Top Secret
Spoilers
Hawk is feeling uneasy on the cargo ship and is convinced that an attempt was made on his life earlier on the night of the explosion. He has been entrusted with carrying a plan which will revolutionise war. He carries the documents in a special belt and can destroy them at the touch of a button.
Phil and Freda Penrose are convinced that Walter is related to someone they know who lost all memory of his family. They share looks and mannerisms.
The arrival of other members of the Penrose family aboard their own boat means that they learn of attempts to find the cargo ship. Two more Penroses, Rex and Archie, fly out to the island. Because of the plot that Archie has overheard, other members of the family are taken into the secret and it is decided that Rex should take the papers with him when he leaves the island. Hawk writes a coded message so that the plans can be sent through the post tucked in between the pages of a catalogue. Rex leaves the island immediately because of the threat of bad weather.
When they are tending the injured from the boat, Hawk recognises one of the men as someone he knew a few years before and so he assumes that he is not the enemy, although Hawk himself, Walter and the Penroses are all suspicious of the new arrivals on the island. As they are discussing what course of action to take, the men ambush them. But unknown to the attackers, Archie was able to sneak away when they struck, and he is making his way down to the family boat in the harbour to get the boat's crew to attempt a rescue.
contributed by Moira Lovegrove, London __ working from a hardback edition