CHAPTER 1 JANUARY                                     They sat by the summit cairn, sheltering under balaclavas and anorak hoods while the wind lifted ice-particles off the surface and drove them against their backs like grape-shot. The sandwiches they ate with clumsy mittened hands were frozen and tasteless and the chocolate bars were as brittle as glass. The snow-bound peaks around them were named and argued over and reminisced about and then they moved on, descending the western ridge and taking the wind head on. Lower down the snow was wet and the spindrift lost its sting. A long plod came next through wet snow, then bog and mud to the glen and the tents. Thermal clothing was dank with perspiration, cold crept into the bones and thoughts turned wearily to hot soup.          The camp site was a flat piece of grass beside the river at a point where the flood burst through a narrow gap in a natural dyke. Water, the colour of muddy custard, surged and roared. A small sidestream from which they drew their drinking water had risen during the day and had turned the flat area of grass into a pond leaving the tents above water level but only just. There was another tent near by and a camper van had arrived during the day. The people inside drank tea and watched with amusement the efforts of the trio to get out of their wet clothes and into something dry without getting their tents soaked in the process.          That was when the stranger arrived. He was young, his climbing gear was split new and he was totally exhausted. He flopped down beside them, ashen faced. The story was punctuated by pauses as he sucked air.          They had been trying to climb the Dearg slabs.          ‘In these conditions?’. Ian rolled his eyes and spread his palms in supplication to the heavens.          Avalanche. Windslab had swept three off the rock face. Two companions were buried in snow at the base of the cliff. He had landed in deep powder. A third friend was stranded high on the rock.          It was Allan, the quiet one, who gave the orders. He pushed the exhausted climber into the camper van. He sent the van and its occupants up the glen for help. He dragged the couple out of the other tent and used them as beasts of burden for ropes, axes, pegs, torches, sleeping bags, stove, cans, chocolate bars. He attacked their own tents and stripped them of the long flexible carbon fibre poles which held them up. For a moment Hamish watched him open mouthed as the tents collapsed into a sodden heap. Then he began to help. They thrust complaining limbs back into their cold sodden clothing.          It was darkening. There was a lurid orange patch in the western sky and the black ragged clouds were beginning to disperse. The wind was dropping. A star or two twinkled through chinks.          They walked fast, stumbling occasionally into a jog trot and then dropping back to walking pace. Legs, stiff at first, settled back into harness. They stuffed chocolate bars as they walked.          Gradually the group began to straggle. Each took rests, dropping out of the group when lungs or legs or heart would do no more. They rested where they were, on hands and knees, eyes shut, head down into the mud, open mouthed and gasping. Mud and bog came first, then snow, soft and dragging at their limbs, then hard and slippery as the temperature dropped, then dry and powdery above the melt line.          It was black when Allan reached the corrie. The wind had gone and the sky was clear. The mountain stood wedge-shaped and jet against prickly stars. By torchlight he found the tracks made by the exhausted climber. They led to a steep bank of snow below the crags. He knew the climb. A shallow scoop running up the slabs - easy enough in summer but a natural avalanche chute in these conditions. The beam of his head-lamp torch shafted through the darkness. The lower half of the slabs had been swept clean but a weight of snow still clung to the upper half, threatening to bury them all. There was a cry from somewhere above. The climber was there, to the right of the groove, a splodge of coloured windproofs clinging to bare rock two hundred metres up.          Hamish and Ian arrived and began quartering the snow drift, prodding, prodding prodding with the long carbon fibre poles. Allan extracted pegs and a hammer from his rucksack, clipped them to his waist-line and started up the slabs. He was fifty metres up and going rhythmically, legs working like a paddle-steamer when he heard more voices below him. More lights were flicking along the base of the cliff.          There was a great stillness. The noise of falling water echoed in the huge rock amphitheatre like the rustle of an expectant audience. The slabs were not vertical but it was dark, and powder snow, packed hard by the force of the avalanche, stuck to the holds. The pool of light from his head torch illuminated a holographic image of the changing seasons. Looking upwards there seemed to be no snow but looking downwards all was white. And all the time he was conscious of the big bank of snow sitting high above him on the slabs waiting to slide.          He heard a shout from below. The voice rang out echoing among the black crags. Then there was more shouting and Ian's voice came floating up the face to him.          ‘We've got one of them!/them! He's still alive!/alive!’ The words had a double beat in the hollow blackness.          He wished he had taken time to put on crampons. They would have been awkward no doubt since there was no depth of snow for them to bite into - it would have been like walking on stilts - but at least they would have sunk through the thin layer of snow on the holds. He scraped each hold clear with the adze of his axe. The noise of it, a hollow drain-pipe sound, echoed round the corrie. Gloved hands were sopping wet and growing numb as he fumbled for a purchase. His breath wheezed. Fifty metres higher the holds became smaller and he had difficulty making progress. Quiet whimpering noises came to him from the trapped climber, not too far above now. That helped. He did not have to waste time looking for him. He moved towards the sound, conscious of a great black empty space around and below.          And then the climber was there just above him, crouching, half lying against the rock face. A huddle of anorak, red snow-gaiters and a small patch of white which might have been a face. A bit of rope was tied to the man's waist. It was severed and splayed on the rock, unravelling like long white silky hair.          Allan moved to the left afraid that the man would try to move and fall before he could get to him. He climbed past him. Allan now needed to get the rucksack off but there was nowhere to stop. He went a few metres higher and heard a strangled cry of despair from the trapped climber.          He tried to be reassuring. ‘Just hang on - I need a belay.’ He kept his voice quiet and undramatic.          At last! A ledge half the width of his boots where he could stand without handholds. He selected a short steel peg and tried it for size in several cracks near him. Blind cracks going nowhere. He moved sideways a couple of metres and found one which took the peg. Legs splayed, he leant forwards, stomach against the cliff, hammer in his right hand, peg in his left, left arm across his chest threatening to topple him backwards. At first he could do little more than tap the peg with the hammer. Then as the peg bit into the rock he could take his left hand away and take a proper swing. The sound of it changed from a dull clatter to a musical ping, rising in pitch as the exposed length of the peg shortened. The clear ringing tones rang round the mountain.          ‘It's the bells! It's the bells!’ The words from far below were scrambled by the echo but were cheerful in the darkness. Ian doing his Henry Irving impersonation.          Another shout floated up.          ‘We've got the other one Allan!/Allan Do you need help/help’          The peg was in. He clipped himself to it and could relax. He needed more rope but it was too complicated to explain while the trapped climber was still clinging to the cliff. The man would be deathly cold, perhaps barely conscious. Allan ignored the shouts and concentrated on getting a rope out of the pack.          ‘Do/do .... you/you .... need/need ..... help?/help’.          Slowly with his chest against the rock he disengaged the straps of the rucksack from his shoulders and eased them down past his elbows. The straps, damp and stiff, were reluctant to move. For a moment his arms were pinned at his sides. He shook himself until the pack dropped a little further. Then it was free and he had it in one hand.          From out of the blackness came the throb of helicopter blades.          Still he leant forwards with chest on the rock, feet spread widely and sideways. He swung the pack up and clipped it to the peg. Numbed hands fumbled at the quick release buckles. The rope came out and dragged a couple of pegs with it. They clattered down the cliff.          ‘Ya!/Ya ... missed me!/_issed me’. That was Hamish's voice.          Damn! he could have used these pegs. From the darkness below came the drain-pipe gargle of an axe scraping on rock. He clipped the rope to the peg and threw the coil down the slabs. It tangled and landed in a heap but at least it had got past the climber. He unclipped himself from the peg and re-clipped his harness to the rope. With straddled legs he gripped the rope and walked backwards down the cliff until he stood astride the trapped man. He had him now. He pinned the man against the rock with his weight.          ‘Get this round you’.          Just a youth still in his teens. He was too frightened or too cold to let go of the indifferent handholds. Allan thrust a loop of nylon tape round the boy's waist and round his thighs to form a makeshift harness. They were clipped together. The boy could not fall now.          ‘I've got him on the rope/ope but I need more rope!/ope’ He heard his own words converted into a staccato double beat.          ‘What?/What’          ‘Need/need .... more/more ....rope/rope!!’          ‘Broke?/broke’          ‘Rrrope!/ope’          The scraping noise started again. Ian and Hamish were discussing something. He heard a laugh. Lights were flicking about at the base of the cliff and another pair of lights were nearer on the rock itself and getting closer. The other bunch of lights were moving away from the cliff. The noise of the chopper was also closer, thrumming like drumbeats. There was a light in the sky - close above - moving inside the corrie.          Allan spread his legs again and began to ease himself and his bundle down the rope. The boy cried out in fear as he lost his grip and slid downwards until the harness held him. They slid down the cliff together. When they reached the tangle they had to stop while Allan tried with one hand to free it. He got it clear. Ian and Hamish were closer.          By the time Allan reached the end of his rope Hamish was beside him.          ‘How're you doing lad?’          ‘OK, but I've got no more rope and this one is fixed. I'll have to leave it behind or go up for it.’ Hamish climbed past him and found a place to drive a peg. The bell tone rang again and then Allan was able to transfer himself and his bundle to the second rope. This time the rope was doubled so that they could bring it down after them. They repeated the operation before they reached the base of the cliff. Ian and Hamish took turns at shepherding him and re-arranging the ropes. As they neared the base of the cliff they were caught in a brilliant spotlight from high above them. The beat of chopper blades was very loud and the down-draught caught them. Dazzled, they dropped down on to the snow cone and half fell, half slid to the foot of the avalanche debris.          The couple from the camp site were a short distance away. The chopper was directly overhead. Deafening. The two avalanche victims were in sleeping bags. Suddenly there was another man with them, two men. Helmets. Flying suits. And a stretcher with straps and flaps. A primus stove was going and someone thrust a mug of soup into Allan's hands. Someone held a mug to the boy's lips. The men from the chopper took over - carrying the avalanche victims to a spot where the chopper could hover. Hamish was talking to them. He shouted into the ear of one of them, ‘We need our sleeping bags!’ and the man nodded and pointed up at the chopper with his thumb.          The three victims were hoisted aboard and a bundle of wet sleeping bags thudded down on to the rocks.          And then the chopper was gone in a great downrush of air. Darkness and silence settled back into the corrie.          It was dawn before they reached the tents. On the way down, cold as they were, they stopped every few yards for rest, legs plastered in mud, boots full of bog water. The tents were flat on the ground. A sheep was standing in the middle of a crumpled heap of canvas. The burn had risen a little further. The tents were awash.          ‘Fucking hell,’ said Ian sinking to his knees. ‘We left the fucking tent poles up in that fucking avalanche cone’.