A historical novel by the well-known historian and writer of the last century, Yevgeny Karnovich (1824–1885), is devoted to a secret page of Russian history—the “Lopukhin Affair,” a “conspiracy” by court ladies against Empress Elizabeth Petrovna. At the center of the narrative is a knot of palace, political, and romantic intrigues, whose victims were innocent people. Based on documentary sources, the novel reliably recreates the everyday life, morals, and fates of people of the Elizabethan era.