# The Secret Agent — Character guide

> Key figures in The Secret Agent by Joseph Conrad.

- [Mr. Verloc](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/mr_verloc.md): Verloc sells dubious photographs and sundries from a Soho storefront while quietly serving as a paid informer, a man whose entire method is to be overlooked. His marriage, his household, and his anarchist acquaintances a
- [Mrs. Verloc](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/mrs_verloc.md): She keeps the shop, keeps house, and keeps her simple-minded brother Stevie close, having chosen Verloc as a husband chiefly because he offered the boy a home. Her manner is stony and practical, her gaze deliberately tur
- [Comrade Ossipon](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/comrade_ossipon.md): Ossipon talks revolution in pubs and meeting rooms while quietly pocketing money from women he charms and abandons, his physique impressive and his moral substance thin. He is both drawn to and intimidated by the cold li
- [Stevie](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/stevie.md): Stevie is Winnie's younger brother, a boyish figure with a horror of cruelty and a habit of drawing circles on paper when his feelings overwhelm him. He adores Mr. Verloc with a doglike devotion that his brother-in-law f
- [Chief Inspector Heat](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/chief_inspector_heat.md): Heat has spent decades building a quiet network of informers and a settled conviction about how the revolutionary underworld should be policed, and he resents interference from above. He regards Verloc as his own propert
- [Mr. Vladimir](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/mr_vladimir.md): Vladimir is the First Secretary of a foreign embassy, a man of polished manners and genuine scorn for the exiles he is supposed to be managing. He regards the British police as complacent and the revolutionists as fat an
- [Michaelis](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/michaelis.md): Michaelis moves through the anarchist circles of London as a figure of gentleness rather than menace, his long imprisonment having left him passive and contemplative. He depends on the hospitality of a rich lady who take
- [Sir Ethelred](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/sir_ethelred.md): A high-ranking government official overseeing the police investigation.
- [Toodles](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/toodles.md): Sir Ethelred's private secretary, a minor functionary.
- [Baron Stott-Wartenheim](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/baron_stott_wartenheim.md): The deceased former ambassador, mentioned in the author's note.
- [Karl Yundt](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/karl_yundt.md): An elderly, toothless anarchist who talks of violence but is inactive.
- [Adolf](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/adolf.md): A minor character, possibly a waiter or assistant at the anarchist meeting place.
- [The Perfect Anarchist](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/the_perfect_anarchist.md): A theoretical figure discussed by the anarchists, not a real character.
- [Mother](https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters/mother.md): Mrs. Verloc's mother, who moves out to a charity home.

HTML index: https://www.betterreads.dev/discover/the_secret_agent_se/characters