A Hapsburg archduke in the 1880s gives up his title, changes his name, marries a Viennese actress, and then disappears with her on a South American ocean voyage.
Stephan Gregorovitch, the unwilling king of a bankrupt Ruritanian country, along with his hucksterish chancellor and musically-inclined bodyguard, travel incognito to London for some fun.
Thelma and Zazu are on a leisurely excursion in a borrowed car. Thelma lets Zazu drive. When she brakes to avoid a bull pulled along by three rustics, her foot gets stuck and the car crashes through a barn.
A foreword warns against the peril of yellow journalism, and the story illustrates it by following events in the upstate New York town of Cornwall after prominant financier George Ferguson is killed.