Character Clues
Character Analysis
Family Life
The opening chapter of this book, when Kate Croy goes to visit her father Lionel, explains the bind that Kate is in. It also contributes a whole lot to James' characterization of Kate. Throughout the rest of this book, Kate is going to do some pretty selfish things, not the least of which is trying to get her fiancé to marry a dying girl in order to scam her out of her money.
By showing us just what an awful person Kate's father is, James sets us up to be more understanding of Kate's actions. Of course she's is going to be cynical and selfish: her role model is the most cynical and selfish person on earth. In fact, we almost want to give Kate credit for not turning out worse.
Actions
Kate shows us just how conniving she can be when she advises her fiancé Merton to marry the terminally ill Milly Theale in order to inherit her money after she dies. Now, this might be because Kate loves Merton more than anything. But it might also be because Kate likes to get what she wants no matter what it takes to get it.
For his part, Merton is totally not cool with Kate's plan. But he goes along with it anyway, which tells us he's kind of spineless. And when the dude does show some backbone, he doesn't do it in a good way. He all but blackmails Kate into having sex with him by promising that he'll blow their scheme out of the water if she doesn't.
The only real saint in this book seems to be Milly Theale, but even she's willing to perform little deceptions in order to feel like she has some sort of control over her fading life. All in all, characters' actions in this book speak louder than words. And what they're saying is, "All of these characters exist in a moral gray area." Everyone exists on a Jerk-to-Angel spectrum, with someone like Kate's dad Lionel being at the Jerk end and Milly Theale being at the Angel end.
Clothing
They say that clothes make the man.
James doesn't spend a whole lot of time focusing on clothing in this book, but he gives us a great description of Merton's wardrobe in order to give us a sense of what kind of character he is. Meeting Merton for the first time, we read that, "It was a little the fault of his aspect, his personal marks, which made it almost impossible to name his profession" (1.2.1.1).
In other words, Merton's clothing makes it almost impossible to figure out what he does for a living. The guy's clothing helps to characterize him as someone who's very hard to place in England's class system. On the one hand, he doesn't have much money. But on the other hand, he takes good care of himself and is very intelligent. Making Merton's clothing ambiguous helps James set up Merton as someone the reader shouldn't expect to fit into a neat category.
Social Status
Merton's low social status might not tell us much about his character, but Maud Lowder's reaction to his low social status tells us a whole lot about her. Maud has high, high hopes for her niece Kate: she wants Kate to marry into upper crust of England's elite. As a poor journalist, Merton doesn't really fit into this vision.
Kate understands that her aunt will never accept Merton if he's a penniless nobody, so she hatches a plan to get Merton married to Milly Theale so he can inherit her money after she has died. Merton, being a good dude, doesn't like the plan. Even after he has inherited Milly's money he forces Kate to choose between him and the money.
This is by way of testing whether she cares more about him or his perceived value. Merton obviously doesn't care about class, and Maud Lowder very much does. The question of how much Kate cares about social status, though, remains ambiguous even at the end of this book.
Thoughts and Opinions
In Merton's opinion, marrying a terminally ill girl for her money is not a cool thing to do. Good job, Mert. The fact that Merton thinks this suggests that he's a moral guy.
But the fact that he doesn't necessarily act on this opinion suggests that there's a gap between his feelings and actions. And that, folks, is what a philosopher would call moral weakness, which is when you know the right thing to do but don't do it. This gap, in fact, pretty much defines Merton as a character for most of this book.
It's only when he's asked to lie directly to Milly's face that his moral compass takes over and finally controls his actions. Kate Croy, meanwhile, is of the opinion that Merton should have told Milly he loved her so the poor girl could die happily. But Kate also believes that it's fine to marry a girl and wait for her to die in order to inherit her money.
Huh. Maybe these two are meant for each other.