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she’d said how cold and sick she felt, so he’d made a huge fire and put all the rugs and blankets on her, but she still shivered. She’d been asleep for ages, now. Maybe she needed a drink. Her face was so pale.
    â€˜Jozz,’ he whispered, leaning across from the hammock. She didn’t move. ‘Jozz! Wake up!’ Nothing. He leapt across to her bed and shook her shoulders urgently. ‘You have to wake up, Jozzie! Please!’ She always woke up for him. She was always there. ‘Jozz! Jozz! Can you hear me?’
    He put his cheek against her face and felt her soft breath. Good. Maybe she just needed a big sleep. Joe lay beside Joycie on the bed, his arm across her, his face buried in her hair. When I wake up she’ll be better, he thought, she’ll be better.
    When he woke the storm outside was raging, but in the cave it was still and silent. The fire was just a glow, and Joycie lay as she had when he went to sleep. She was cold. He felt for her breath. There was none. He pushed the blankets aside and pressed his ear against her chest, listening for a heartbeat. Nothing. He shifted his head urgently. Sometimes it was hard to hear. Nothing.
    â€˜Come on, Jozz. No! You can’t be . . . !’ He took her hand and rubbed it between his, but her fingers were cool and limp. A choking pain of grief welled in his throat. He knew death. He knew when life was gone.
    He knelt beside the bed for a long time with his head against his mother’s chest, talking to her, crying, keening. After a while he tidied the bed and tucked the blankets in, pushed the fire together and picked the cup up from the floor; putting things right. Then he realised it was never going to be right. Never going to be the same. He was alone.
    Suddenly the cave felt like a tomb, and his mother . . . well, that wasn’t his mother. She was gone. He couldn’t stay here without her. He pulled down the big bag and began packing, wildly at first, but then with more consideration. The rabbit-skin rug, the Phantom comics, the blue-and-silver tin, clothes, gear, anything he would need for . . . what? For life? Where was he going?
    He carried the bag to the mouth of the cave then turned to look back. A thought struck him, and he felt in his bag for the tin, opened it carefully and took out the Seal Island necklace. He walked back to the bed, gently placed the shells around his mother’s face, then pressed his cheek against hers, breathing in the scent of her beautiful hair one last time.
    The rain stung his face as he swung his bag onto the platform outside the cave. He felt for the pile of rocks he knew was there. One of Joycie’s Phantom comics told a tale of giant tigers, and when he was a very little boy he couldn’t stop worrying about them. Joycie had laughed and reassured him, but he had insisted on carting rocks up to the cave so if the tigers ever did attack they could barricade themselves inside. The rocks had sat there ever since. Now he packed them carefully in the entrance, stacking them one on top of the other, sealing it so that his mother would not be disturbed.
    The rain streamed down his face. He could taste the salt of his tears. His hands were numb with cold. Lightning flashes showed him that the wall was nearly finished. He packed wet earth into the cracks, then rested his head for a moment against the rock wall. He shouldered the bag and made his way across the valley, past the pool, past the swing, past the shells spinning in the wind. The bush lit up, blue and ghostly, as he climbed the track, but he didn’t look back.
    Ferns and branches lashed him as he picked his way along a roaring creek. The rain beat down. He walked for hours without direction, just going. On and on. He had no idea where he was. Resting for a moment in the lee of a rock, he heard a noise over the racket of the storm. He listened carefully, and yes, there was a crying sound just above him. He left his bag and