Spirit Mission
Page 29
“Understood.” Turtle was nodding now.
Zack continued: “It needs to be widespread but not destructive.” He wagged his finger at Turtle. “It would not be good if it provoked a crackdown or other aggressive response from the tactical department.”
“Maybe somehow suck the officer in charge into the action if I can. Pull him out of the fight.”
“Who’s the OC today?”
“Captain Gunderson. From phys ed. Nice guy. ROTC commission. Pushover.”
I was starting to feel better. Zack had gotten us unstuck.
Zack and I came up with a quick plan. We would attend formation and dinner and then leave promptly when the Corps was dismissed. Go back to our room, change into civvies, and head up the mountain to Zack’s car as quickly as possible. We still weren’t sure where we were going to stash the goat when we got back. Hopefully a good idea would occur to us on the long drive ahead.
Formation was uneventful. Dinner was loud as Army-Navy Week continued to build momentum and the Corps became more rambunctious. The Goat-Engineer Game would be tonight after dinner. A tradition at West Point since 1905, this full-contact football game, complete with pads, pits the top academic half of the firstie class (the Engineers) against the bottom academic half (the Goats). The players are given equipment and one practice earlier in the week and then go at it in front of the whole Corps, administration, and community. Some old grads swear that “as the Goats go, so goes Army against Navy.”
All of this boded well for Turtle’s assignment. The more frothy the Corps’ spirits, the less of a shove he would have to provide shortly before midnight.
* * *
US Route 9W hugs the Hudson River’s western bank south of West Point. The mountains mellow into rolling hills as the route links up with the New Jersey Turnpike and the Hudson widens in anticipation of the Atlantic Ocean. The river flows under the George Washington Bridge, along the length of Manhattan, and into the sea. Since first classmen have been allowed to own cars, the Palisades has served as the high-speed avenue of escape to New York City or farther south for a weekend. Zack and I did not have the usual happy anticipation on this road trip, however. We drove in determined silence and hoped it would go smoothly.
We got to the farm in Harrisburg just after 2200 hours. We parked about half a mile down the road from the long driveway. Ambizo’s uncle was the kind of guy who would keep a loaded shotgun handy, so we wanted to be as stealthy as possible.
It felt good to be walking after the long drive. We trotted quietly into the farm, sticking to the shadows, and went directly to the barn. Creeping inside, we found the goat. I leashed him up while Zack watched the door. I fed the goat a few mess hall carrots, and he decided we were guys he could hang out with. It was an easy trot back to Zack’s car. Then things got interesting.
“He doesn’t want to get in.”
“Are you discussing it with him?”
“No, asshole. Look at him.” The goat strained at his leash as I tried to pull him toward the backseat of Zack’s car.
“Give me that motherfucker.” Zack came around the front end of the car. The goat, sensing Zack’s resolve and emotional state, suddenly went limp. Zack picked him up and tossed him roughly into the backseat, where he lay still, stunned by his sudden change of fortune.
“See?”
“You’re a regular Doctor fucking Dolittle.”
“Just get in. Let’s get this drive over with.”
Zack started the car and pulled out onto the road. Our second theft of the Navy goat in a week was complete.
The drive back was equally uneventful, other than the goat eating most of the upholstery in the backseat of Zack’s car. He was a slow but deliberate eater, and all we could do was hope that the material wasn’t toxic. We needed him to live at least another three days. Zack moaned with every rip and tearing sound that emanated from the rear, but we kept driving. We didn’t have time to figure out anything else.
“Those guys back in the fifties were smarter than us, huh?” said Zack.
“What do you mean?”
“Remember that picture of the goat knocked out by ether? We should have done that.”
“Where the hell do you get ether these days?”
Zack grunted and faced the road again.
We did figure out where to hide the goat ahead of its Army-Navy game debut.
“Pelly’s,” Zack said out of nowhere.
“Huh?”
“We should keep him at Pelly’s.”
“She loves cadets, hates tacs, and would dig it.”
“That’s perfect. But we’re not going to get there until about one in the morning.”
“So, we’ll wake her up.”
With a large, rambling piece of land several miles off the post, Pelly was a legend among cadets. For a small monthly fee, she let underclass cadets hide their vehicles at her place. This was a violation of cadet regulations, of course. Only firsties could have cars. The tacs tried to keep the illicit car storage from happening. She looked after her cadets, though, calling the police anytime a tac came snooping. Even though there were usually more than a dozen cars hidden in the trees at Pelly’s, no one ever got busted. Pelly was proud of that.
Two hours later, we pulled into Pelly’s. Rather than continuing on to the wooded back where underclass cadets kept their secret vehicles, we stopped in the front. We sat in the dark car for a moment and looked at her front door.
“This is where Bill kept his motorcycle, isn’t it?” I asked.
“Yes.”
We got out of the car and slowly walked up to her door.
“Well, here we go.” Zack rang the doorbell.
We stood for a full minute in silence, then rang the bell again. We waited there for another minute. As Zack raised his hand to press the bell a third time, the door unlocked suddenly and swung open. Pelly didn’t crack it to peer out to determine who was on her front step. She opened the door wide and took a step forward, almost knocking us off the stoop in one catlike motion.
“Who the hell are you?”
“Good evening, ma’am. My name is Zack, and this is Sam. Sorry to disturb you, but we have a huge favor to ask.”
Pelly narrowed her eyes at Zack as he spoke.
“Um. You see. The thing is, we have just returned from stealing … I mean, borrowing the naval academy’s mascot. A goat. And we need a place to hide him for about a day or so. Really about two and a half days.”
“Wait a minute. Shut up. You did what?”
“We stole Navy’s goat, ma’am,” I said. Now her eyes were narrowed at me. “And we really need a place to hide him until Friday about noon.”
She looked past me at Zack’s car. It was rocking slightly from side to side as the goat jumped around in the backseat, finishing his destruction of Zack’s interior. His painted horns flashed blue and yellow behind the car window.
A smile slowly spread across Pelly’s face until her smoke-stained teeth were showing.
“It’s always something with you cadets. I just love you guys.”
“Is that a yes, ma’am?” asked Zack softly.
“That’s a hell yes, son. Pull around back to the garage.” She stepped back inside and shut the door. Zack and I gave each other a high five. It was 0118 hours. I wondered how Turtle’s impromptu mischief was going.
FIFTY-TWO
DECEMBER 1990
“Attention all cadets, there are fifteen minutes until assembly for breakfast formation. The uniform is battle dress uniform. Fifteen minutes, sir!”
Zack and I got out of bed as the minute caller popped off. We dressed and then walked slowly to formation, arriving just as the first sergeant gave the command to fall in.
At breakfast, we began to get a sense of what Turtle had wrought.
“Was that the craziest BP cart race you have ever seen, or what?” asked Zimmer, a cow at my table.
“It was crazy,” I said, sipping my coffee. I smiled. BP carts were large rolling car
ts used by the barracks police, or janitors, as they went about their custodial chores. They were five feet long, three feet wide, and a little over three feet tall and served well as general-purpose carryalls. Put a cadet inside one, however, and have four other cadets push it at a sprint, and it became a careening, barely controllable chariot of ridiculousness.
“I’ve never seen a race that big! Have you, Sam? Was there anything like that when you were plebes?” asked Montman, the other cow at my table.
“No. No, that was definitely the biggest. How many carts do you think were involved?”
“At least three dozen! What do you think?”
“Three dozen at least. Maybe more.”
By lunch formation, Zack and I had pieced together an outline of what had happened. The diversion had kicked off with a spontaneous dance rally just before taps in front of the supe’s house, with about two dozen cadets cheering and inviting the supe to come out and do a “Rocket” with them. There were several uniformed cheerleaders involved, which is probably why the supe felt like he had to oblige. He stepped out and gave the Rocket cheer, which dates back to the first days of Army football and seems ridiculous now but is beloved by cadets and old grads. After completing the Rocket, Turtle’s troops politely grabbed the supe and placed him into a BP cart that had been painted black and gold. He was either having a good time or had been shocked into silence, because he never ordered the cadets to let him go. Cheering, they pushed him all the way to Central Area, where they demanded that the OC join in. Then cadets started pouring out of the barracks. They’d heard the noise, looked out their windows, seen the superintendent in a BP cart surrounded by screaming cadets and cheerleaders, and had been sucked into the melee.
By the time the OC came out and was put in a BP cart, there must have been a thousand cadets in the area. Soon, BP carts began to show up from all directions, being pushed by cadets in silly outfits and carrying passengers holding aloft their company guidons. It didn’t take long before the chant “Race, race, race” was sounded. At that point it was unstoppable, and the BP carts surged onto the apron, where they were greeted by Disco Bob’s disco party equipment, set up and blaring on the mess hall steps, where at least fifty cadets danced beneath a lit mirrored ball.
At that point I’m sure the supe and the OC realized that the only way to get the Corps back under control was to let it get its gun off. So they went with it. Beat Navy.
Taps room checks across the Corps were blown off.
It was a masterpiece. Both vintage and new Turtle. The vintage was the “Fuck it, let’s start at the supe’s house” audacity. The whole fragile, critical undertaking could have been squelched before it even began had the supe come out and barked angrily at the nascent uprising. But he didn’t. It worked. The new Turtle was evident in that he wasn’t the wedge breaker. He didn’t run up onto the supe’s porch and pound on the door yelling, “Beat Navy, motherfucker!” Rather, he had proved to be a planner. A strategist.
Turtle came to our room before dinner with news.
“I talked to Ambizo today.”
“What happened?”
“He turned himself in to their commandant this morning and told them where the goat was being held. The military police went directly there to reclaim it, but it wasn’t there, of course. They interrogated his uncle, but he hadn’t even noticed the thing was gone.”
“That’s right, you nasty squids!” laughed Zack.
“Then they hauled Ambizo back to the com’s office and braced him pretty good. Demanded to be told what he knew.”
Zack got quiet.
“Did he give up our names?” I asked.
“No. He didn’t. All he said was ‘Sir, I wish I could be of more assistance, but I do not know where the goat is now.’ Said he was in the admiral’s office for over half an hour. Same question over and over. Says he never cracked.”
“Wonder why he did that? I thought he wanted to be first captain.”
“Doesn’t matter. He found his path.”
“That’s great. I also heard that Major Eifer tore into Second Regiment today,” Zack said. “Word is that he hit D2 really hard.”
I smiled. “He’s chasing rumors.”
FIFTY-THREE
DECEMBER 1990
The Corps’ energy level at dinner was high, and the mess hall was loud. Only a day and a half stood between the cadets and the big weekend. Across the mess hall, last-minute link-up plans were being made, girls’ phone numbers shared, and transportation details confirmed. When the command was sounded for the brigade to come to attention for orders, it took longer than normal for quiet to descend.
The cadet adjutant made the typical mundane announcements as I refilled my coffee cup. Then there was a shuffling noise as he turned the microphone over to someone else. When the officer spoke, I froze.
“Attention all cadets. My name is Major Eifer, special projects officer for the commandant of cadets. Some of you may have heard the rumors about the Navy goat being stolen last weekend.” A ripple of whispers propagated through the Corps. I resisted the urge to look at Zack and Turtle. “As you all should also know, this is an expressly forbidden activity. We are in the process of trying to locate the Navy’s stolen property. In support of this effort, any cadet who signs out on pass to attend the Army-Navy game this weekend will be affirming that they did not participate in the theft and have no knowledge of the whereabouts of the Navy goat. A cadet who so affirms and signs out to the game for the weekend and is found to have been involved in the forbidden activity will face an honor board as well as disciplinary action. That is all.”
The Corps was silent for a moment as it digested what it had just been told. I looked down at my coffee. My heart sank. I couldn’t believe it. Eifer was erecting a barrier between us and Philly.
As I rubbed my eyes, I noticed a sound. A murmur growing to a buzz, then to a rush, then to a roar. I looked up. Cadets were pounding the tables and climbing onto their chairs. They began to cheer. They swung their napkins over their heads. I was confused.
“We got the goat!” The plebes at the end of my table were jumping up and down. I smiled. In an effort to cast a wide and inescapable net, Eifer had confirmed the rumor. The goat had been stolen. The Corps believed it now. True, Zack, Turtle, and I were screwed. I didn’t see a way through this. But the Corps was happy.
The noise died down as cadets began to head back to their barracks.
“Pretty cool, huh?” said Zack, smiling broadly. “They fucking love it!” He gestured around at the mess hall.
“I don’t know what you’re so happy about, Zack,” I said. “In case you haven’t figured it out yet, we’re done.”
“Oh, what? That guy?” He pointed in the general direction of the man in the sky, Major Eifer. “Fuck him. We’re not doing that.”
“What do you mean?” asked Turtle.
“I mean, fuck him. It’s an improper question. We sign out. We don’t mean it. We go. What’s the problem?”
“I suppose you’re right.”
“Cheer up, Sam!” said Turtle, slapping me on the back. “You coming to the Firstie Club with us?”
“No. I’m beat, guys. I’m going to hit the rack.”
“Okay, I’ll see you after,” said Zack. He and Turtle bounced out of the mess hall.
I fell asleep feeling despondent. I was trapped. I wasn’t going to sign a false report again. Period. I didn’t see a way out of this one.
I didn’t hear Zack get back to the room that night. I slept fitfully until morning, when he jostled me awake.
* * *
“Sam! Wake up! You’ve got to see this.”
Zack dragged me to his desk. He sat down in front of his computer and pointed at the screen.
“Look at this, Sam. It’s a fucking uprising.”
I read the entries on the class bulletin board. The Corps was raging.
“‘This type of mass-issued improper question is totally inconsistent with both the spirit of the
honor code and the letter of regulations,’” Zack read out loud. “‘I, for one, agree with those who say we should sign out in a way that indicates clearly that we are only signing out for the weekend and nothing else!’”
Zack glanced at me over his shoulder in glee. “See, buddy? No moral crises for you here after all!” He stood up and started getting ready for formation. I looked quickly at all of the bulletin board headers, then threw on my uniform and grabbed my hat as the minute caller popped off for breakfast formation.
Walking into the mess hall, I realized how widely this position in the Corps had spread since dinner the night before. On every table there were several printed flyers. Zimmer read from one as we sat down: “‘Major Eifer’s sign-out directive for the Army-Navy game is not in keeping with the highest traditions of the Corps’ honor code nor the letter of regulations. As the chairman of the Cadet Honor Committee, I do not support his actions and I encourage all cadets to sign out with the explicit caveat that they are making no statement regarding the Navy goat. Cadet Stanley, Honor Committee Chairman. Beat Navy!’”
I looked around and saw every table going through the same sequence we were: one cadet reading the flyer aloud, then everyone agreeing and exhorting one another to resist.
The movement spread so quickly because there were not many occasions in cadet life when the Corps was right and the system was wrong. Usually, we begged for forgiveness when we screwed up. We did our time when we got caught. We groveled daily as we fell short of the ideal. But every once in a while, we were in the right. The system would briefly reveal itself as fallible, and the Corps would seize on it. Seldom receiving mercy ourselves, we never extended any when it was ours to give.
On the way to class, I smiled and shook my head. Thursday morning. One more day. It looked like we were actually going to make it to Philly. Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good, as the Guru would say.
But when I got back to my room after class and found Creighton waiting for me, I didn’t feel like I was either.
FIFTY-FOUR
0458 HOURS, 2 AUGUST 2015