‘Are you surprised, my darling? I've often heard you refer to it as "washing your feet with your socks on".'

‘Yes, but Carol does not need a baby this season. Certainly not a little bastard before she's considered her Howard options. But, Mo, I did concede that Ted is himself a Howard. I simply said that, all right, if Carol got pregnant from giving him a soldier's farewell, I wanted him to promise that he would come back when the war is over and marry Carol and take her and her baby to - What's that you call your planet, Captain? Boondock?'

‘Boondock is a city; my home is in its suburbs. The planet is Tellus Tertius, Earth Number Three.'

I sighed. ‘Theodore, why wouldn't you agree to that? You tell us that you have four wives and three co-husbands. Why wouldn't you be willing to marry our Carol? She is a good cook, and she doesn't eat all that much. And she's very sweet tempered and loving.' I was thinking how dearly I would like to go to Boondock... and marry Tamara. Not that I ever would; I had Briney and our babies to take care of. But even an old woman can dream.

Theodore said slowly, ‘I abide by my own roles, for my own reasons. If Captain Smith does not trust me with respect to my behaviour toward other people -‘

‘Not "other people", Captain! A particular sixteen-yearold girl named Carol. I am responsible for her welfare.'

‘So you are. I repeat, "other people", be they sixteen-yearold girls or whosoever. You don't trust me without promises; I don't give promises. That ends it and I am sorry the matter ever came up. I did not bring it up. Captain, I did not come here to bed your ladies; I came to say goodbye and thank you to a whole family all of whom had been most generous and hospitable to me. I have not intended to disturb your household. I'm sorry, sir.'

‘Ted, don't be so damned stiff-necked. You sound just like my father-in-law when he gets his back up. You have not disturbed my household. You have pleased my wife enormously and for that I thank you. And I know that you were trapped by her; she told me months ago what she intended to do to you if she ever got you alone. This discussion is just over Carol, who has no claim on you. If you don't want her under what I see as minimum protection for her welfare, then let her stick to boys her own age. As she should.'

‘Agreed, sir.'

‘Damn it; knock off the sirs; you're in bed with my wife. And me.'

‘Oh, dear!'

‘Mo, it's the only sensible solution.'

‘Men! Always doing what you call "sensible" and always so wrong-headed and stubborn! Briney, don't you realise that Carol doesn't give a hoot about promises? She just wants to spread her legs and close her eyes and pope that she catches. If she doesn't catch, a month from now she's going to cry her eyes out. If she does catch, well, I trust Theodore and so does Carol.'

Briney said, ‘Oh, for God's sake, Mo! Ted, ordinarily she is quite easy to live with.'

Theodore said, ‘Maureen, you said, "A month from now she's going to cry her eyes out." Do you know her calendar?'

‘Why, yes. Well, maybe. Let me think.' My girls kept their own calendars... but old snoopy Mama kept her eyes open, just in case. ‘Today is Wednesday. If I recall correctly, Carol is doe again three weeks from tomorrow. Why?'

‘Do you remember the thumb rule I gave you to ensure, uh, "ringing the cash register" you called it.'

‘Yes, indeed. You said to count fourteen days from onset of menses, then hit that day. And the day before and the day after, if possible.'

‘Yes, that is how to get pregnant, a thumb role. But it works the other way, too. How not to get pregnant. If a woman is regular. If she is not abnormal in some way. Is Carol regular?'

‘Like a pendulum. Twenty-eight days.'

‘Brian, stipulating that Maureen's recollection of Carol's calendar is accurate -‘

‘I would bet on it. Mo hasn't made a mistake in arithmetic since she found out about mo and two.'

‘ - if so, Carol can't get pregnant this week... and I'll be on the high seas the next time she is fertile. But this week a whole platoon of Marines could not knock her up.'

Briney looked thoughtful. ‘I want to talk to Ira. If he agrees with you, I'll drop all objections.'

‘No.'

‘What do you mean "No"? No rules. Relax.'

‘No, sir. You don't trust and I don't promise. The situation is unchanged.'

I was ready to burst into tears from sheer exasperation. Men's minds do not work the way ours do and we will never understand them. Yet we can't get along without them.

I was saved from making a spectacle of myself by a knock on the door. Nancy.

‘May I come in?'

‘Come in, Nance!' Briney called out.

‘Come in, dear,' I echoed.

She came in and I thought how lovely she looked. She was freshly shaved that morning, in preparation for a swap that Nancy and Jonathan had asked for - Jonathan into my bed, Nancy into, Theodore's. Theodore had hesitated - afraid of hurting my feelings - but I had insisted, knowing what a treat our Nancy would be for Theodore (and Theodore for Nancy!)

(And Jonathan for Maureen; I was flattered enormously that Jonathan had suggested it.)

Father had taken the rest of my zoo to the Al G. Barnes Circus, playing in Independence - all but Ethel, too young for the circus, too young to notice; I had her crib in my bathroom, safe and in earshot.

That playful swap had gore beautifully and made me think even more highly of my prospective son-in-law. About three o'clock we four, Nancy and Theodore, Jonathan and I, had gathered in ‘Smith Field', my big bed, mostly to chat. As Briney often said, ‘You can't do it all the time, but there is no limit to how much you can talk about it.'

We four were still lounging in Smith Field, talking and necking, when Brian telephoned - he had just arrived in town, on leave. I told him to hurry home and cued him in family code as to what he could expect. Nancy understood the coded message and looked wide-eyed but said nothing.

Thirty-odd minutes later she closed her eyes and opened her thighs and for the first time received her father - then opened her eyes and looked at Jonathan and me, and grinned. I grinned back at her; Jonathan was too busy to look.

What this world needs is more loving, sweaty and friendly and unashamed.

Then the children had gore downstairs; Nancy had sensed that I wanted time alone with my two men. She took the telephone with her, long cord and all. Now she stood by the bed and smiled at us.

‘Did you hear the phone ring? It was Grandpa. He said to tell you that the zoo wagon will arrive - that's your car, Ted-Lazarus darling - will arrive at exactly six-oh-five p...o Jonathan is bathing and I warned him not to use all the hot water. He left.his clothes up here; I'll take them down to him, then I'll bathe and dress up here. Ted-Lazarus dear, where are your clothes?'

‘In the sewing-room. I'll be right down.'

‘Cancel that,' Brian said. ‘Nance, fetch Ted's clothes when you come up, that's my sweet girl. Ted, in this family we spit in their eyes and tell'em to go to hell. You don't need to dress until we do, after the doorbell rings: A husband is all the chaperone a wife needs, and I don't explain to my children why we choose to have a guest upstairs. As for mon beau père, he knows the score and is our shut-eye sentry. If Carol guesses, she won't talk. Thanks, Nancy.'

‘Pas de quoi, mon cher père. Papa! Is it true that Ted doesn't have to go back tonight?'

‘Ted goes back with me, Sunday night. Special duty, assigned to me - and I sold him, body and soul, to your mother, who may kill him by then -‘

‘Oh, no!' Both my daughter and I said it.

‘Or not, but shell try. Now get along, darling, and ser that door to latch as you close it.'

Nancy did so; my husband turned to me. ‘Flame Top, it is now five-forty. Can you figure out a way to entertain Ted and me for the next twenty-five minutes?'