Horatia Winwood is the youngest daughter of a family brought to financial straits via the gambling habits of their menfolk. When the rakish Earl of Rule offers for the oldest daughter in marriage, it might seem to be an ideal situation. However, she is in love with a soldier, so Horatia goes to visit Lord Rule and offers to marry him instead of her beautiful sister. She hopes that he won't mind her eyebrows and stammer! He agrees to the substitution and Horatia throws herself into the fashionable life style with vigour. Rule begins to fall in love with his wife, but she holds him at arm'sĀ length, believing that he is still involved with his ex-mistress. The plot becomes convoluted with a lost brooch, a would-be seducer, a malicious mischief-maker, and a developing love story, and Georgette Heyer keeps her readers intrigued to the lastĀ page.