While hunting in India, General Mathieson escaped certain death when a courageous young man, John Simcoe, disrupt a tiger attack. Believed to have perished on a ship lost at sea some time later, the general is surprised and much pleased When Simcoe reappears in England twenty years later. However, Mathieson's niece Hilda Covington suspects that Simcoe may not be the man he claims to be. When the general's will is changed shortly before his suspicious death and the rightful heir, young master Walter is kidnapped, Hilda and her good friend Netta make it their mission unravel the mystery of John Simcoe. Can Mathieson's Hilda and Netta find out the truth about John Simcoe? Will they find Walter before it is to late? These and other questions will be answered in The Lost Heir by G.A. Henty. Set in mid-ninteenth century India and England, this book includes more than forty geographical, historical, and explanatory footnotes to aid the modern reader.