The Earl of Rockhaven calls on his friend the Vicar, the Reverend Simon Wolverham, to ask if his beautiful daughter, Lucinda, will pretend to be his own daughter, Muriel, who is away in Scotland staying with her aunt. Fortunately the girls have similar looks and Lucinda could easily be taken for Muriel.

The Earl explains to the Vicar that a certain Baron Schlesinger and his son, Kurt, from Germany have invited themselves to luncheon at his nearby ancestral home and are insistent that his daughter is present for the occasion.

They want the Earl’s help in planning a ball in London and another one in Berlin for the Baron’s daughter at which the German Kaiser will be present. However, the Earl is sure that what they really want is information about a unique gun which his son, Ivan, has invented and wishes to keep top secret at all costs, particularly from the Germans.

Lucinda has known Ivan since she was a child and she shares his love of horses and riding as well as the lovely countryside. She is deeply suspicious of the Germans’ motives in planning these balls as she feels that it is just a pretext for finding out what they can about Ivan’s gun as it could be of considerable use for Germany’s growing Army and Navy, which at some stage might be a menace to England.

How Lucinda helps the Earl and Ivan entertain the Germans and help them with the two balls. How she finds the Baron’s son, Kurt, very frightening and unpleasant. And how, when they reach Berlin, Lucinda finds intrigue and love, is all told in this exciting and romantic novel by BARBARA CARTLAND.

Barbara Cartland was the world’s most prolific novelist who wrote an amazing 723 books in her lifetime, of which no less than 644 were romantic novels with worldwide sales of over 1 billion copies and her books were translated into 36 different languages. As well as romantic novels, she wrote historical biographies, 6 autobiographies, theatrical plays and books of advice on life, love, vitamins and cookery. She wrote her first book at the age of 21 and it was called Jigsaw. It became an immediate bestseller and sold 100,000 copies in hardback in England and all over Europe in translation. Between the ages of 77 and 97 she increased her output and wrote an incredible 400 romances as the demand for her romances was so strong all over the world.

She wrote her last book at the age of 97 and it was entitled perhaps prophetically The Way to Heaven. Her books have always been immensely popular in the United States where in 1976 her current books were at numbers 1 & 2 in the B. Dalton bestsellers list, a feat never achieved before or since by any author. Barbara Cartland became a legend in her own lifetime and will be best remembered for her wonderful romantic novels so loved by her millions of readers throughout the world, who have always collected her books to read again and again, especially when they feel miserable or depressed. Her books will always be treasured for their moral message, her pure and innocent heroines, her handsome and dashing heroes, her blissful happy endings and above all for her belief that the power of love is more important than anything else in everyone’s life.