Classic Gothic Romance.
"From the very first page, when we encounter a young American writer living on the French Riviera, the suspense builds and builds and builds. Just as his money runs out, Tom Welles meets a dapper, obviously wealthy, international type under very peculiar circumstances in a cafe. Paul Ehrenhardt is amused at the idea of an impoverished American, and hires him as a confidential secretary with no secretarial duties, and as a Man Friday for some mysterious project.
Tom's first project is to entertain Ehrenhardt's seductive wife, Anna, for which he is given a fat expense account and the run of the Riviera gambling casinos and restaurants. His next task is to rent a half-ruined medieval castele in the hills of Provance without letting on who his employer is. And finally he has to find a girl - any girl - who is about nineteen, French, beautiful, blonde, aristocratic in manner, without a family or other ties, and able to disappear for a few months.
Tom is paid off handsomely, but, unfortunately for his employer's mysterious scheme, he falls in love with the girl he finds, and is completely distraught when she disappears as planned. Naturally his suspisions turn to the vast, dank, lonely ruins of Castle Garac. What happens there makes a thrilling and absorbing story."
"From the very first page, when we encounter a young American writer living on the French Riviera, the suspense builds and builds and builds. Just as his money runs out, Tom Welles meets a dapper, obviously wealthy, international type under very peculiar circumstances in a cafe. Paul Ehrenhardt is amused at the idea of an impoverished American, and hires him as a confidential secretary with no secretarial duties, and as a Man Friday for some mysterious project.
Tom's first project is to entertain Ehrenhardt's seductive wife, Anna, for which he is given a fat expense account and the run of the Riviera gambling casinos and restaurants. His next task is to rent a half-ruined medieval castele in the hills of Provance without letting on who his employer is. And finally he has to find a girl - any girl - who is about nineteen, French, beautiful, blonde, aristocratic in manner, without a family or other ties, and able to disappear for a few months.
Tom is paid off handsomely, but, unfortunately for his employer's mysterious scheme, he falls in love with the girl he finds, and is completely distraught when she disappears as planned. Naturally his suspisions turn to the vast, dank, lonely ruins of Castle Garac. What happens there makes a thrilling and absorbing story."
