On a day unlike any other, Hermia Brooke, the poor but beautiful daughter of the Vicar of Little Millbrooke, stumbled upon a man who had difficulty removing a shoe from his horse's hoof in a country lane, and she helped him. He was a dark and very sardonic Gentleman and to thank her, he gives her a guinea and a kiss, mistaking her for a milk-maid. Spirited and imaginative, she realises she did not try to stop him kissing her, and is convinced that he was the Devil himself. Hermia had no way of knowing that before very long she would save the Devil's life, and that he would show his gratitude in a most surprising manner....