Joseph Conrad himself considered "The Secret Agent" to be one of his best novels. At the center of the plot is a infernal betrayal of trust: the small shop owner Verloc lives with his wife Winnie and her mentally disabled brother Stevie in the Soho district of London. In reality, however, Verloc is an informant for embassy employee Wladimir, for whom he writes reports on the anarchist scene. He also receives the order from him to carry out a bombing at the observatory in Greenwich to incite the sluggish British police against the anarchists. Verloc chooses the friendly and trusting Stevie for this task, who, however, is torn apart by the bomb that explodes too early. Only by chance does Winnie learn days later what her husband has done to her helpless brother.