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Birds of a Feather

ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

Maisie Dobbs

Birds of a Feather

A Novel

JACQUELINE WINSPEAR

Copyright © 2004 by Jacqueline Winspear

All rights reserved.

Published by

Soho Press, Inc.

853 Broadway

New York, NY 10003

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Winspear, Jacqueline, 1955–

Birds of a feather / by Jacqueline Winspear.

p. cm.

ISBN 1-56947-368-4 (alk. paper)

1. Women private investigators—England—London—Fiction. 2. Young women—Crimes against—Fiction. 3. Inheritance and succession—Fiction. 4. Children of the rich—Fiction. 5. World War, 1914–1918—Fiction. 6. London (England)—Fiction. 7. Missing persons—Fiction.

I. Title.

PR6123. I575 B57 2004

823'. 92—dc22 2003025732

Designed by Kathleen Lake, Neuwirth & Associates, Inc.

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

To Kenneth Leech

1919–2002

During my childhood I was lucky to have Ken Leech as my teacher. In the years of my growing up and into adulthood, I was privileged to count him among my friends.

How will you fare, sonny, how will you fare

In the far off winter night

When you sit by the fire in the old man’s chair

And your neighbors talk of the fight?

Will you slink away, as it were from a blow,

Your old head shamed and bent?

Or say, “I was not the first to go,

But I went, thank God, I went”?—from the song “Fall In,” by Harold Begbie, 1914

CONTENTS

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

CHAPTER TWENTY

CHAPTER TWENTY - ONE

CHAPTER TWENTY - TWO

CHAPTER TWENTY - THREE

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

CHAPTER ONE

Maisie Dobbs shuffled the papers on her desk into a neat pile and placed them in a plain manila folder. She took up green marble-patterned W. H. Smith fountain pen and inscribed the cover with the name of her new clients: Mr. and Mrs. Herbert Johnson, who were concerned that their son’s fiancée might have misled them regarding her past. It was the sort of case that was easily attended to, that would provide a useful reference, and that could be closed with presentation of a timely report and accompanying account for her services. But for Maisie the case notes would not be filed away until those whose lives were touched by her investigation had reached a certain peace with her findings, with themselves, and with one another—as far as that might be possible. As she wrote, a tendril of jet black hair tumbled down into her eyes. Sighing, she quickly pushed it back into the chignon at the nape of her neck. Suddenly, Maisie set her pen on the blotting pad, pulled the troublesome wisp of hair free so that it hung down again, and walked to the large mirror hanging on the wall above the fireplace. She unpinned her long hair and tucked it inside the collar of her white silk blouse, pulling out just an inch or so around her chin-line. Would shorter hair suit her?

“Perhaps Lady Rowan is right,” said Maisie to her reflection in the mirror. “Perhaps it would look better in a bob. ”