I says, “Oh, Papa-Daddy,” I says, “I didn’t say any such of a thing, I never dreamed it was a bird’s nest, I have always been grateful though this is the next to smallest P.O. in the state of Mississippi, and I do not enjoy being referred to as a hussy by my own grandfather.”

But Stella-Rondo says, “Yes, you did say it too. Anybody in the world could of heard you, that had ears.”

“Stop right there,” says Mama, looking at me.

So I pulled my napkin straight back through the napkin ring and left the table.

As soon as I was out of the room Mama says, “Call her back, or she’ll starve to death,” but Papa-Daddy says, “This is the beard I started growing on the Coast when I was fifteen years old.” He would of gone on till nightfall if Shirley-T. hadn’t lost the Milky Way she ate in Cairo.

So Papa-Daddy says, “I am going out and lie in the hammock, and you can all sit here and remember my words: I’ll never cut off my beard as long as I live, even one inch, and I don’t appreciate it in you at all.” Passed right by me in the hall and went straight out and got in the hammock.

It would be a holiday. It wasn’t five minutes before Uncle Rondo suddenly appeared in the hall in one of Stella-Rondo’s flesh-colored kimonos, all cut on the bias, like something Mr. Whitaker probably thought was gorgeous.

“Uncle Rondo!” I says. “I didn’t know who that was! Where are you going?”

“Sister,” he says, “get out of my way, I’m poisoned.”

“If you’re poisoned stay away from Papa-Daddy,” I says. “Keep out of the hammock. Papa-Daddy will certainly beat you on the head if you come within forty miles of him. He thinks I deliberately said he ought to cut off his beard after he got me the P.O., and I’ve told him and told him and told him, and he acts like he just don’t hear me. Papa-Daddy must of gone stone deaf.”

“He picked a fine day to do it then,” says Uncle Rondo, and before you could say “Jack Robinson” flew out in the yard.

What he’d really done, he’d drunk another bottle of that prescription. He does it every single Fourth of July as sure as shooting, and it’s horribly expensive. Then he falls over in the hammock and snores. So he insisted on zigzagging right on out to the hammock, looking like a half-wit.