Rosina Bevan works for The Travel Agency, a powerful twenty-fourthcentury business that transports paying customers back in time. TheAgency also retrieves valuable items from the past and occasionallyrescues people who otherwise would have met an unfortunate end, like Rosina, a Victorian young lady who almost died in a railway accident, and her boyfriend, Ned York, who was imprisoned in the Tower of London by his uncle, Richard III.Rosina, Ned, and their co-worker, Olga, are tasked with going back to 1863 and getting a hairless blue horse from Africa belonging to the eccentric and fabulously wealthy Earl of Stamford. They have competition from an American millionaire, whom Rosina suspects isn't who he claims to be. If they succeed, they'll please the Agency's most important client and possibly bring a subspecies of zebra back from extinction. If they fail, they'll be in serious trouble.