Double Indemnity
Cover Artist: not identifiedBy: Cain, James M.
Publisher: Avon Book Co. (137)
Place of Publication:New York, NY
Catalog #: Kelley Box 211: PS3505 .A3113 D68 1947
Contributor: J. Lukin
General
Era: 1930sAuthor as on Cover: James M. Cain
Publication:1947
Original Date: 1943
Setting: urban; middle-class residences and offices, a train heading north, a ship heading south
Plot Summary
Insurance salesman Walter Huff has long fantasized of a method whereby one could bilk an insurance company for a bundle of cash and not be found out. When he meets seductive and amoral Phyllis Nirdlinger, who has reasons for wanting her husband dead, Walter falls into her arms and her scheme. Together they concoct a plan by which they can set up the husband's "accidental" death, collect $50,000 from his insurance company, and leave no evidence enabling the company to challenge the claim. But Walter isn't invulnerable: his sentimental fondness for Phyllis's stepdaughter combines with Phyllis's psychopathic greed to put him in a position where he is more the victim than the aggressor.Major Characters
Keyes adult male, middle-aged, big, fat, tough, insurance investigator who's nostalgic for the days when everyone at the firm was as obsessively rigorous as he isYoung Norton adult male, 35 years old, small, pudgy insurance executive, too cautious to discover the truth
Beniamino Sachetti a.k.a. Nino, adult male, 26 years old, graduate student in chemistry with a passion for justice
Walter Huff adult male, 33 years old, handsome, self-educated, insurance salesman
Phyllis Belden Nirdlinger adult female, 32 years old, shapely blonde, formerly a nurse
H.S. Nirdlinger adult male, 44 years old, big and blocky, a Stanford graduate and oil executive
Lola Nirdlinger adolescent female, 19 years old, bright and pretty