Petula is young, breathtakingly beautiful and, after her father's death, stricken with grief and with poverty as well. The family Manor is all but falling down, she is at the mercy of her dissolute loser of an uncle, who plans to sell her off in marriage and pocket the lion's share of her dowry! Then Fate in the shape of a carriage crash brings a dashing Major to Petula's door. And so begins Petula's thrilling rollercoaster ride through the twists and turns of love.