‘I don’t want to be left here, Jake.’

‘Can you ski down?’

‘No, I lost my skis. They’re somewhere under the snow.’

‘Mine too. We’ll have to walk down to the next lift station. I’m frozen. I need to move to get warm. Are you up to it?’

‘I feel okay. Really. Maybe it’s the adrenalin, but I feel okay. Come on, let’s go.’

They put their arms around each other and, trudging along the edge of the slope, they made slow progress down the mountain. Alive. Alive.

With light snow still falling around them it took maybe three-quarters of an hour of struggling through the deep snow in their heavy ski boots before they saw the overhead cables of a drag lift, with an intermediate station cabin about three hundred metres down the slope. The drag lift had been stopped. Neither was there any sign of activity on the slopes above or below them.

Zoe was shivering. Jake talked, mostly just to distract her. He told her that the trees had saved him. He’d been thrown against a slender pine and had flung his arms around it, swimming up its trunk as the snow deepened under him. Zoe grinned at him and nodded as he chattered about their escape. She recognised that he was in a state of shock. She knew that when they reached the drag-lift cabin the operator would radio for first-aiders and they would soon be whisked off the mountain.

But when they reached the cabin, it was empty. Through the smeared glass they could see one red and two green electronic lights shining under a row of switches on a console. The engines to turn the drag had been powered down. The glass door to the cabin stood very slightly ajar and heat was coming from inside. Jake pushed open the door.

‘Come on, darlin’ girl. We need to get you warm.’

‘You think they shut down the mountain?’