Rafael Sabatini

Fortune's Fool Rafael Sabatini

London 1665 is no place for Randal Holles, a former soldier in Cromwell's army, now that the monarchy has been restored and the exploits of the Republicans are being condemned in the highest degree. Holles, desperate for an escape from his hopeless situation and almost certain execution, sees no option but to accept the Duke of Wellington's rather dubious commission - to abduct a famous actress and bring her before him. However, as events take an unexpected turn, Holles is presented with the opportunity to be reinstated to his former glory. The times were full of trouble; but Martha Quinn was unperturbed. Hers was a mind that confined itself to the essentials of life: its sustenance and reproduction. Not for her to plague herself with the complexities of existence, with considerations of the Hereafter or disputations upon the various creeds by which its happiness may be ensured-a matter upon which men have always been ready to send one another upon exploring voyages thither-or yet with the political opinions by which a nation is fiercely divided.