‘Hey ho! That’s that then.’

‘No, it’s too soon to know how bad it’ll be. Don’t despair yet.’

‘Me, I never despair,’ said a voice behind them, and they both groaned at the arrival of Henry. ‘Come on,’ he rallied them. ‘Where’s your sense of adventure?’

‘I put it to rest on the day I accepted responsibility for bringing people up here,’ Renzo said through gritted teeth.

Now he was a guard dog again, shepherding them both back inside, commanding everyone to bed, chivvying them until they obeyed.

‘How’s the leg?’ he asked Mandy.

‘Fine. Everything’s fine. Dr Renzo’s Linctus is great. You should patent it.’

‘No, I keep it for special occasions. Sleep well.’

To everyone’s relief, the snow stopped during the night, but the day was overcast, making Renzo frown. As breakfast finished they were startled by the sight of a group coming out of the clouds on skis, heading towards them. When they arrived, it soon appeared that they had turned back.

‘It’s getting bad up ahead,’ said the leader, a bearded young man called Toby. ‘We’re going down before it gets worse.’

‘Right, then so will we,’ Renzo declared. ‘Sorry, folks, but safety first.

‘Everyone get packed up and ready to go. And that includes you, Henry. Henry? Where is he?’

‘I haven’t seen him this morning,’ one of the men said.

Even then nobody guessed the truth. Renzo simply shrugged and said, ‘Tell him to get packed up, and then hurry.’

It was another five minutes before one of the young men approached him and said worriedly, ‘Henry’s vanished. We found this.’

It was a note in Henry’s schoolboy handwriting:

Some of us aren’t afraid to go on. See you up there, losers!

‘He’s gone ahead on his own!’ Mandy breathed. ‘How can he be such an idiot?’

‘Because he is an idiot,’ Renzo said savagely.

The look on his face made his audience recoil. They were used to seeing Renzo friendly, amusing and firm, but nothing had prepared them for the bleak fury that confronted them now.