From the author of The Scarlet Pimpernel, comes a series of 12 cozy British mysteries featuring one of literature s first female detectives. Molly Robertson-Kirk a.k.a. Lady Molly shares the same mental prowess as C. Auguste Dupin and Sherlock Holmes but brings a woman s wit to the table making for a formidable crime buster. Join her as she solves the crimes that plague the hills and highlands of Inverness, Scotland.

Citizen Chauvelin, of the Committee of Public Safety, presents citizen Fouquier-Tinville, the Public Prosecutor, with the most extraordinary claim:

"The dangerous English spy known to the world as the Scarlet Pimpernel," he says, "is now safely under lock and key. He must be transferred to the Abbaye prison forthwith -- and to the guillotine as quickly as might be. No one is to take any risks this time. There must be no question either of discrediting his famous League, or of obtaining other more valuable information out of him. Such methods have proved disastrous!"

There are no safe Englishmen these days, except the dead ones -- and it will not take citizen Fouquier-Tinville much thought or time to frame an indictment against the notorious Scarlet Pimpernel . . . and "that" will do away with the necessity of a prolonged trial. The revolutionary government is at war with England now, and short work can be made of all poisonous spies!

English novelist and playwright Baroness Emmuska Orczy (1865-1947) achieved enduring success with her novels of politics and intrigue set during the time of the French Revolution.

So it must also come from those members of the Blakeney family in whose veins runs the blood of that Sir Percy Blakeney -- who is known to history as the Scarlet Pimpernel -- for they in a manner are responsible for the telling of this veracious chronicle.

For the past eight years now -- ever since the true story of The Scarlet Pimpernel was put on record by the present author -- these gentle, kind, inquisitive friends have asked me to trace their descent back to an ancestor more remote than was Sir Percy.

Strangely enough his history has never been written before. it is to the man himself -- to the memory of him which is so alive here in Haarlem -- that I am indebted for the true history of his life, and therefore I feel that but little apology is needed for placing the true facts before all those who have known him hitherto only by his picture, who have loved him only for what they guessed.

The monograph which I now present with but few additions of minor details, goes to prove what I myself had known long ago, namely, that the Laughing Cavalier who sat to Frans Hals for his portrait in 1624 was the direct ancestor of Sir Percy Blakeney, known to history as the Scarlet Pimpernel.

"There have been more escapes" -- engineered by a band of Englishmen of unparalleled daring who, in a mad spirit of sheer meddling, devote their spare hours to snatching away lawful victims destined for "Madame la Guillotine!"

No one has seen these mysterious Englishmen. As for their leader, he is never spoken of, save with a superstitious shudder. Scraps of paper appear from some mysterious source -- announcing that the band of meddlesome Englishmen are at work . . . and always it is signed with a singular device drawn in red, of a little star-shaped flower -- called in England the Scarlet Pimpernel.

English novelist and playwright Baroness Emmuska Orczy (1865-1947) achieved her greatest success with her 1905 novel set in the time of Robespierre. Dramatized in collaboration with her husband that same year, in its movie version, starring Leslie Howard and James Mason, "The Scarlet Pimpernel" has become a perennial favorite.

Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. Visit us online at www.1stWorldLibrary.ORG - - A surging, seething, murmuring crowd of beings that are human only in name, for to the eye and ear they seem naught but savage creatures, animated by vile passions and by the lust of vengeance and of hate. The hour, some little time before sunset, and the place, the West Barricade, at the very spot where, a decade later, a proud tyrant raised an undying monument to the nation's glory and his own vanity. During the greater part of the day the guillotine had been kept busy at its ghastly work: all that France had boasted of in the past centuries, of ancient names, and blue blood, had paid toll to her desire for liberty and for fraternity. The carnage had only ceased at this late hour of the day because there were other more interesting sights for the people to witness, a little while before the final closing of the barricades for the night.