Royal Flash

In this second volume of The Flashman Papers, ''Flashman,'' The arch-cad and toady, matches his wits, his talents for deceit and malice, and above all his speed in evasion against the most brilliant European statesman and against the most beautiful and unscrupulous adventuress of the era. From London gaming-halls and English hunting-fields to european dungeons and throne-rooms, he is involved in a desperate succession of escapes, disguises, amours, and (when he cannot avoid them) hand-to-hand combats while the destiny of a continent rests on his broad and failing shoulders. Courtesans and prize-fighters, assassins and duellists, crowned heads and chambermaids crowd the pages of his memoirs, while old Flashy scuttles nimbly from cover to cover.