Nobody must guess the terrible truth...

Why would beautiful Lady Susan Winthrop throw herself away on a penniless baron, who has nothing to offer but gambling debts and a dilapidated castle in Cornwall? Everyone had expected the well-connected heiress to make a brilliant match.

Her worried family and friends cannot fathom why Susan is acting so strangely out of character. Even her detractors do not suspect her of falling heads over heels for such an unsatisfactory suitor. Surely she is too intelligent and level-headed for such folly. Yet the wedding is scheduled with suspicious haste.

Only one other person is privy to Lady Susan's motives, and it is not her new husband, Lord Northcote. Will this match end in disaster, as so many predict? Or are they underestimating both bride and groom?