The Secret Agent · Chapter
V explained
Chief Inspector Heat reflects on anarchism as mere disorderly conduct, contrasting it with the serious sport of catching thieves.
What happens
Chief Inspector Heat reflects on anarchism as mere disorderly conduct, contrasting it with the serious sport of catching thieves. He reports to the Assistant Commissioner that all known anarchists are accounted for, but the investigation into the Greenwich bombing suggests two men were involved. Meanwhile, the Professor walks through London, nursing his fanatical ambition to destroy public faith in legality, feeling both powerful and isolated. He encounters Heat in a narrow alley, where their tense exchange reveals the Professor's readiness to die and his contempt for conventional morality.
Themes in this chapter
Anarchism and Terrorism
The chapter contrasts Heat's view of anarchism as mere disorder with the Professor's fanatical belief in violence as a tool to destroy social order.
Psychology of Crime
Heat's professional mindset sees thieves as normal criminals, while the Professor's psychology is driven by a puritanical ambition and a desire for power through destruction.
Isolation and Alienation
The Professor feels lost in the crowd, finding solace only in his hermitage-like room, and his encounter with Heat underscores his alienation from society.
Characters to notice
- Chief Inspector Heat
Dismisses anarchism as foolishness and lunacy, preferring the clear rules of thief-catching. Reports to the Assistant Commissioner and later confronts the Professor in a tense alley.
- The Perfect Anarchist
Walks through London, meditating on his power and his plan to shatter social order. His encounter with Heat reveals his fanaticism and willingness to die.
- Assistant Commissioner
Receives Heat's report on the bombing investigation, noting that the public will see their lack of answers as ignorance.
Key passages
“Truth to say, Chief Inspector Heat thought but little of anarchism. He did not attach undue importance to it, and could never bring himself to consider it seriously. It had more the character of disorderly conduct; disorderly without the human excuse of drunkenness, which at any rate implies good feeling and an amiable leaning towards festivity.”
Chief Inspector Heat dismissed anarchism as trivial, likening it to mere rowdiness without the redeeming quality of drunkenness.
Highlights Heat's contempt for anarchists as a criminal class.
“The Professor’s indignation found in itself a final cause that absolved him from the sin of turning to destruction as the agent of his ambition. To destroy public faith in legality was the imperfect formula of his pedantic fanaticism; but the subconscious conviction that the framework of an established social order cannot be effectually shattered except by some form of collective or individual violence was precise and correct.”
The Professor justified his destructive ambition as a moral mission to undermine faith in law, believing violence was the only way to break society's structure.
Reveals the Professor's self-justification and fanatical ideology.
“Chief Inspector Heat was, of course, not insensible to the gravity of moral differences. But neither were the thieves he had been looking after. They submitted to the severe sanctions of a morality familiar to Chief Inspector Heat with a certain resignation.”
Heat recognized that thieves, like himself, operated within a shared moral framework, unlike anarchists who rejected it entirely.
Contrasts Heat's view of conventional criminals with anarchists.