Let  
 ${{M}^{m}}$  be an  
 $m$ -dimensional, closed and smooth manifold, equipped with a smooth involution  
 $T\,:\,{{M}^{m}}\,\to \,{{M}^{m}}$  whose fixed point set has the form  
 ${{F}^{n}}\,\bigcup \,{{F}^{j}}$ , where  
 ${{F}^{n}}$  and  
 ${{F}^{j}}$  are submanifolds with dimensions  
 $n$  and  
 $j$ ,  
 ${{F}^{j}}$  is indecomposable and  
 $n\,>\,j$ . Write  
 $n\,-\,j\,={{2}^{p}}q$ , where  
 $q\,\ge \,1$  is odd and  
 $p\,\ge \,0$ , and set  
 $m(n\,-\,j)\,=\,2n\,+\,p\,-q\,+\,1$  if  
 $p\,\le \,q\,+\,1$  and  
 $m(n\,-\,j)\,=\,2n\,+\,{{2}^{p-q}}$  if  
 $p\,\ge \,q$ . In this paper we show that  
 $m\,\le \,m(n-j)+2j+1$ . Further, we show that this bound is almost best possible, by exhibiting examples  
 $({{M}^{m(n-j)+2j}},\,T)$  where the fixed point set of  
 $T$  has the form  
 ${{F}^{n}}\,\bigcup \,{{F}^{j}}$  described above, for every  
 $2\,\le \,j\,<\,n$  and  
 $j$  not of the form  
 ${{2}^{t}}\,-\,1$  (for  
 $j\,=\,0$  and 2, it has been previously shown that  
 $m(n\,-\,j)\,+\,2j$  is the best possible bound). The existence of these bounds is guaranteed by the famous 5/2-theorem of J. Boardman, which establishes that under the above hypotheses  
 $m\,\le \,\frac{5}{2}\,n$ .