The Tender Winds of Spring Read Online Free Page A

her to swallow.
    ‘Ugh!’ she spluttered.
    ‘A Scot would be horrified at such a description of his best Highland dew.’
    ‘Dew?’ she queried.
    ‘I believe it’s brandy that should be administered, but it was whisky that was in my flask.’
    ‘It’s very strong.’
    ‘No water. I wanted you to have it neat, Josephine, for I want you to lie down.’
    ‘No.’
    ‘All the same, I believe you will in a moment.’
    ‘There’s a lot to be done, a lot to be considered.’
    ‘That’s why you must rest first.’
    ‘I can’t. I can’t, I tell you. I—I don’t think I ever will again.’ But the last words came a little fuzzily, the strong neat spirits were having their way with Jo at once. The moment she swayed, he had her in his arms, and within seconds she was lying on a bed ... Mark’s? Dicky’s? The girls’? Gavin’s? she did not know or care ... and he was pulling over a rug, drawing a blind and shutting a door.
    The bed was rocking and Jo was rocking with it. It could have been a soothing process except that she fought against it, fought desperately.
    ‘Not,’ she said piteously, ‘not Gee and Mark at all. Someone else. Not a plane but a tree. A big mahogany. Not. Not. Not!’
    Then the mesmeric motion began taking over. The furniture instead of moving in front of her was misting. The pain was being blurred by memories.
    She and Gee waiting at the end of Tender Winds for the school bus to take them to lessons on the coast.
    She and Gee going down to the creek on school holidays with a stick against snakes and a hamper against hungry stomachs.
    She and Gee riding with the bananas on the flying fox, that strange but highly practical means of transport, for some of the slopes were so steep a picker could not carry his hand of bananas to the top. When the Queen had come, one hand had been taller than the Queen, and over a hundredweight.
    She and Gee lying in the clover and reaching up for a banana whenever they felt like it, an escaped banana of course, golden and sun-ripened and undisciplined.
    She and Gee going backwards and forwards on the swing Uncle Mitchell had put up, all carefree summer and all uncaring childhood in the hollows of their hands.
    She and Gee growing up eventually and starting beauty diets, only to be stopped by a toppling helping of Aunt’s banana cake.
    She and Gee ... she and Gee ...
    The mist was breaking. The pain was coming back. Jo got up. She went outside and found Abel Passant sitting at the table.
    ‘It’s no good,’ she said tonelessly.
    ‘I didn’t think it would be, but I just wanted you to have a moment before—’
    ‘Before?’
    ‘You faced up to it.’
    She nodded, and took the chair that he indicated, also drawn up at the table, and opposite to him.
    ‘First of all—’ she said with difficulty.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘Is it certain?’
    ‘It is certain,’ he said.
    ‘Quite certain?’
    ‘Quite.’
    ‘What do I do, then? I mean—’
    ‘Your sister?’
    ‘Yes.’
    ‘You leave it to me.’
    ‘Thank you.’
    There was a pause, a long one, then he said gently but deliberately:
    ‘But you also have to do something else.’
    ‘What, Mr. Passant?’
    ‘Not that now, please. Not Mr. Passant. Afterwards, when I’m the banana boss again, that is if you prefer to, but not at this moment.’
    ‘What are you at this moment, then?’ she asked dully.
    ‘A friend, I hope.’
    ‘I mean what’s your name?’ As she said it, Jo rubbed at her forehead as though to rub back awareness. He had told her, she recalled, but she seemed to have forgotten. She still felt cut off, remote, detached. Not present.
    ‘Abel Passant,’ he prompted quietly. ‘You’ll remember again soon. Abel.’
    ‘A man called Abel.’
    ‘Yes, a man called Abel. Call me Abel.’
    ‘I’ve never known anyone called Abel before.’
    ‘It has two meanings. Breath: Vanity. I prefer Breath. I love the outdoors, and I like to think my name captures it. On the other hand that might just be my