复数 )； 突然发大财，暴发

参考例句：

• His statement was seen as an allusion to the recent drug-related killings. 他的声明被视为暗指最近与毒品有关的多起凶杀案。
• The government issued a statement condemning the killings. 政府发表声明谴责这些凶杀事件。

7 permit   

n.许可证，许可，执照；vt.允许，容许；vi.容许

参考例句：

• The doctor will not permit mother up until her leg is better.在母亲的腿好些之前,医生不允许她起床。
• The soldiers had orders to permit no stranger through.士兵们接到命令不许任何陌生人通过。

8 standing   

n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的

参考例句：

• After the earthquake only a few houses were left standing.地震过后只有几幢房屋还立着。
• They're standing out against any change in the law.他们坚决反对对法律做任何修改。

9 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。

10 fireplace   

n.壁炉，炉灶

参考例句：

• The fireplace smokes badly.这壁炉冒烟太多。
• I think we should wall up the fireplace.我想应该封住壁炉。

11 exploration   

n.探险，踏勘，探测

参考例句：

• Their team will undertake exploration for oil.他们队将着手进行石油勘探工作。
• This book is descriptive of a scientific exploration.这本书是描写科学探险的。

12 horrible   

adj.可怕的，极可憎的，极可厌的

参考例句：

• This is a horrible monster.这是一个可怕的怪物。
• That is a horrible accident.那是一次可怕的事故。

13 chimney   

n.烟囱，烟筒；玻璃罩

参考例句：

• The chimney blew out a cloud of black smoke.烟囱里喷出一团黑烟。
• His father is a chimney sweeper.他的父亲是一位扫烟囱的工人。

14 appearance   

n.出现，露面；容貌

参考例句：

• In appearance, he was a little like his father.他看起来有点像他的父亲。
• She was a young woman of good appearance.她是一位年轻貌美的女子。

15 killer   

n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者

参考例句：

• Heart attacks have become Britain's No.1 killer disease.心脏病已成为英国的头号致命疾病。
• The bulk of the evidence points to him as her killer.大量证据证明是他杀死她的。

16 surely   

adv.确实地，无疑地；必定地，一定地

参考例句：

• It'should surely be possible for them to reach an agreement.想必他们可以达成协议。
• Surely we'll profit from your work.我们肯定会从你的工作中得到益处。

17 Frenchman   

n.法国人（男） (复 Frenchmen)

参考例句：

• John's house was sold to a Frenchman.约翰的房子卖给了一个法国人。
• He speaks French well enough to pass for a Frenchman.他说法语很流利，很容易被当作法国人。

18 Englishman   

n.(pl.Englishmen)英国人；英国男人

参考例句：

• I was astonished that he was not an Englishman.我很惊讶,他竟不是英国人。
• She stared thoughtfully at the Englishman across the table.她若有所思地盯着桌子对面的那个英国人。

19 separate   

n.分开，抽印本；adj.分开的，各自的，单独的；v.分开，隔开，分居

参考例句：

• Are they joined together or separate?它们是合在一起还是分开的？
• Separate the white clothes from the dark clothes before laundering.洗衣前应当把浅色衣服和深色衣服分开。

20 learned   

adj.有学问的，博学的；learn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He went into a rage when he learned about it.他听到这事后勃然大怒。
• In this little village,he passed for a learned man.在这个小村子里，他被视为有学问的人。

21 killers   

凶手( killer的名词复数 )； 消灭…者； 致命物； 极难的事

参考例句：

• He remained steadfast in his determination to bring the killers to justice. 他要将杀人凶手绳之以法的决心一直没有动摇。
• They were professional killers who did in John. 杀死约翰的这些人是职业杀手。

22 lower   

adj.较低的；地位较低的，低等的；低年级的；下游的；vt.放下，降下，放低；减低

参考例句：

• Society is divided into upper,middle and lower classes.社会分为上层、中层和下层阶级。
• This price is his minimum;he refuses to lower it any further.这个价格是他开的最低价，他拒绝再作任何降价。

23 iron   

n.铁，熨斗，坚强，烙铁，镣铐；vt.烫平，熨，用铁包；vi. 烫衣服

参考例句：

• The iron has lost its magnetic force.这块铁已失去了磁力。
• We need an electrician to mend the iron.我们要请电工修理熨斗。

24 nail   

n.钉子，指甲；vt.用钉钉牢，使固定，使集中于，揭露

参考例句：

• He drove a nail into the wall.他把钉子钉在墙上。
• In order to hang the picture,he had to hammer a nail.为了挂那幅画，他必须钉枚钉子。

25 possess   

vt.持有，占有，使拥有，克制，支配，迷住

参考例句：

• To possess wealth is not always to be happy.拥有财富未必一定幸福。
• Some animals possess the characteristic of man.有些动物具有人类的特征。

26 crimes   

n.罪，罪行，犯罪( crime的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The courts were empowered to impose the death sentence for certain crimes. 法院有权因某些罪行判处罪犯死刑。
• The two crimes are apparently unconnected. 这两起犯罪显然没有关联。

27 known   

adj.大家知道的；知名的，已知的

参考例句：

• He is a known artist.他是一个知名的艺术家。
• He is known both as a painter and as a statesman.他是知名的画家及政治家。

28 attach   

v.附上，使依恋，爱慕

参考例句：

• I do not attach much weight to the theory.我不十分重视这学说。
• I advise you not to attach yourself to the party.我劝你不要参加这个党。