Thea pressed her forehead against the crumbling bark of the tree and felt her heartbeat thud in her throat.

The man turned and peered into the trees. ‘You looked as if you’d seen something,’ he said suspiciously.

Thea darted out of sight.

‘What? No. I didn’t see anything …’

There was a pause big enough to contain a whole life. Rory was pale, sweat beading on his forehead despite the cold.

She heard snow crunch and squeak as footsteps moved closer to them.

‘Wait!’ Thea could hear the panic in Harriet’s voice. ‘I think it was a … a fox or … something …’

‘This is an island, Ms Stowe. There aren’t any foxes on here. Unless they swam across.’

More crunching. Closer again.

‘No! No, of course not! My imagination, been here too long, probably. I should get on the boat, yes? Like you said?’

But the crunching continued, far too loud, far too close and then, suddenly, there he was, near enough for Thea to see the light blinking on his walkie-talkie and the grey in his hair, near enough to stretch out and grab his leg. He had his back to them. Harriet came floundering behind, snow puffing up around her steps.

‘Over there!’ She pointed in the opposite direction to Thea. ‘That’s where I was looking. Not that there’s anything there. I’m just spooked by this place. Shouldn’t we go back?’

The words tumbled from her too quickly, too loudly. Thea couldn’t see the man’s face, but she imagined he was eyeing her with a frown.

A few electrical signals from brain to neck muscle, a small movement of the head as it turned; that would be all it would take from this man. He would find her and Rory and that would be it. Whatever “it” turned out to be. Thea suspected it did not involve a trip back to the mainland and a warm drink.

But, miraculously, the man headed over to where Harriet pointed. Whilst he was walking the few steps away, Harriet turned to Thea, two hectic spots of red on her cheeks, her eyes huge, the panic thrumming off her as if she was a badly played theremin.

That’s when Thea saw their tracks, fresh trails in the snow, leading right to them.

Harriet saw them too and, checking that the man wasn’t looking, stumbled over to them, dragging her feet and taking great gouges out of the snow as the man bent to inspect something further away.

They could hit him, Thea thought wildly. She cast about for a weapon, a handy tree bough or one of Harriet’s stilettos, except she was wearing snow boots with useless flat rubber soles. Thea could tell Harriet was thinking the same thing but there was just snow and the rocks on the beach were too far away.