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days."
    "That's right, Popsy," Mary Anne called out. "They've been having quite a lot of trouble with stray dinosaurs and stuff in Georgia lately."
    "Don't be flip with your father, young lady," her mother cautioned.
    "This pistol," Colonel Meecham said authoritatively as if he were lecturing recruits," is to be used only in case of emergencies. "Then he glanced back at Mary Anne through the rearview mirror, smiled, and continued in a magisterial voice," Such as dinosaurs. Indian attacks. Tartars sweeping out of the hills, surprise raids by the Japanese air force. But most of all because we are in the Deep South, and the times being what they are, you never know when I might have to give some wild nigger a new asshole."
    A troubled silence invaded the back seat. The eyes of the children turned to Lillian awaiting a swift response. Lillian felt the silence and knew that the children were waiting for her to speak. She did not want to anger her husband, but she had no other options. Finally she said," You know I don't allow that word to be used in this family, Bull. Only poor white trash use that word. So please don't use that word around our children."
    "You're supposed to call them Negroes, Daddy," Karen said, highly offended by her father's vulgarity.
    "Gee, thanks a lot, muffin. Negroes, you say," Bull teased.
    "Yeah, and he said that other word too, because I heard it with my own two ears," Matt said.
    "It's not sophisticated to use those words," Karen said.
    "Oh goddam," Bull responded, starting up the engine of the car. "If it isn't sophisticated then I can't ever use them words again. Lordy me, to think ol' Bull Meecham let an unsophisticated word pass his lips. Why, it shames me even to think of it. "Then his voice lowered an octave, and he spoke sharply to his wife. "What kind of happy horsecrap have you been feeding Karen since I've been gone?"
    "For your information, I've been teaching Karen the art of being a lady. And I've taught your sons how to be gentlemen. Training they normally never receive at home."
    "Oh, gentlemen. Excusem-wah," he said sarcastically. "There ain't nothing in this world that makes me puke faster than a southern gentleman."
    "I'll remind you, Bull, that you are an officer and a gentleman."
    "And I'll remind you that I'm not a pansy southern gentleman.
    "True, you're not. There's not a place on earth you could qualify as a gentleman."
    Ben and Mary Anne suppressed giggles into the pillows they were lying on, not daring to let their father hear them. Bull turned to his wife slowly, the engine running, and said," You know, Lillian, I think after eighteen years of marriage, you're starting to develop a sense of humor. Now let's quit the yappin' and let's get down the road. I want to make some good time."
    "Give me a kiss good-bye, fighter pilot," Mamaw said, an almost forgotten shadow standing by the side of the car. She leaned in and kissed her son-in-law on the lips. "Be good to the children on this trip, Bull. You hear me. They've been looking to your coming home. Don't spoil it. I mean it too. This is your lover girl speaking."
    "Just so long as they do exactly what I say. They know that as well as you do."
    "They're just kids, Bull."
    "They're Marine kids, Alice, and that's what makes them different."
    "Mother," Lillian said, her eyes shining, "thanks for everything. The year was wonderful."
    "For me especially," Alice said reaching across Bull and grasping her daughter's hand. Alice looked very old under the street light. She was not good at farewells, especially when she was tired and her defenses down on the far side of two o'clock in the morning.
    "All right, Alice," Bull growled impatiently, "we're all getting kind of weepy and you know there's nothing I hate worse than boo-hooing."
    "You come see us, you hear, Mother," Lillian called.
    "Yeah, you heah," Bull said, mocking his wife's southern accent. "Is that dumb dog in the car?"
    "He's not dumb, Dad," Matt answered, offended, petting