Black Plumes

In Black Plumes (1940), Frances Ivory finds herself caught in a web of unsettling events at her family’s London-based art gallery and adjacent home while her father is abroad. Strange incidents—such as a broken vase, a burned catalogue, and a slashed painting—undermine her peace and point suspicion toward her stepsister’s manipulative husband, Robert Madrigal
Margery Allingham
She Reads Novels
.

To thwart Robert’s attempts to push Frances into marrying his repugnant assistant, Henry Lucar, Frances agrees to a faux engagement with the painter David Field, whose artwork was vandalized
She Reads Novels
Literary Potpourri
. But this maneuver only deepens the intrigue. After an explosive disagreement with David, Robert vanishes—only to be discovered dead, hidden away in a cupboard
Margery Allingham
Literary Potpourri
.

As suspicion falls on those closest to her, particularly Lucar and Field, Frances must question her loyalty, her burgeoning love, and her own judgment. Though Inspector Bridie from Orkney is brought in, it’s Frances’s perspective and the intimidating presence of her 90-year-old grandmother, Gabrielle, that drive the suspense in this atmospheric and cleverly plotted standalone mystery