The Scarlet Pimpernel #1: The Laughing Cavalier

This prequel to the Scarlet Pimpernel series was actually the fifth Scarlet Pimpernel novel written, however, it should be first if read chronologically. The book is followed by THE FIRST SIR PERCY. It is set in Holland in around January 1623. THE LAUGHING CAVALIER reloves around a foreign adventurer and ancestor of the Scarlet Pimpernel who goes by the name Diogenes. Diogenes, we are told by Orczy, is the real subject of the famous painting by Frans Hals. The son of an English Nobleman and a Dutch woman, his father abandoned his mother after Diogenes was born, and he was brought up by Hals in Haarlem. He has spent his life fighting in various battles as a mercenary for hire, but now, along with his two sidekicks - fellow 'philosophers' - Socrates and Pythagoras, he is back in Haarlem, penniless and looking for entertainment.