The Last of the Duchess

It's 1980 and The Sunday Times plans a fabulous journalistic coup - a photograph by Lord Snowdon of the long-reclusive Duchess of Windsor

Lady Caroline Blackwood - novelist, wit and journalist - is dispatched to Paris to secure it

But no sooner has she entered the Windsor mansion than she finds herself locked in battle with the Duchess's octogenarian lawyer, Maître Suzanne Blum

As the conflict ignites between them, Caroline begins to find Blum decidedly more fascinating than the Duchess herself

Where did she come from?

What's her obsession?

How did she get power of attorney over the Windsor fortune?

Cruellest of all - why has she deprived the Duchess of her vodka?

One of the Duchess's last loyal friends, Diana Mosley, introduces a further mystery - why do the famous Windsor jewels keep appearing anonymously on the international market?

And since no one has seen the Duchess for many years, what proof is there that she is even still alive?