Pinkie

Pinkie is the central villain of Brighton Rock and the dominant figure of the novel. Much of Greene's narrative is dedicated to following Pinkie in his struggle to control the ramifications of his first murder. He is a sixteen-year-old thug who leads a much older gang in Brighton and obsesses about eternal damnation.

Pinkie enters the novel unobtrusively, antagonizing his eventual victim Fred Hale in the first chapter. Hale, a journalist, wrote an article about Brighton crime that somehow led to the killing of Pinkie's crime mentor, Kite. Pinkie and his gang kill Hale and make it look like natural causes. Rose, a waitress at a local restaurant, becomes wise to the killing, but is fascinated by Pinkie's vicious allure. Pinkie takes Rose on a date to feel out her knowledge of the gang. Soon, he resolves to marry her to prevent her being able to testify against...