The Kingdom of the Blind

Surgeon-Major Hugh Thomson is engaged to the beautiful Geraldine Conyers. Ostensibly responsible for military hospitals on the front in France, in reality he is in charge of military counter-intelligence. He is on the trail of a German master spy who seems to be able to travel across the lines and back and forth between Germany and England.

Captain Granet is a wounded war hero recently awarded the DSO and recovering after having been captured twice and escaping twice from the Germans. He meets and falls in love with Geraldine Conyers.

This novel was written and published in 1916, during the early years of World War 1. It relates with remarkable clarity the thoughts and feelings of the upper class in London during the early, romantic, phase of the war. Although there are intimations of the brutality of Ypres and other battles, there is still the remarkable fluidity between the battlefields in France, and society in London. Much is made of the ignorance and cowardice of politicians and businessmen, and the courage of military men in confronting the enemy.

The plot evolves around the development and implementation of secret war weapons aimed at German Submarines. Airplanes are still a novelty, and there is a nighttime Zeppelin raid on a secret weapons laboratory.