Walter Huff

At the beginning of Double Indemnity Walter Huff is portrayed as a very ordinary huckster, well-known to almost every hard-working citizen--the insurance salesman. He appears a little self-important, eager to display his knowledge of the insurance game and ready to prove how smart he is to get past the maid who answers the door at a client's home. He tells his story in a direct, blunt way but with a sense of style that comes through in comments like, "Once you're in, they've got to listen to you, and you can pretty near rate an agent by how quick he gets to the family sofa, with his hat on one side of him and his dope sheets on the other."

He possesses a self-image as someone who is just a shade cleverer than other people, and this misperception is his fatal flaw. In particular, he harbors a...