Tales of Europe, before and after the war, when lives could change in an instant Fleeing the Cuban revolution, a businessman's return to England is blocked by the secret police of General Franco. In Hungary, a peasant treasures a barrel of wine as a symbol of the world she lost during the war. At a Romanian ball, in the frenzied years that followed the break-up of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, a British traveler finds himself challenged to a duel....

An English university professor on holiday in Spain is drawn into a web of intrigue and murder surrounding an intoxicating woman of mystery. Dr. Philip Ardower is fascinated by the stunning beauty in a red cape he encounters on a beach in Spain outside the Hostal de las Olas. While immediately charmed by the lady's sophistication and pluck, the British academic knows nothing of the enchanting Olura's personal history, or the rumors that have accompanied...

In war-torn Lebanon, a beautiful French woman fights a war of spy versus spy There is no privacy in Beirut. In the hotel lobbies and high-class bars of this beautiful Eastern capital, intelligencers of every stripe hide in plain sight: British spies and Nazi moles, Free French operatives and the lackeys of Vichy France. Stalin has his men here, as do the Zionists who would turn British Palestine into a haven for the Jewish people. There are agents...