The Lords of Discipline by Pat Conroy Page B

month of our plebe year, upperclassmen came from the other three battalions to see Pig, and the cadre would force him to strip off his shirt and stand braced as the obscene, uninvited eyes of upperclassmen examined his already famous physique. From my vantage point in the second platoon, I could see the entire ceremony, and I filled up with an immense pride for this freshman, so much a man that our inquisitors, our lean tormentors, were coming to the ranks of plebes to study the most magnificent body in the Corps. They would hit him in the stomach as hard as they could and he would take their best punches. I could not convey how beautiful Dante Pignetti looked to me then, exposed to sunlight, barechested, struck by them, admired by them, more than them. As I was witnessing the strangeness of this ceremony, I decided on the spot to make friends with him. Wisdom and a knack for survival told me that it was no foolish act to have the strongest man in the Corps tied up with my destiny. Because powerful men inspire fear, they usually have very few friends and almost never have developed the soft skills necessary to make friends; they have spent too much time developing their pectoral muscles. I also knew Pig would instinctively like me. As I watched him from a distance, I knew with absolute surety that Pig had isolated and imprisoned himself in his own physical invulnerability. He was lonely that first year, and he smiled foolishly, boyishly, when I asked him to walk downtown for a beer.
    There was a disturbance outside on the gallery. The door shivered violently as someone was hurled against it. I heard shouts, profanity. Suddenly, the door was flung open and Gooch Fraser flew into the room and tumbled onto the floor. Pig was behind him and gave him a swift kick on the buttocks that sent Gooch sprawling into Mark’s luggage.
    “Over here, Toecheese,” Pig ordered.
    “Pig?” I said in a half-question, half-greeting.
    “I can’t say hello now, paisan,” Pig answered, throwing his suitcase on the bed and snapping it open. “Toecheese has just insulted my girl.”
    “I didn’t know you had a girl, Pig,” Gooch whined. Gooch Fraser was a junior sergeant and as harmless and inoffensive as a gerbil.
    “You call me Mr. Pignetti. I don’t like the way you say ‘Pig.’ ”
    “Please, Mr. Pignetti. I didn’t mean anything.”
    “I’ve got to teach you a lesson, Toecheese,” Pig explained. “I’ve got to make sure it doesn’t happen again. I’m going to show you a picture of the girl you just insulted and you’ll understand why I become a wild man when someone says something nasty about her.”
    “But, Pig . . .” Gooch said, desperately trying to explain.
    “Shut up,” Pig yelled, slapping Gooch on the top of the head. “I’m Pignetti to you and you’re Mr. Nothin’ to me. I’d be doing myself a favor to strangle your scrawny, greasy neck. Now watch as I show you the girl you insulted.”
    He reverently slid the photograph out of his suitcase. I had seen the photograph for three straight years; it was as familiar to me as the face of Lincoln on a five-dollar bill.
    “There,” Pig said with obvious self-justification. “Now do you understand why I become a homicidal maniac when some nothin’ makes a dirty remark about her? Did you ever see such a beautiful woman?”
    Then he slapped Gooch on the back of the head again.
    “Take your beady eyes off her!” he screamed. “You’re not worthy to gaze upon such an exquisite sight. If you only knew how good she was, how kind she was, how humble, how quiet, how smart—you wouldn’t blame me for throwing you to your death off fourth division. You’d beg me to kill you. That’s how ashamed you’d be.”
    “I didn’t know, Mr. Pignetti. I really didn’t know.”
    “What did Gooch say, Pig?” I asked.
    “I asked him if he got any pussy this summer,” Gooch explained to me with penitent, uncomprehending eyes.
    Pig slapped him on the back of the head