Previous Year Questions: A Question of Trust | English Class 10 PDF Download

Ans: Horace Danby planned to rob a house but encountered a young lady in the house. Claiming the safe to contain her jewels, she tricked him into opening it. She fooled Danby into thinking she was another thief. Finally, he was caught by the police and at last, he realised that he was just fooled by another thief who claimed to be the owner's wife.

Ans: The phrase 'honour among thieves' means that thieves would never cheat each other in their deeds. Horace gets angry at this phrase because he got cheated by another thief while he was in the midst of his planned robbery. He mistook the lady thief as the madam of the house and opened the safe for her so that she could have those jewels. Later when he was arrested, he found out that he was cheated.

Ans: 'Honour among thieves’ is a popular code among thieves to protect themselves from each other. Thieves follow his code and they are not supposed to cheat each other and double cross against themselves. According to this, the thieves help each other. In the story, 'The Question of Trust’, the main protagonist is very careful regarding his theft conducted once a year. But the lady in red, who is thief herself, does not follow the code and breads the code of honour that exists between them. Horace mistake the lady thief as the owner of the house and opened the safe for her so that she could have those jewels. This resulted its him going to the prison for the first time. Horace felt betrayed and his trust broken. 

Ans: Horace Danby was sure of his success in that year's robbery because he had gained enough information about the house he had planned to rob. He had been studying the house at Shotover Grange, looking at its rooms, its electric wiring, its paths, and its gardens. He even knew about the schedules of the people in the house, which made it easy for him to successfully rob the place.

Ans: Horace Danby was good and respectable but not completely honest because he was not a typical thief. He was fond of books, and to fulfill his desire to have books, he used to steal once every year. He never stole more than his needs. However, no matter how trivial the crime is, it remains a crime. Therefore, he could not be called completely honest.

Ans: Horace Danby was suffering from hay fever. Horace Danby's ailment made him sneeze relentlessly anytime he was in the presence of flowers or the smell of flowers entered his nostrils. It was because of his sneezing that he caught the attention of the gorgeous lady, who asked him to break the safe for her, and eventually got him arrested.

Ans: Horace Danby's hobby was collecting rare and expensive books. In order to fulfill his hobby, Horace would rob a safe every year. He would plan carefully just what to do, stole enough to last a year, and secretly purchased the rare, expensive books from an agent.

Ans: Horace studied the house, its rooms, gardens, electric wires, and all the other details about it quite carefully before the robbery. So, he was sure about the success of his robbery, as he had laid out a perfect plan according to his knowledge.

Ans: Horace suffered from an allergy called ‘hay fever’. So, whenever he came into contact with pollen or dust, he used to sneeze uncontrollably. The flowers kept in the room were making Horace’s nose tickle, and he was scared of getting caught

Ans: In the kitchen, Horace Danby saw a small dog named Sherry. He greeted Sherry in a friendly way, calling the dog by its name. Horace used tact by being kind to Sherry, knowing that it would keep the dog quiet and not raise any alarms.

Ans: Horace Danby had a passion for rare and expensive books. To satisfy it, he robbed safes every year, using the stolen money to secretly buy the books he loved through an agent.