A British agent (Kenneth Gilbert) desperately taps out a morse
message, but is killed by a ski-mask wearing assailant. Meanwhile,
down and out ex-agent Freddy (John Carson) meets Steed leaving a
club with his girlfriend (Tania Mallett), but the next morning is
startled when armed men storm the ruined building he's dossed down
in.
The men are in fact looking for a rat, but when Tayman (Lionel Guyett)
is bitten by it, his boss, Professor Taylor (David Swift), orders
him killed and they leave Freddy unmolested and unnoticed.
Morgan (Peter Winter) relates the radio message to the New Avengers,
warning them of 'Midas' and a contact arriving that afternoon from China.
They intercept the flight and Steed recognises Hong Kong Harry
(Ronald Lacey), except he's put on weight. Harry's contact, disguised as
a pilot (Boz - Tim Condren), shoots him to stop him revealing
anything, and Harry bleeds gold! Boz is pursued by Purdey
and Gambit and dies when Purdey kicks him off a building.
Taylor meets Harry's rival bidder, Vann
(Ed Devereaux), prime minister of the obscure country of Boltania who
wants to rid himself of the princess royal and gain complete control.
Taylor offers to show him a demonstration of Midas he'd arranged for
Harry - Harry's invitation to the event is found when Steed is
unstrapping the bags of gold from his chest.
Midas (Gilles Millinaire) arrives at a house party in the countryside
and kills everyone by putting his hands into a bowl of punch. By the time
Gambit arrives everyone is dead but he manages to disable an incendiary
device that was meant to destroy the evidence.
Chinese attaché Sing (Pik-Sen Lim) arrives to take charge of
Harry and they depart with his stash of gold. Freddy meanwhile has
broken into Taylor's labs and phones Steed, telling him he knows
about Midas and has recognised a face from Pilton Down - a chemical weapon
laboratory. He fights Midas to escape and when Purdey and
Steed arrive to talk to him, they see him, disease-riddled, kill himself
by driving off a cliff.
Gambit learns from the doctor called to the party (Chris Tranchell)
that the guests died of "everything - typhus, typhoid, malaria..."
and is promptly inoculated.
Vann meets with General Garvin (Ray Edwards) at a museum to discuss the
security arrangements
at a gold exhibit from his country, saying that the princess in universally
loved but privately gloats over his chance to kill her with no repercussions.
Purdey visits an SAS Lieutenant (Jeremy Child) who'd been
chief of security at Pilton and when he mentions Taylor's obsession with gold
she knows she's on the right track - she visits the museum, calling
Steed when she arrives and sees Taylor interrupt Vann's discussion
with the curator (Robert Mill). Taylor's henchman Simpson
(Geoffrey Bateman) sees her holding Taylor's photo and holds her at gunpoint.
Back at Taylor's lair, Midas demands to have Purdey sexually and Taylor
agrees - once the princess is dead. Steed and Gambit find Purdey has
vanished, but Gambit discovers Taylor's whereabouts from Sing after
defeating her champion wrestler, Choy (Bruno Elrington) - he and Steed hurry to save
her, and her lecherous but naïf guard Froggart (Bruce Bould) is easily
dispatched. They now all race to the museum to save the princess - Purdey had
seen them practicing hand kissing and they've deduced the plot.
Meanwhile, the princess (Pola Churchill) arrives and it's only due to the
excessively prolix curator that the New Avengers arrive in time to save her,
Purdey kicks Midas away from her and he collides with Taylor as he's flung
into a sarcophagus - Taylor instantly develops a nasty pox which kills him.
Steed cheekily tells the princess that she'd better hand out three medals.
