Barbara Cartland's Pink Collection

Lord Waincliffe breaks his horse’s bridle out one day and calls at the nearest house for help so that he can ride home in safety. It belongs to Terence Stourton, a Professor of Literature, and he meets his daughter, Rosetta, who repairs the bridle for him. Not only does he think that Rosetta is the most beautiful girl he has ever seen, but he feels there is something unusual about her. Only when he returns home, does he realise that she bears an extraordinary resemblance to his sister, Dolina.

Queen Victoria sends for the Duke of Sherbourne and asks him to undertake a very secret mission on her behalf. It is so secret that only his loyal valet is told. The Duke agrees and it takes him to Greece. He visits King George who is the same age as he is and whom he has known in the past. He has been a great success as King, although he was only eighteen when he took over the throne and he is married to Princess Olga of Russia and they are extremely happy. The Duke envies them and, although he has been pursued by a great number of beautiful women in London, he has never yet fallen in love.

Beautiful Lady Lucilla Welton is all alone in the world, having lost both her parents in a tragic accident. She has nowhere to go and so she stays with her cruel and distant Aunt Maud, who wants to marry her off as soon as possible. An ardent suitor is at hand – the rich Texan, Harkness Jackson – but his proposal is not one Lucilla could ever contemplate. She has already met the only man who will ever find the key to her heart – but the handsome Marquis of Castlebury is enthralled by another and for him, Lucilla seems to be no more than a casual friend.

Princess Zelda of Brienz in Switzerland is being harassed by her father to marry a King or Prince of one of the small countries of Europe. Zelda is very beautiful and determined when she does marry it will be for love and only love and she cannot possibly fall in love with any of her father’s suitors. She runs away from her home to her cousin, Prince Johann II of Liechtenstein, who has always been very fond of her. She tells him that she is determined to find out the truth about a scandal that has been repeated ever since she was born.

After the Battle of Waterloo and the subsequent Army of Occupation in France, the Earl of Monthurst returns to his ancestral home in England to find it in a very bad condition. Because labour had not been available during the war, The Hall, which goes back to Tudor times, was badly in need of repair, while the farms on his extensive estate were untenanted and the fields unploughed. The Earl had unwisely brought back with him a French Comtesse who was very beautiful and possessive and was obviously determined that he should marry her.

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.

The beautiful Ilena Foringham not only helped her father, who was a senior Member of Parliament, with his speeches but she also assisted Lord Witherington with his. She had always found him a tremendous bore, but when he eventually proposed marriage to her she knew that this was something that she could not bear and that she could never be happy with him. As Ilena realised that her parents also wanted her to marry Lord Witherington, she knew that she had no option but to run away.

The lovely red-haired eighteen year old Lady Viola Francis is orphaned. She and her fortune are in the power of her stepfather, the sinister Sir Rudolph Vane. Violas late father, the Earl of Galhampton, was passionately interested in motor cars and from an early age Viola worked with him on his engines. Now she wants to fulfil his ambition to build one that can be sold to the growing numbers of people keen to acquire this new and expensive form of transport. Sir Rudolph, however, has other plans for her and her fortune and wants her to marry the ineffectual Lord Carncross.

Lorena Conway has devoted most of her life to being a secretary to her father, a noted historian. Sir Arthur suddenly dies and leaves Lorena with too little money to maintain her childhood home. Wondering how she will survive, the beautiful Lorena overhears a friend of her neighbour plotting to kill the Earl of Bramfield, who has recently and unexpectedly inherited from his father and whose vast estates lie near her home. Realising that she has no option but to try and convince the Earl of the peril he is in, Lorena sets out to confront him.

The beautiful Princess Vasila, an orphan, who has been looked after by Baroness von Bergstein in a Grace and Favour house, is astonished when an Equerry arrives to take her to Windsor Castle to see the Queen. She is not told until she arrives that Prince Gadelov of Saralovia, which is a small Balkan State, has appealed to Queen Victoria to give him a Royal British wife so that he can be protected from the grasping Russians. When the Queen tells Vasila that she is to marry Prince Gadelov immediately, she is horrified and very frightened.

The beautiful Alvita who had lost both her parents, was living quietly in her family home in Southern Russia. Her father had been Russian and her mother had been English. Alvita was pleased to receive a visit from her brother, Ivor, but shocked when he told her that they must leave Russia immediately, as a Revolution was inevitable and would start very soon. He had brought with him his friend, Nicholas, who said that he would help them pack up as many of their treasures as they could and make their way to England. Alvita felt a little unsure of Nicholas, but thought that perhaps she might be mistaken.