Class 10 English Footprints without Feet Chapter 4, A Question of Trust by Victor Canning, explores the ironic proverb ‘honour among thieves’ through fifty-year-old locksmith Horace Danby—a ‘good, honest citizen’ who robs one safe a year to buy rare, expensive books, until he is duped at Shotover Grange by a young woman in red who is a thief herself.
What Class 10 English (Footprints without Feet) Chapter 4 Covers
Story Summary: A Question of Trust (Victor Canning) Fifty-year-old unmarried locksmith Horace Danby (who suffers from summer attacks of hay fever and served his only prison sentence fifteen years ago in the prison library) is considered a respectable citizen by everyone, except that he robs one safe every year to secretly buy rare and expensive books through an agent. Having studied the country house at Shotover Grange for two weeks (including a magazine article showing the room plan and that the safe containing $\pounds 15,000$ worth of jewels is hidden behind a poor painting), Horace enters while the servants are at the movies, his nose tickling from a bowl of flowers on the table. Suddenly a quiet, firm voice speaks from the doorway: a pretty young woman dressed in red comes down the stairs, pets the little dog Sherry by name, adjusts the ornaments on the fireplace, and claims to be the owner’s wife who has forgotten the safe combination and needs the jewels for a party that night. Terrified of going back to prison, Horace eagerly takes off his gloves to give her his cigarette lighter, opens the safe for her with his bare hands, and leaves happily—only to be arrested two days later for the jewel robbery because his fingerprints are all over the room and the real mistress of the house is a sixty-year-old grey-haired woman with a sharp tongue. Now assistant librarian in prison, Horace gets very angry whenever anyone mentions ‘honour among thieves’.
Exercises in Chapter 4
- Read and Find Out & Think about It cover what Horace Danby likes to collect and why he steals every year, who the real culprit in the story is, how the young woman in red tricks Horace into opening the safe without his gloves, and why Horace gets angry at the phrase ‘honour among thieves’.
Read Class 10 English (Footprints without Feet) Chapter 4 Online
More Chapters
- Previous: Chapter 3: The Midnight Visitor
- Next: Chapter 5: Footprints without Feet
- All English (Footprints without Feet) chapters and the other Class 10 books: Class 10 NCERT books 2026-27
- All Class 1 to 12 NCERT Textbooks: NCERT Books PDF (Class 1–12)
- Every book chapter by chapter: NCERT chapter wise PDF
FAQ
How did the young lady in red deceive Horace Danby into opening the safe for her?
The young woman in red was a fellow thief who happened to be robbing Shotover Grange at the same time. With complete confidence and composure, she walked down the stairs, called the house dog Sherry by name, touched up her make-up, threatened to call the police, and then pretended to be the lady of the house who had forgotten the safe’s combination and needed her jewels for a party that night. Eager to avoid prison, Horace took off his gloves to light her cigarette and opened the safe for her, leaving his fingerprints everywhere.
Why does Horace Danby get angry when anyone talks about ‘honour among thieves’?
Horace Danby kept his promise to the young woman and trusted her completely, whereas she was a fellow thief who tricked him into doing the burglary for her, took all the jewels, and left him to take the blame and go to prison on the evidence of his bare fingerprints.