 The sailor offers to pay a reward , but Dupin is interested only in learning the circumstances behind the two murders . The sailor explains that he captured the orangutan while in Borneo and brought it back to Paris , but had trouble keeping it under control . When he saw the orangutan attempting to shave its face with his straight razor , imitating his morning grooming , it fled into the streets and reached the Rue Morgue , where it climbed up and into the house . The orangutan seized the mother by the hair and was waving the razor , imitating a barber ; when she screamed in fear , it flew into a rage , ripped her hair out , slashed her throat , and strangled the daughter . The sailor climbed up the lightning rod in an attempt to catch the animal , and the two voices heard by witnesses belonged to it and to him . Fearing punishment by its master , the orangutan threw the mother 's body out the window and stuffed the daughter into the chimney before fleeing . 
