by Pat Conroy
I had been called sanctimonious by every person who had ever known me well and for good reason. I am a member-in-good-standing of that contemptible race and I cannot help it. On my deathbed, I will be grandly dispensing good to my last breath, and my friends and loved ones will be despising that part of me to the very end. My goodness is my vanity, my evil. It does not well up naturally out of me but is calculated and plotted as carefully as a mariner studies the approach to an unfamiliar harbor. Sometimes I will reveal this to friends so they will like me and praise my honesty, but in actuality, I am presenting them with a mariner’s chart of my character.
Anyone who knows me well must understand and be sympathetic to my genuine need to be my own greatest hero. It is not a flaw of character; it is a catastrophe. I have always been for the underdog and I’ve pretended it was because I was sensitive and empathetic, but that’s not it at all. It was because I wanted the adoration of the underdog, the blind approval that the downtrodden so gratefully bestow on their liberators. It was all paternalism, my insatiable desire to be the benevolent tyrant dispensing tawdry gifts and moldy foodstuffs to the subjects who stumbled into the spiritual famine of my sad kingdom. When I bestowed my friendship on Tradd, Mark, and Pig, I was doing them a favor, liking them when other people ignored or feared them. I was a natural to take care of Pearce, not because of my radiant humanity (although that is what I wanted to believe) but because he would be indebted to me and I could rule him and own him and even loathe him because I had made him a captive of my goodness. I had the need to be the good master, but definitely the master, no matter what the cost. I did not like it that the three unpopular boys I had honored with my friendship had thoughts and ideas that differed from my own. It both surprised and angered me that my roommates had reached a consensus of agreement against me. The way I looked at the world, enemies criticized and friends affirmed. I granted my friends freedom of expression only when I was certain that the ideas expressed would be congruent with mine. It was but one of the reasons for my loneliness at the Institute; it was but one of the things that made friendship with me an ambivalent enterprise.
When my roommates asked me to go to a movie at Durrell Hall that Friday night, I told them I had some letters to write. It would take a few days for my petulance to subside. An infuriating piety reinforced even my anger. Knowing me well, they left for the movie arm in arm, and in ten minutes I was wishing I had gone with them. But as I look back on the events of that first week, I was not meant to see a movie that Friday night. It was my destiny to take an early shower.
It was nine o’clock and I was thinking all these thoughts about piety and friendship when I left my room, dressed in a light blue Institute bathrobe and my flip-flops. Pausing on the gallery I leaned against the iron railing and looked out into the checkered quadrangle far below me, my eye following the rows of perfectly congruent arches as they flowed across the opposite side of the barracks. The Institute was constructed as symmetrically as a rose, I thought. There was a quality of immense repose in the silent flow of stone. Then I heard a boy crying hard. The sounds came from the shower room.
I entered the room and found two members of the R Company cadre, a sophomore and a junior, surrounding an overweight freshman shaped like a yam, enjoying the spectacle of his weeping. The junior was Cecil Snipes. He turned to spot me coming through the door, and the demons of a long fine enmity flapped their leathery wings as we faced each other in the damp atmosphere of that room.
I did not wish to have words with Snipes on this night. Too much had already happened during this first week that I needed time to understand, to think out, and to plan for. Yet at the moment Snipes and I met head-on, there was the undeniable sense of confrontation.
“Easy, boys, easy. The lad looks like he’s had about enough for today,” I said in what I hoped was an affable, rather benign voice.
“Hi, Will,” Matt Ledbetter said. He was the sophomore guidon corporal and like most sophomores had gone overboard in his zeal to inflict on plebes punishment as intolerable as he had endured the year before. Sophomores were dangerous in their vengeance.
“Hello, Matt. The young smackhead looks like he needs to call it a day to me.”
“He’s really a waste, Will,” Matt said in disgust. “He couldn’t have made it five minutes in the old Corps.”
Snipes said nothing but turned from me wordlessly and faced the freshman. Clearly, he was relieved that I had not been a tactical officer on a reconnaisance foray through the barracks.
“You fucking pussy,” he screamed into the boy’s ear. “I want to see you cry some more, you fucking pussy. Bawl, little baby. Bawl, you fucking cunt-eyed baby.”
The freshman had lost control long before I had entered the room. He was sweating profusely, and his face was flushed an unhealthy, overextended crimson. Tears had troweled out two ugly trenches beneath his eyes. His eyes were hideously swollen. He began sobbing uncontrollably as soon as Snipes screamed at him.
“Such language, Snipes,” I said. “It makes me wonder if cadets are indeed gentlemen and scholars.”
Snipes ignored me. He concentrated on watching the freshman, staring at the boy with intense, malevolent eyes. “What did you come here for, pussy? A fat little vagina like you ain’t never going to make it in the Corps. Jesus, it’s got snot running out of its nose. Spit running out of its mouth. Tears running out of its eyes. You make me sick, maggot-load. Why did you come here, wad-waste? Pop off!”
“Sir,” the boy blubbered, his words barely coherent. “Sir, my father graduated from the Institute. I’ve always wanted to go here, sir.”
“Well, you’re here now, douchebag. How do you like it?” Snipes s voice was edged with menace.
“I love it, sir,” the freshman replied.
“Bullshit, young innocent freshman,” I butted in. “You think it sucks. Now why don’t you tough, mean cadre boys run along while this young knoblet comes to my room for a long talk on the jolly art of how to survive the plebe system?”
“It looks like you were about to take a shower, Will,” Snipes said. “Would you like me to run your water?”
“No, thanks, Cecil. I would like you to get off this dumbhead’s ass.”
“You’re interfering with the system again, McLean,” he answered, trying to control himself. “You almost got in trouble last year for interfering when I was trying to discipline a knob.”
“It’s not discipline, sweet Cecil. It’s called hazing.”
“Will, you have no right to butt in,” Ledbetter said, not easily. It was no simple matter for a sophomore to challenge a senior at the Institute; it took considerable nerve, especially for someone as openly ambitious as Matt Ledbetter. “This knob is our responsibility, not yours.”
“He’s crying, Matt. I think you’ve convinced him that you’re the big tough son of a bitch you think you are. Can you see that he’s crying?”
“He’s a fucking pussy,” Snipes said.
“He may be, Cecil, but why don’t you let him go to his room and figure that out for himself? You’ve cracked him, and now it’s beginning to look a little more serious than just the game.”
“You’re interfering with the system, McLean,” Snipes said, taking the freshman by the collar and shoving him brutally against the tiled wall.
“I’m interfering with an asshole, Snipes,” I answered, then turning to the freshman, I screamed, “Get to your room, dumbhead.”
The freshman took two steps for the shower room door before he braced to attention again when Snipes shouted, “Halt, smack. You stay where the fuck you are.”
Snipes turned to face me and said, “I outrank you, McLean. I’m a platoon sergeant and you’re nothing but a fucking private.”
“Gee, a platoon sergeant. Jeepers-creepers, you must be something very special, Mr. Snipes. You must be a leader of men. Let me remind you of something, you fucking creep. I’m a senior and you’re a junior. It’s not rank that counts in this school and both you and Matt kno
w it. It’s the class system.”
Matt spoke up nervously from the corner where he had retreated. “I don’t think the dumbhead should hear this, Will.”
“You can’t talk like that in front of a knob, McLean,” Snipes warned. “He’s going to lose respect for me.”
I walked over and stood directly in front of the freshman. He was still crying but had regained a measure of control over himself.
“What’s your name, dumbhead?” I asked.
“Sir, my name is cadet recruit Poteete, J. M., sir.”
“Have you lost respect for Mr. Snipes, Poteete?”
“No, sir.”
“Well, I have, dumbhead. I lost all respect for him two years ago when he was standing beneath the stairwell on first division.”
“McLean!” Snipes said.
“He started crying when three seniors jumped him coming back from mess. They weren’t even getting on him bad, Poteete. They were just racking his ass lightly. A little warm-up variety. Well, ol’ Snipes cried like a goddam baby I got him out of the rack line and into my room with the three seniors right behind me, screaming at me that they were going to jack it up my ass for interfering with the plebe system. They did, too, Poteete. Served confinements for one whole semester. Little Cecil cried in my room for half an hour. This same tough guy who’s making you cry right now. I want you to remember that story. I want you to know about this sick fucking sadist who has you crying tonight. He cried his way through plebe year. Now you get to your room, Poteete. In an hour, I want you to come to my room for a little powwow. I’m in the alcove room on fourth division.”
“Yes, sir,” Poteete said, slipping on the wet tiles as he left.
“Don’t you ever interfere when I’m disciplining a knob again, McLean,” Snipes said, “or so help me, I’ll report your ass.”
“I’m so scared. I think I’m getting sick to my stomach. Fear does that to me.”
“You interfered with me last year.”
“Sadism repels me, Snipes. It’s a quirk of mine.”
“It’s the system, McLean,” he replied.
“It’s an aberration of the system.”
Matt Ledbetter cleared his throat and spoke to me in a voice trembling with emotion. “Will, that freshman doesn’t belong in this school. We’ve got to run him out of here. We can’t help it if he cries. He cries every time we look at him. He simply doesn’t belong here. It’ll be better for him and the other knobs when he goes.”
“Last year, you were a freshman, Matt. This year you’re God.”
“He doesn’t belong here, Will. It’s our duty to run him out. We owe it to the Institute. We owe it to the line.”
“Your duty?” I asked him.
“Our duty,” Matt replied.
Chapter Twelve
It was dangerous to have a sadist in the barracks, especially one who justified his excesses by religiously invoking the sacrosanct authority of the plebe system. The system contained its own high quotient of natural cruelty, and there was a very thin line between devotion to duty, that is, being serious about the plebe system, which was an exemplary virtue in the barracks, and genuine sadism, which was not. But I had noticed that in the actual hierarchy of values at the Institute, the sadist like Snipes rated higher than someone who took no interest in the freshmen and entertained no belief in the system at all. In the Law of the Corps it was better to carry your beliefs to an extreme than to be faithless. For the majority of the Corps, the only sin of the sadist was that he believed in the system too passionately and applied his belief with an overabundant zeal. Because of this, the barracks at all times provided a safe regency for the sadist and almost all of them earned rank. My sin was harder to figure. I did not participate at all in the rituals of the plebe system. Cruelty was easier to forgive than apostasy.
I placed a very high premium on my enmity with Snipes. He personified the Institute’s capacity for deviance. He had the face of a young wolf—thin, carnivorous, and rapacious. His complexion was oily and barnacled with pimples, as though his very flesh was marked with his cunning debasement. Leanly, he moved along the galleries ferreting out plebes. I was glad he was not handsome; it was far easier to have ugly enemies.
As I waited for Poteete’s knock on my door, I thought about my relationship with Cecil Snipes. In some deep instinctive way, I needed there always to be a Snipes at the Institute, perhaps throughout my entire life. I required always the hostility of the announced enemy, the devout and certified adversary. I needed the symbol of something worthy of encounter on the road, to test the resonance and mettle of my own humanity. If I could always be waging war against a Snipes, I would never have to turn a cold eye inward to discover the subtle and unexamined evil in myself.
The screen door slammed twice against the doorjamb, the signal of a freshman seeking entry into the room of an upperclassman.
“Drive in, dumbhead,” I called out.
Poteete appeared in the entranceway, still sweating liberally. You could almost watch him losing weight. His face spoke eloquently of the day’s rigors. His eyes, piglike and the color of tobacco leaf, were hideously swollen.
“Good evening, Mr. Poteete.”
“Cadet recruit Poteete reporting as ordered, sir,” he said.
“Not bad, Poteete,” I said admiringly. “It’s amazing how quickly you learn the little tricks they teach by torture this first week. Remove your cap when you come into an upperclassman’s room. I forgot once during my plebe week and the first sergeant almost tore my head off. That’s good. Now. At ease. Sit down and relax.”
He stood before me bracing as earnestly as when he entered the room. It was almost impossible to relax in front of an upperclassman in the first months of school. The brace became a method of defense, a natural reflex like a turtle withdrawing into its shell.
“Relax your chin, Poteete,” I ordered. “Quit bracing and sit down. You’re making me nervous. You had a tough day, didn’t you?”
“No, sir.”
“Please try to remember that I’m not Snipes or any of those other assholes.”
“Yes, sir.”
“I’m a senior private, Poteete. I have no rank and no authority except that which comes naturally to any senior in this school. There aren’t any privates around now, but there’ll be a lot of them when the Corps gets back next week. We got where we are, to our incredibly unprestigious positions, by basically not giving a shit. Do you understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You’ve got a great personality, kid. You’re going to do well here,” I said.
“Sir, permission to make a statement, sir.”
“My God, Poteete, what do I have to do, get the General to sign a piece of paper that I just want to talk to you?”
“Sir,” he said, and his voice was whining and rasping, “sir, I was the most popular boy in my high school. People liked me there.”
“Ha! Wonderful, young dumbhead. Be sure to tell the cadre that. They’d hate to know they’d been abusing the most popular boy in his high school class. Let me do you a favor, Poteete, and suggest you keep that piece of information between us. They pick up on that kind of stuff and go for the groin. By the way, Poteete, are you sure you want to stay in this school?”
“Yes, sir,” he answered. “More than anything in the world. I’ve been planning to come to the Institute ever since I can remember.”
“So you’ve been fucked up a long time, Poteete.”
“Sir,” he bristled. “My father was a battalion commander in the class of 1947. He was a legend here. Sam Poteete. Have you ever heard of him?”
“Naw, not a single time in my whole life.”
“It would’ve killed him if I’d gone to Clemson or Carolina. But when I was a senior he told me I could go to any college in the country, that he wouldn’t interfere with my decision at all.”
“And you chose this place?” I asked.
“He did make one stipulation, sir. He said he would pay for my education at
the Institute.”
“A legend in his own time, huh?” I said. “He sounds like a flaming asshole in his own time to me.”
“He loves this place, sir. I think he was happier here than he ever has been since.”
“How do you feel about it, Poteete?”
“I didn’t know it was going to be like this, sir. I didn’t know about the cruelty.”
“Oh, they’re just getting warmed up,” I said. “It’s just plebe week. You’ve got a big nine months to go. You’re merely seeing the birth of the ghouls this week. They’re only truly fearsome when they reach maturity in January. Then and only then is their cruelty really formidable. But by that time, if you make it that long, you could withstand an assault by the whole Chinese army.”
“Do you think I can make it, sir?” Poteete said pleadingly. “I mean, I’ve got to make it. I could never go home to Dad as a quitter.”
“You’ve got to quit crying, Poteete.”
“I can’t, sir. I’m easily upset.”
“They’ll run you out of here in a couple of days if you don’t. They already know that you cry easily, Poteete. They already know they can get to you. So now they’re going to start singling you out the way they were doing in the shower room tonight. They’ll cut you off from the herd, use you as an example, get the other freshmen to turn against you. If you don’t learn to quit crying, Poteete, it’s going to be a gang-bang every moment of your life.”
“I can’t help it, sir. It just comes.”
“I know, Poteete. I cried myself to sleep every night for three months. I cried throughout my entire plebe year. Do you know what happened to me after that?”