Without the minor characters the story "A Separate Peace" would be missing major points and it wouldn’t run smoothly. The minor characters in the story play an important role in the way the story falls together and in causing Finny to die. The minor characters in this story set up kind of props for other things to happen in the story. For example Brinker’s conflict with Gene. The first part of the conflict begins in the butt room where Brinker brings Gene after Finny has his fall. Brinker tries to tell everyone that Gene in fact did knock ....