The Long and the Short of It : THE FORESEEABLE FUTURE, <i> By Reynolds Price (Atheneum: $19.95; 288 pp.)</i>

Comes now Reynolds Price with his 22nd book, consisting of three “long-form” stories in the North Carolina setting he is so comfortable with. They concern men going to or returning from war; in the first two, World War II, and in the last, Vietnam. In each, Price explores his characters’ relationships with women, wives or otherwise, in the context--greater or lesser--of their military experience. In two of the stories, miscegenation is a major theme; the third revolves around jealousy.

Price peoples his world with middle-class protagonists who collide with the lower classes or the bizarre, a familiar device among Southern writers. And he does it quite well, as usual, for the author is a man of considerable gifts.

In “The Fare to the Moon,” Kayes Paschal, a moderately successful middle-aged man, has been called up by his draft board in 1943. At the time, he is separated from his wife Daphne and living in a shack with a beautiful African-American woman called Blackie, much to the consternation of his family.

The story explores Kayes’ apprehension toward going to war, and his tender concern for Blackie’s welfare once he’s gone.

In “The Foreseeable Future,” Whit Wade is returned to his home and job as an insurance adjuster after being nearly mortally wounded on the beaches of Normandy. He leaves his wife and daughter for a weeklong business trip, during which he encounters a spiritual healer called Mother Marie; a black woman named Martha with whom he may or may not have fathered a child; a boy, Traynham Burns, who saves Whit’s life after a car accident (and whom he momentarily considers adopting), and a beautiful and mysterious woman called Beck Barksdale who had a crush on Whit as a young girl.

Whit also meets a doddering insurance customer who is trying to collect on an old family painting that he destroyed himself, and a pathetic man living in a trailer who has filed a claim for stolen ancient coins. But it is the two women, Martha and Beck, who set Whit’s mind in turmoil. His near death on the battlefield and the strangeness of being suddenly dropped into the safety of his home and family have led him to question his prewar values.

In the final story, “Back Before Day,” Dean Walker, Vietnam vet and high school football coach, is convinced that his wife Flynn is cheating on him. The man in question is Clyde Bowles, an old flame of Flynn’s who, Dean learns from his son, had stopped by to see her earlier in the day. Then Dean learns that Clyde Bowles is a dying man and, if that isn’t enough, a former student and football player of his is involved in a fatal accident in front of him and his son. These brushes with mortality allow Dean a fresh look at his life.

Price is a deft writer and these stories showcase his talent. His images tend to linger. But the problem with stories of this length, what some call “novellas,” is that they often do not satisfy. Just about the time you’re getting into the story, the show’s over and you really don’t get a plot resolution or character development that might have come with expanding the story into a novel, however short. This is not necessarily a criticism; in fact, it may be a compliment.

What is sometimes distracting, however, is the glibness of language the author puts on the tongues of his actors. Instead of sounding like what they are, children, their middle-class parents and even servants often are given dialogue that sounds as though it might have been written by a countrified Noel Coward. Such talk might be believable in a more cosmopolitan setting, but strains credibility for communities in the rural South.

In spite of those small considerations, fans of Reynolds Price should be delighted with this new collection.