These Old Shades by Georgette Heyer was first published in 1926.
The tale begins on a dark night in Paris in the reign of Louis XV. Justin Alastair – the notorious Duke of Avon who also goes by the nickname of Satanas as he’s a bit devilish – is surprised when a small red-headed boy crashes into him. Justin assumes that he is about to be robbed but the boy assures him that he did not intend robbery, he is being chased by his much older brother a publican who is cruel to him. The lad is called Leon and when the older brother arrives the Duke buys Leon from him. Despite the fact that Leon is absolutely filthy and in rags, the Duke can see a strong resemblance to his great enemy the Comte de St Vire. That gives the Duke an idea, but first Leon will have to be cleaned up. Quelle horreur! It turns out that Leon is actually a Leonie, and the plot thickens.
Leonie has been living as a boy for years as she/he had been working in her brother’s pub, it seemed safest to eschew femininity in that atmosphere, but Leonie was loath to give up her breeches for corsets and dresses as the Duke insists. She comes to enjoy the finer things in life though as she’s taken into high society, including Versailles.
This is an adventure tale but of course there’s romance too. That’s the bit that didn’t feel quite right to me although I’m obviously looking at it from a modern stance. There’s also not much in the way of witty dialogue between characters. I think for many people this is one of their favourite Heyers and I’m glad I read it but I found it slow to begin with and it just didn’t hit the spot for me. With the 19 year old female in the romance seeming more like a ten year old to me and the over 20 year age difference in the couple, the male of which keeps calling her baby, infant and child, it seemed a bit sick to me.