"They went to Gatlinburg?" I asked. I was surprised. Read Sunday's Birmingham News and you'll see that fifty percent of the newlyweds go to Gatlinburg for their honeymoon; forty-nine percent go to Panama City, Florida. Occasionally a couple, either very imaginative or moneyed, will opt for someplace exotic like the Virgin Islands. Somehow the helicopter had hinted strongly at this one percent.

"Debbie's car was at the airport," Sister admitted. "And Gatlinburg's fine."

"Of course it is," I agreed.

Sister sighed and took a long swig of her beer. ' 'It's where Philip and I went on our wedding trip." She

frowned. "Or maybe it was Will Alec." Another swig. "Anyway, it's a nice place for a honeymoon. Where did ya'll go? I can't remember."

"We didn't," I said. "No money. Two dollars for the license and ten dollars for the preacher did us in."

"Y'all should go on a honeymoon. A cruise. I know a wonderful travel agent I could fix you up with."

Fred changed the subject. "Where's Meg Bryan?"

"Haley and Philip took her home. Richardena and the twins, too. The babies were getting tired and Meg said she had some work to do."

"She told me she wanted to do some research while she was here," I said.

"She's a sweet lady," Mary Alice said. "I think it would be interesting being a professional genealogist."

"It's a dog-eat-dog world."

Sister and Fred both looked at me, surprised. I explained to them about Camille Atchison's anger, what Meg had said about people stealing information, about Henry Hudson's great grandfather, about Meg's pitbull look and being a big dog. "And how do you get to be a professional genealogist, anyway?" I wanted to know.

"You do it for a living?" Fred surmised.

"No, that's not it," Mary Alice said. "She told me she went to school at Samford and earned a professional certificate. It's a complicated business."

"Dog-eat-dog," I said.

"A degree in looking up ancestors?" Fred finished his beer and stood up. "Whoever heard of such."

"Something like that," Mary Alice said. "Get her to tell you."

"I will. I told her I might do some research into

my family history, and she said she would show me how to get started."

"You want to find out about your family?" Mary Alice looked innocent, but Fred was suspicious.

"Why not?" he asked.

"Sometimes it's best to let sleeping dogs lie."

"What dogs?"

"The dogs that eat dogs." I couldn't resist.

Fred raised his eyebrows at me, got another beer from the refrigerator, and went out the back door.

"Now," Mary Alice said. "Let's get down to the postmortem."