As if to answer his question he saw a cop being interviewed by a CBC crew out in front of the lodge, while behind him a family in crap ski-suits took an unnaturally long time to slide past. Their tiny dumb attempt at immortality. Get in the shot. Look, kids! A camera! Get in the fucking shot.

What did they think it would gain them? That maybe in the year two thousand and ninety Martians would examine all the earth’s news footage and those grinning morons behind the interviewee would be picked out and discussed? Sad, sad, sad.

Sadder still was Pasqual gloating that everything was okay after all. ‘You see you worry too much, Eric. When did you see a weekday car park like this huh? And look at the bitching snow!’

But this wouldn’t last. It was day after a death hysteria. And if the cops didn’t catch this guy soon, or if he killed again, Silver would be as empty as a kids’ party at Michael Jackson’s.

Eric thought the cops were wrong to let them open for business immediately but Pasqual had argued that they always carried on after any death on the mountain. Company policy. The time that guy from Norway had wiped himself out at forty-five miles per hour straight into the pylon in front of the whole quad-line the resort hadn’t even blinked. The bits were scraped off, loaded into the meat wagon and away before the screaming had stopped. Surely murder was different? When people said skiing was dangerous, they didn’t mean you had to watch your back for a psycho who’d slice your head in two.

He sighed and turned to walk back into the lodge just as a rusty Toyota drew up and spat out Sam Hunt. The car park guys were waving their arms and shouting Move it! to the driver and Sam barely had time to wave goodbye as the vehicle slithered away.

Sindon stopped to greet him.

‘Hi, Sam.’

He looked up at his boss standing on the concrete steps. ‘Mr Sindon.’

‘Feeling better?’

‘Yeah.’

‘They catch you last night then?’

Sam stared at him with horror. What did he mean? His mouth went tight, and inside his fleece his heart did a flip. ‘Excuse me?’

‘The cops. They were coming to see you.’

Sam breathed a relieved plume of steam through his nose, and kicked at the snow. ‘Yeah. They came. Don’t think I helped much.’

‘Uh-huh.’

Sam changed the subject, although the subject was all around them, an all-singing, all-dancing murder hunt.

‘Am I lodge-side or up at the top station this afternoon?’

Eric took his hands out of his pockets and turned up his collar. ‘Neither, Sam. We have to talk seriously about a complaint from a customer yesterday. Did you think it would just go away?’

‘Guess not.’

‘Grab a coffee. My office in five.’

‘Okay.’