At a dinner party at her aunt Edith's, Penelope"Penny" Parker makes the acquaintance of debonair Simon Templar. While attracted to her, Simon is more interested in the actions of another guest, Bruno Lang. As the party breaks up, Lang finds a note in his car from"The Saint," a detective well-known on both sides of the Atlantic. Penny, suspecting that Simon is The Saint, follows him to Lang's home, where Simon steals a document out of Lang's safe. As Simon and Penny escape together, they discover a beaten man stumbling along the road. After getting the man medical attention, Simon learns that he is Count Stephen Duni, who was kidnapped and forced to print £1,000,000 worth of counterfeit bills. Duni names his kidnapper as Kussella, a business associate of Lang's. Simon leaves Duni under the name of Claud Teal in a hotel run by Mrs. Buckley.