In the first of these linked stories, Smithy's cupboard has always been his refuge despite its different locations and uses. It serves him well in his childhood days on the Wimmera area broad-acre farm in Victoria where he was born and grew up. He plays with his toy soldiers inside the secret place. As he grows to observe wild life and later hunt game, he makes hides. His career in the army leads him to join the SAS as one of Australia's top snipers. His clever use of hides and secret areas makes him well known and respected, and he is drawn deeply into CIA operations. A family tragedy changes his outlook and leads him into a crime of vengeance. He uses various means to assist him in his own personal therapy and he frequently seeks the confessional, yet perdition ticks away inside his mind like a noisy metronome.
In She Walks the Line, Dave Smith's daughter Suzie is in the USA on tour with her country and western band. She impersonates Johnny Cash and June Carter with her rendition of 'She Walks the Line'. However, she also has a top secret mission: after courageously disarming a crazed man outside the entrance to the White House, she has been recruited to gather intelligence for the Secret Service. Suzie falls in love with an agent who has a lot of military experience and an undiscovered enemy lurking. Extreme danger, coupled with great humour, follows Suzie, with twists, turns and dramas which she overcomes in her uncompromising fashion. The spirit of her mother offers encouragement and cautions her about aping her father, but in the end she knows what she must do to stop the stalker, because Suzie Smith is her father's daughter, his Doppelganger, who also meditates in a cupboard.
