"What word?"
"'Regiment.'"
He reached across to pat the vein-corduroyed back of her hand.
"My little sweetheart mamma," he said.
She, in turn, put out her hand over his, her old sagging throat visibly constricting in a gulp, and her eyes as if they could never be finished with yearning over him. "You're a good boy, Sammy."
"Sure!"
"I always say no matter what it is bad my life has had for me with my twenty-five years a widow, my only daughter to marry out six hundred miles away from me, my business troubles when I had to lose the little store what your papa left me, nothing ain't nothing, Sammy, when a mother can raise for herself a boy like mine."
"You mean when a fellow can pick out for himself a little sweetheart mamma like mine."
"Sammy, stop it with your pinching-me nonsense like I was your best girl!"
"Well, ain't you?"