From Here to Eternity_ The Restored Edit - Jones, James [312]
“On the other hand,” Turnipseed grinned, “other guys actually get the shakes.”
“Major Thompson must be quite a guy,” Prew said. “To put that up there. I wonder where he got hold of it.”
“Hell, he dint put it up there,” Turnipseed said indignantly. “I been here longer than he has, and it was there when I come here.”
“I been here longer than you have,” Hanson said. “And it was here when I first come here.”
“Well,” Prew said, “you’ve showed it to me. Where to now?”
“Take you in for your visit with the Major,” Hanson grinned, “then we’ll take you out to work.”
Prew studied him. There was no malice in that odd grin, only a humor of amusement, like when you watch a child mispronounce a word too big for it. It seemed to be a stiff grin.
“Well, lets go,” he said. “What’re we waitin for?”
“Major Thompson’s very proud of that clipping,” Turnipseed said. “You’d almost think it was his. He claims you can tell just what kind of prisoner a guy will make just by the way he reacts to it.”
“Well, lets shove,” Hanson grinned friendlily. “From now on you’re marching at attention, bud,” he added.
As they rounded the corner back down the long gleaming corridor to the outside door they had first entered by, Hanson made the old familiar quick shuffle with his feet, like a sliding boxer, to pick up the step. Their footsteps in unison reverberated crashingly ahead of them down the long hall.
“Prisoner, column right, harch!” Hanson said, when they reached the first door on the right, and both giants marked time while Prew cut the pivot and then followed him in one pace behind him, half a step on his right and left.
“Prisoner, halt!” Hanson said from his left. It was a beautiful movement, beautifully executed with professional precision. Prew was standing two paces from the mission oak desk of Major Thompson and bracketed exactly between the two statues of the gleaming giant MPs.
Major Thompson looked at them approvingly. Then he picked up the sheaf of papers on his desk and looked at them through his gold rimmed spectacles.
Major Thompson was a short barrelchested man whose OD blouse and summer pinks fitted like a glove. On his chest was a World War Victory ribbon with three stars and a Legion of Merit ribbon, joined on the same steel band. He peered myopically from his gold rimmed spectacles. He had the ruddy complexion and close cropped gray hair common to Regular Army officers of long service. He had evidently been an officer ever since 1918.
“I see you are from Harlan Kentucky,” Major Thompson said. “We get quite a few boys from Kentucky and West Virginia here. I could almost say they are our chief stock in trade. Most of them is coal miners,” he said, “but you dont look big enough to be a coal miner.”
“I’m not a coal miner,” Prew said. “I never was a—”
The butt of a grub hoe handle thudded into the small of his back above the kidney on the left side and he was afraid for a second he would vomit.
“—Sir,” he said quickly.
Major Thompson nodded at him from behind his gold rimmed spectacles. “Much better,” he said. “Our purpose here is to re-educate men to both the manual skills and right mental thinking of soldiers, and to reinstill in them (or teach them, if they never have learned) the desire to soldier. You dont want to get off on the wrong foot, do you?”
Prew did not answer. His back ached and he thought the question was purely rhetorical. The butt of the grub hoe handle whacked into the small of his back in the same spot making his testicles ache, informing him differently.
“Do you?” Major Thompson said.
“No, Sir,” Prew said quickly. He was catching on.
“We feel here,” Major Thompson said, “that if you men had not mislaid either your manual skills of soldiering, or your mental conditioning, or your desire to soldier, you would not be here. Whatever the legal reasons for your restriction. So our every effort is bent toward reaching the objective of re-education with the minimum of wasted time and the maximum of efficiency. Both to the men personally and