Double Indemnity

Double Indemnity (1936) is a crime thriller novel by American novelist, journalist, and screenwriter James Mallahan Cain. Double Indemnity follows Walter Huff, an insurance agent who is seduced by Phyllis Nirdlinger into killing Phyllis’ husband for an insurance fraud scheme to collect 50 thousand dollars. “Double indemnity” is a clause in a life insurance policy that doubles the policy’s value if the policyholder dies in an accident.

James M. Cain was a pioneer of American crime fiction, and Double Indemnity is considered a classic that solidified many tropes of the genre. Double Indemnity was a success and adapted into a successful film in 1944 by director Billy Wilder. Like the novel, the film is considered one of the first classic noirs of its medium.

This guide uses the 1992 Black Lizard edition of the novel.

Content Warning: Double Indemnity includes suicide, violence, murder, substance abuse, anti-fat bias, and biased views on women and racial minorities.

Plot Summary

Walter Huff is a 34-year-old insurance agent for General Fidelity of California. One day he remembers that a client, Mr. Nirdlinger, is due for an automobile insurance renewal and pays Nirdligner a visit. ­Huff narrates the novel as a confession after murdering Nirdlinger and calls Nirdlinger’s home a “House of Death” (3). At the House of Death, he meets Phyllis Nirdlinger, whose husband is not home. Phyllis asks about taking out a secret life insurance policy on her husband, and Huff guesses that she means to murder her husband. Phyllis seduces Huff and the two begin an affair.

Phyllis visits Huff at his home and expresses regret over the affair. Huff sees her ruse and says that she wants to kill her husband. He wants to help her kill her husband in order to have her to himself along with the money from the insurance plan. Huff is a veteran insurance agent and has seen all sorts of fraudulent claims, which puts him in a position to fool insurance companies. Phyllis denies Huff’s accusations at first but then reveals that he is correct.

Huff plans to try to sell accident insurance to Mr. Nirdlinger with witnesses present to attest that Nirdlinger turned it down. Huff sells Nirdlinger auto insurance, but one of the copies Nirdlinger unknowingly signs contains the accident insurance policy. The witness Phyllis brought is Nirdlinger’s 19-year-old daughter, Lola. Afterwards, Huff drives Lola down to the movie theater, but Lola is secretly going to see her boyfriend Sachetti. Huff agrees to keep this secret.

Lola and Sachetti visit Huff the next day to get a loan on Sachetti’s car, so that Sachetti can finish his schooling and get a degree. Huff agrees and secures a copy of Sachetti’s car key.

Huff visits Nirdlinger and lies to him to secure a check for the exact amount of the accident insurance policy, securing the policy and making it seem as if Nirdlinger took it out in secret.

After the policy is secured, Phyllis and Huff set the murder in motion. The two are stumped until Nirdlinger breaks his leg. They decide that Phyllis will persuade Nirdlinger to take a train to his class reunion now that he can’t drive.

The two murder Nirdlinger on the way to the train station. Huff disguises himself as Nirdlinger, complete with a foot cast and crutches. Huff gets on the train and climbs off the back after the train begins moving. Huff and Phyllis leave Nirdlinger’s body on the tracks, as if he fell off and broke his neck. They pull off the murder without a trace left behind.

Huff and Phyllis’s relationship deteriorates after the murder. The police report the murder as a suicide or accident.

Barton Keyes, another agent at General Fidelity, becomes suspicious about Nirdlinger’s death. He knows that the “suicide” doesn’t match any known statistics on suicide. The policy payout is $50,000 dollars, which was an astronomical amount of money in the 1930a. The insurance company plans to stall and potentially refuse to pay Phyllis. Keyes suspects Phyllis murdered her husband. Huff panics and fears that Keyes will learn the truth.

Lola believes Phyllis murdered her father. Lola’s mother was Nirdlinger’s previous wife and Phyllis’s best friend. Her mother died under mysterious circumstances and Lola believes Phyllis is responsible for her death, too. Lola and Huff grow close and Huff falls in love with her. He is haunted by his guilt over what he did to Lola’s father.

Huff learns from Keyes that Sachetti is visiting Phyllis on a daily basis. Keyes believes Sachetti is her accomplice, while Huff believes Phyllis played him for a fool and plans on betraying him for Sachetti.

Phyllis files her insurance claim and General Fidelity refuses to pay, causing her to sue. Huff pursues Lola. He wants to help her get over Sachetti’s apparent affair with Phyllis, but Lola still loves him and cannot move on. Huff feels cornered and plans to murder Phyllis to cover his tracks. He plans on framing Sachetti by stealing his car at night and shooting Phyllis in an isolated park after he establishes an alibi of being at the theater. Huff plants his own car in the park as a getaway vehicle. He tells Phyllis they need to meet, but when he gets to the park she shoots him first. He manages to get to his own car before passing out.

Keyes waits in the hospital for Huff to wake up. Keyes explains that the police found Huff in his car with Lola and Sachetti trying to unlock the door to help him. The police believe Sachetti shot him, and Lola thinks so as well.

Keyes explains that Sachetti’s father was a doctor and Phyllis worked for him. Several children died under mysterious circumstances while under Phyllis’s care. One of those children was an heir to inheritance that Phyllis wanted; the other children were murdered as a cover-up. Sachetti’s father was disgraced after the deaths. There is no evidence Phyllis killed the children, but she is the common element between every death. Sachetti has been looking for evidence of Phyllis’s crimes and started an affair to find evidence. Keyes also believes Sachetti shot Huff. Huff confesses to murdering Nirdlinger to save Lola from police interrogation.

Keyes gives Huff a way out because he wants to save the company reputation. Keyes wants Huff to write him a complete confession in full and mail it to him, which will arrive after Huff gets on a boat Keyes has arranged to take Huff to Mexico. Huff agrees to the plan. Huff discovers that Phyllis is on the same boat. They learn that Sachetti and Lola are soon to be married. Phyllis and Huff have nothing ahead of them in life and discuss marriage. They settle on dying by suicide together. Huff writes one last note in his ship cabin before the two drown themselves in the ocean at night.