In the novel Ordeal by Innocence, Superintendent Huish was the police officer who handled the first investigation into the murder of Rachel Argyle some two years before the events im the book. This resulted in Jacko Argyle being convicted. When Jacko is granted a posthumous pardon based on information provided by Arthur Calgary, the Rachel Argyle case is reopened and Huish has to take up the trail again.
Huish is described as a tall, sad looking man, with an air of melancholy "so profound that no one would have believed that he could be the life and soul of a children’s party...." Arthur Calgary also thought Huish to be "one of the most depressed and gloomy-looking men he had ever seen." He appeared so profoundly disillusioned that Calgary supposed his career must have been a long series of failures. In actual fact Huish was extremely successful in his job.