A QUESTION OF TRUST

A QUESTION OF TRUST

By VICTOR CANNING

Horace Danby collects rare books, breaking safes and finances his hobby. But this year a pretty young lady has caught him pretending to be the house owner's wife. She tricks him to open the safety door and hand over to her the jewels. Horace is arrested later for the theft of the jewel.

CHARACTERS:

HORACE DANBY: Horace Danby is a lock-opening expert who is caught for a jewellery robbery by trusting a woman who has claimed to be a family member of the house owner.

THE UNKNOWN WOMAN: The unknown woman is a smart thief who uses Horace’s ability to open the safety door.

SUMMARY

Horace Danby had a good reputation in society. He was about fifty years old and unmarried. He ran a lock making business and had two assistants. However, Horace was not honest. He loved rare and expensive books. Horace robbed a safe every year to finance his expensive hobby.

Horace had been studying the country house at Shotover Grange for two weeks, whose owners normally lived in London. He wanted to burgle in that house the jewellery that was lying in the safe. One day when the servants were away, Horace entered the house. He had an allergy to flowers known as hay fever. He began to sneeze. He heard the voice of a lady then. She told him a cure for the sneeze.

She was pretty and young. His first idea was to run, as the lady told him to call the police. Horace told her to let him go and forget she had ever seen him.

The lady made one condition for letting Horace go. She told him that she had promised her husband to take her jewels to the bank. However, she had left the jewels in the safe, because she wanted to wear the jewels in a party that night. She came down to get them but had forgotten the number combination to open the safe. So she needed his help to break open the safe. Horace, therefore, opened the safe and gave her the jewels to get his freedom.

After two days a policeman arrested him for the jewel theft at Shotover Grange. Horace’s fingerprints were found all over the room. Horace had opened the safe without using his gloves. He informed the police that he had been ordered to open the safe by the lady of the house. But the actual lady was a sixty-year-old woman. She said that the story of Horace was nonsense. Horace, then, realised that the pretty young woman had used his skill to steal the jewel.

Horace is now an assistant librarian in prison. Sometimes he thinks about the young, beautiful and clever woman, who was also in the same profession as him. But she had simply fooled him. So he gets angry when someone says 'honour among thieves'.

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WORD MEANING

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Housekeeper – a person looking after the domestic work in a house.

Hay fever – disease affecting the nose and throat caused by allergy to pollen or dust.

Respectable – regarded as good by people.

Served – spent.

Sentence – punishment.

Safe – strong locked box storing valuable things.

Grange – a big house in a rural area.

Tickle – itching.

 

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Make him happy – keep him satisfied.

Fingerprints – marks left by fingers.

Wondered – thought.

Room – space.

Burglar alarm – alarm to warn about thieves.

Hindering – delaying.

 

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One with firmness in it – determined.

Ornaments – decorations.

Inconvenience – trouble.

Get you – arrest you.

 

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Hate the thought of – don’t like.

Desperate – without any hope.

Wrong kind of people – criminals.

Mended – repaired.

 

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Look for – steal from.

Sharp-tongued – using harsh language.

Charming – friendly and likeable.

In the same profession – doing the same work.

Honour – respect for each other.

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1. What does Horace Danby like to collect?

Answer: Horace Danby likes to collect rare and expensive books.

2. Why does Horace Danby steal every year?

Answer: Every year, Horace Danby steals so that he can buy the rare and expensive books that he loved to collect.

3. Who is speaking to Horace Danby?

Answer: A lady standing at the door is speaking to Horace Danby. She was pretty young and was dressed in red. She appeared to be one of the members of the family living in Shotover Grange. 

4. Who is the real culprit in the story?

Answer: The real culprit in the story is the woman who said that she was a member of the family living at Shotover Grange. She fooled Horace Danby into believing her, and cleverly took away all the jewels kept in the safe. 

5. Did you begin to suspect, before the end of the story, that the lady was not the person Horace Danby took her to be? If so, at what point did you realise this, and how?

Answer: Yes, we began to suspect before the end of the story that the lady was not the person Horace Danby took her to be. Once she saw Horace, she was surprisingly calm. This seemed strange. It seemed suspicious when she did not contact the police and instead asked Horace to take out all the jewels from the safe, even if it meant breaking it open. Besides, it appeared extremely unlikely that she would forget the number combination to open the safe. It is therefore obvious, before the story was over, that the lady was not the person Horace had taken her to be.

6. What are the subtle ways in which the lady manages to deceive Horace Danby into thinking she is the lady of the house? Why doesn’t Horace suspect that something is wrong?

Answer: Her relaxed walk, her familiarity with the dog Sherry and her act of touching up her make-up and the ease with which she selects a cigarette from the right spot are sufficient to deceive anybody.

Horace is too frightened to think properly, so he doesn’t suspect anything.

7. ‘Horace Danby was good and respectable – but not completely honest.’ Why do you think this description is apt for Horace? Why can’t he be categorised as a typical thief?

Answer: Horace’s habits were not typical of a thief. He loved books. He used to steal only once in a year. However, an act of theft is still a crime, regardless of how well a thief behaves, so this description is apt for Horace. He can’t be categorised as a typical thief because he is not a regular offender like other thieves.

8. Horace Danby was a meticulous planner but still, he faltered. Where did he go wrong and why?

Answer: Horace Danby did not get enough information about the real inhabitants of the house. He seemed to be too busy with the collection of information concerning the house map, wiring and location of valuable objects. While he was smart enough to know the actual name of the dog, he did not know about the occupants of the house. When he landed in trouble with the appearance of the young lady, his smart thoughts gave way to carelessness and led him to open the safe without wearing gloves.

9. Do you think Horace Danby was unfairly punished, or that he deserved what he got?

Answer: Horace Danby deserved what he got. A crime is a crime, regardless of whether it is committed for your or somebody else’s benefit.

10. Do intentions justify actions? Would you, like Horace Danby, do something wrong if you thought your ends justified the means? Do you think that there are situations in which it is excusable to act less than honestly?

Answer: “Ends do not justify means”, is a very old and proven saying. Nobody should harm others for their benefit. But this world doesn’t function on idealism. There are many examples of people tricking others for quick gains. These actions must be regretted and seriously dealt with.

11. Whom did Horace Danby see in the kitchen? How did they greet each other? What tact did Horace apply there?

Answer: Horace Danby saw the family dog, Sherry, in the kitchen. The dog greeted Horace with stirring, making a noise and a welcoming wagging of its tail. Horace greeted the dog by calming it down tactfully, calling it by its name and showing it love.

12. How did Danby prepare for the robbery at Shotover Grange?

Or

How did Horace Danby plan his robberies?

Answer: Horace Danby always carefully planned his robberies. He planned for the robbery at Shotover Grange by studying the house, electrical wiring, paths and garden. He knew that the family was usually staying in the city and knew about the movements of the servants, who had gone out that afternoon. His tools packed in a bag were kept ready.

13. What was the passion of Horace Danby and how did he satisfy it?

Answer: Horace Danby's passion was collecting rare and expensive books. He needed money to indulge this desire and arranged it by robbing one safe every year and then secretly buying the books through an agent.

14. Describe the safe at Shotover Grange.

Or

Where was the safe at Shotover Grange? What was there inside it? What did Horace expect to get if he sold them one by one?

Answer: The safe at Shotover Grange was kept in the drawing-room behind a poor painting and had jewels worth about 15000 pounds kept in it. There was a malfunctioning burglar alarm but could be opened only through a specific code. Horace expected to get 5000 pounds if he sold them one by one.

15. How can you say that Horace Danby was good and respectable but not completely honest?

Answer: Horace Danby was good and respectable because he was a specialist in his profession of making locks. Yet because he loved to collect rare and expensive books, every year he robbed a safe to finance the purchase of these books through an agent. Thus he was not completely honest. 

16. How did flowers hinder Horace in his work?

Answer: Flowers hindered Horace in his work because he had hay fever, an allergy to pollen or dust condition that irritated the nose and throat. Due to this problem, whenever he came close to flowers, he began to sneeze and could be caught.

17. Why was Horace Danby sure that his robbery at Shotover range would b a successful one?

Answer: Horace Danby was sure he would be successful with his robbery at Shotover Grange as he had studied the house, the drawing-room where the safe was kept, the wiring and its garden. He had also observed the servants' movement, so he had planned well, thus ensuring that nothing could go wrong.

18. What are the subtle ways in which the lady manages to deceive Horace Danby into thinking she is the mistress of the house?

Answer: Her beauty, charming ease, intelligence, patience, way of talking confidently and familiarity with the household are the subtle ways in which the lady manages to deceive Horace Danby into thinking she is the mistress of the house. She even threatens to get him arrested, which convinces Horace Danby that she is genuine.

19. What did Horace Danby wonder about for a moment? What did he think and decide?

Answer: Horace Danby wondered for a moment if he should collect paintings instead of books when he saw the poor painting in front of the safe. But then, he thought that books were better in a small house as his, as paintings took up too much room.