Nine Coaches Waiting, 1958, is a delirious blend of Jane Eyre, Wuthering Heights, and Cinderella.
An young woman, orphaned at a young age and raised in a boarding school, moves from England to France to take care of an orphaned boy living with his Aunt and Uncle. The boy, Phillippe, is the Comte Valmy, and his gaurdians insisted on a Governess who was English, and spoke no French. Linda Martin, who was born and lived in France until the death of her parents, pretends not to know any French as she is desperate for the job.
Arriving at the country Manse, Linda is spooked by Leon Valmy, young Phillippe's guardian. Despite a physical impairment, he is still a dangerous man; a tiger in human guise. Linda also meets his son, Raoul, who is very like his father. Linda falls in love with him, but when Phillippe is almost killed several times, Linda is led to suspect that Raoul might be behind it. After all, if the boy dies, Leon inherits the Valmy land and title... and after him, Raoul.
This is an incredibly exciting book, although the romance angle is a bit ham handed, as it is in many of Stewart's earlier books. There's constant confusion over who is bad and who is good, deception layered atop deception. It's also a fairly dated book, as none of the female characters, like my grandmother, don't know how to drive.