“I don’t expect you to, but you’d better listen to it. He’s spoiling her rotten and you’re helping him do it.”

“I’ll be the judge of that.”

“You know, it’s usually the parents who discipline the child and the grandparents who spoil it. Not the other way around.”

“Then don’t discipline her.”

“Someone has to. Maybe you don’t mind her talking that way to you, but she’s not going to do it with me.”

“Kenneth, leave her alone.”

“Thank you, Mother.” I turned back to him. “Now let’s drop it. If you have nothing to say that’s pleasant—”

“That’s right, something you’d like to hear.”

“—then you can leave. You seem to forget this is my house, not yours.”

“ ‘He’s your dad, not mine,’ ” he said, mimicking Regina.

“Kenneth, what is the matter with you?”

“You know what it is, Mother? It’s that damned male pride that can’t stand a little girl talking up to it. Thank God Frank doesn’t have that handicap.”

“You’re right, he doesn’t have any pride. Maybe that’s why you married him.”

It was well below the belt, and I was more stunned than angry. But I quickly realized how I could zero in. “You can think that if you want. But just remember he’s got one thing you don’t have. He’s got his Ph.D. Now go peddle your sour grapes elsewhere.”

He stood up. “Maybe Regina is more like you than I thought. But at least you waited until you grew up to kick me.”

My mother’s consolation at the door—while my father raced the car engine in the driveway as a signal for her to hurry up—was that he and I would make up after we had had a few days to cool off.

“Do you think I’m a bad mother?” I asked.

“Of course not. And neither does he. He’s just mad at Regina, so he’s taking it out on you and Frank.”

“Do you think she’s spoiled?”

She hesitated. “Not really spoiled, but a little high-strung. You’re going to have to be both patient and firm with her and that’s a hard balance to maintain.” My father honked the horn. She squeezed my hand and kissed me. “Don’t worry about your father. He’ll brood for a few days and then he’ll be ready to apologize. Give Frank our love when you talk to him.”

Frank came home the next afternoon, sunburned but haggard.

“I suppose you heard about the confrontation,” he said.

“What confrontation?”

“At the convention. Haven’t you seen the news?”

“No.”

He went into elaborate detail about the hecklings and the beatings and the arrests. They had managed to raise the bail for Tim’s release and were laying plans for his lawsuit against the Chicago police. My interest and attention were half-hearted, but I managed to hear him out to the end.

“Where’s Regina?”

“She’s outside. Frank, there’s something I want to talk to you about. And I want to discuss it calmly.”

“What is it?”