The Naked and the Dead - Norman Mailer [207]
What is partially behind it all is the conversation Cyrus has had with the town doctor. The fabulous beard, the hard shrewd eyes have twinkled at him, got a little of their own back. Well, now, Mr. Cummings, there ain't a damn thing can be done now, it's over my head, if he were a little older I'd say take the boy over to Sally's and let him git some jism in his system.
The basic good-bye at the age of ten, the railroad train, the farewell to the muddy roads at the periphery of town, the gaunt family houses, the smell of his father's bank, and the laundry on the lines.
Good-bye, Son, and do all right for yourself, do you hear?
He has accepted the father's decision without any feeling, but now he shudders almost imperceptibly at the hand on his shoulder.
Good-bye, Ma. She is weeping, and he feels a mild contempt, an almost lost compassion.
Good-bye, and he goes, plummets into the monastery and becomes lost in the routine of the school, in polishing his buttons and making his bed.
There are changes in him. He has never been friendly with other boys, but now he is cold rather than shy. The water colors, the books like Little Lord Fauntleroy and Ivanhoe and Oliver Twist are far less important; he never misses them. Through the years there he gets the best marks in his class, becomes a minor athlete, No. 3 man on the tennis team. Like his father, he is respected if he is not loved.
And the crushes of course: he stands by his bunk at Saturday morning inspection, rigidly upright, clicking his heels as the colonel headmaster comes by. The suite of officer-teachers pass, and he waits numbly for the cadet colonel, a tall dark-haired youth.
Cummings, the cadet colonel says.
Yes, sir.
Your web belt has verdigris in the eyelets.
Yes, sir. And he watches him go, shuttling between anguish and a troubled excitement because he has been noticed. A subterranean phenomenon, for he takes no part in the special activities pertinent to a boys' private school, is almost conspicuous by his avoidance.
Nine years of it, the ascetic barracks, and the communal sleeping, the uniform-fears, the equipment-fears, the marching-tensions, and the meaningless vacations. He sees his parents for six weeks each summer, finds them strange, feels distant toward his brother. Mrs. Cyrus Cummings bores him now with her nostalgia.
Remember, Eddie, when we went out to the hill and painted?
Yes, Mother.
He graduates as cadet colonel.
At home he makes a little stir in his uniform. The people know he is going to West Point, and he is pointed out to the young girls, to whom he is polite and indifferent. He is handsome now, not too tall, but his build is respectable, and his face has an intelligent scrubbed look.
Cyrus talks to him. Well, Son, you're ready for West Point, eh?
Yes, sir, I expect so.
Mmm. Glad you went to military school?
Tried to do the best I could, sir.
Cyrus nods. West Point pleases him. He has decided long ago that little Matthew Arnold can carry on the bank, and this strange stiff son in the uniform is best away from home. Good idea sending you there, Cyrus says.
Why. . . His mind is blank, but a powerful anxiety stirs along his spine. His palms are always wet when he talks to his father. Why, yes, sir (knowing somehow that this is what Cyrus wants to hear). Yes, sir. I hope to do well at the Point, sir.
You will if you're a son of mine. (Laughing heartily in the consummation-of-business-deal heartiness, he claps him on the back.)
Again. . . Yes, sir. And he withdraws, the basic reaction.
He meets the girl he is to marry in the summer after his second year at West Point. He has not been home in two years because there have been no vacations long enough for him to make the trip, but he has not missed the town. When this vacation comes he goes to Boston to visit his mother's relatives.
The city delights him; the manners of his relatives come as a revelation after the crude probing speech of the town. He is very polite at first, very reticent, aware that until he learns the blunders he must not