"Anyway," Peter continued, now warming to her task, "David was suspicious of Mrs. Thurston, but Daddy said she was bird watching. That night, after I'd gone to bed, I heard horses coming up the valley, and it was some men with the news that the twins were lost. They said that Mr. Ingles and Tom, and David too, had gone off on a motor bike and sidecar to Appledore, but that we were to search the mountain. The fog had cleared now, so Daddy and I joined the search party and I went on Sally, the pony. On the top of the hill I met a man called Evans who said he was on a walking holiday and offered to help us. Of course we didn't find the twins 'cos they were at Appledore. After a bit, Daddy and I went home and Mr. Evans came with us, and slept downstairs because we've only got two bedrooms.

"In the morning, the Home Guard came and woke me up early. When I got downstairs, Mr. Evans had gone. They all seemed rather annoyed about it, and got me to go over to Witchend because the others had rescued the twins successfully and got them down out of their bedroom window at Appledore.

"Later that morning we were all going back to Hatchholt. I was in front with David and Sally, when the man Evans jumped up out of the heather, grabbed the pony and dashed back down the valley. Then there was a frightful roar and a crash, and I knew the dam of the reservoir had been blown up and that all the water was rushing down and would drown us if we didn't climb up the sides out of the way. We shouted to Tom and the twins who were behind us, and David and I clambered up on a big rock just in time. I had trained Sally to obey my whistle, so when I saw some Home Guards coming up the valley, I whistled in a special way, and she stopped suddenly and threw Evans over her head, right at the feet of one of the men, who hauled him off. The twins and Tom climbed up safely out of the way of the flood, and when the water had gone down, we went up to the cottage, where we found that Daddy was all right.