The Harbinger

While on an ocean voyage to join his parents in Italy, Doug Whittaker meets Margaret McAllister and her brother. The two siblings are on their way to lend their medical services to the government of Spain in that nation's war with Francisco Franco's forces. They part when the ship reaches England, but when tragedy strikes and Margaret is stranded and alone, Doug ventures into Spain to help her. Her desperate journey to find refuge from enemy soldiers and Doug's imprisonment and encounters with the armies on both sides illustrate the conditions within that country in the latter part of the 1930s. While Doug is out of Italy, the Nazi and Italian militaries kidnap his parents and sister, forcing his father, a chemist, to work for them. In time, the Nazi SS officer holding his family plans to have them shot. With Doug as their only hope of escape, he uses piloting skills he learned while in the United States and attempts a daring rescue in a violent storm.