A Private View

A Private View is a 1952 detective novel by the British writer Michael Innes.

[1][2] It is the thirteenth in his series featuring John Appleby, now an Assistant Commissioner in the Metropolitan Police.

It also features the characters of Inspector Cadover and the Duke of Horton who had previously appeared in What Happened at Hazelwood and Hamlet, Revenge!

Appleby accompanies his wife to a Private view at an art gallery featuring an exhibition of paintings by a young artist murdered several days earlier.

While he is there, the last work ever painted by him is stolen in plain view, which Appleby at first takes to be part of a publicity stunt by the gallery's owner.