by Pat Conroy
Young girl crying on the phone. Great heaving sobs. “I’m pregnant. That son of a bitch, Cadet Varlenti, won’t marry me. I thought a cadet was a gentleman. He promised me, Colonel, he promised me.”
This is a facsimile of a conversation The Boo received sometime in 1962. If a cadet became a surprised father and left the surprised and expectant mother to cast her fate to the many prevailing winds of Charleston, The Boo would often receive hysterical phone calls demanding justice from the reluctant cadet. In this case, as in all the others, The Boo called five cadets into Jenkins Hall. The cadets remained downstairs at strict attention. He brought the girl out of his office (she had dressed to the teeth for this event). Together they stood upstairs looking at the five cadets. Boo had selected four of them at random from the Corps. One of them was Cadet Varlenti. “Right face,” The Boo roared. “Left face,” he roared again. “Which one is it, honey?” The Boo asked. “I don’t know, Colonel.” She could not pick out the cadet who supposedly had fathered her child.
A mother called Colonel Courvoisie one afternoon just before Corps Day. She said, “Colonel, I hate to bother you but I just had to call someone. My daughter is seventeen and has been dating Cadet J for about a month. He is the first boy she has ever dated. Well, Colonel, he invited her to the Corps Day Hop with him. I can’t begin to tell you how thrilled she was. We went downtown to buy a dress. We found one that was absolutely beautiful. It was expensive, but we both loved it. Then she had her hair fixed for the prom. And all of her girl friends know about it. Well, Colonel, Cadet J called last night and broke the date. My daughter didn’t go to school today because … well … I had to call somebody.” “Madame,” The Boo answered, “I may be able to help you.” At the Corps Day Hop, Colonel and Mrs. Courvoisie stood in the receiving line. When Cadet J and his date passed by, Mrs. Courvoisie couldn’t help but remark to her husband that the girl was wearing a particularly attractive dress.
Harry Lester was a bum from the very first day he entered Lesesne Gate to the very last. He was a discipline problem in the highest, purest sense of the term. He and The Boo squared off several times during his infamous years as a cadet. But one of The Boo’s greatest surprises as Assistant Commandant came several years after Harry graduated, when Harry called and said, “Colonel, I think it is a disgrace to The Citadel for cadets to be going around Charleston with ‘El Cid’ stickers on their windows. Can you do something about it? If they aren’t proud enough to put Citadel stickers on their cars, then keep them in on the weekends.”
From that moment on The Boo believed in the resurrection and regeneration of bums.
Alf Garbade looked like the typical jock, sort of square-shaped, thick-trunked and powerful. He played fullback on the football team and achieved a certain amount of success. Like many jocks, his feet were faster than his brain, and he found himself in summer school after the rest of his class had graduated in June. Toward the middle of August, Alf started acting a little funny. He would lie in bed for days at a time, staring at the ceiling in absolute silence, or babbling incoherently to no one in particular. His roommate, becoming extremely concerned, went to The Boo’s house one night to ask for advice. The Boo went over to see Alf himself. When The Boo came into the room, Garbade never looked up, just lay on his back, with a glazed and sightless expression, not saying anything to anybody. When The Boo spoke to him, no response whatsoever registered in Alf’s eyes and he gave no indication that anything The Boo said to him got past the wall he had erected between himself and the world. Alf snapped out of it in time to take and pass his exams. He and his roommate came over to the Courvoisie house to say goodbye. While saying appropriate farewells, Alf slipped his Citadel ring from his finger. “Colonel, take this ring, I don’t deserve to wear it.” The Boo took the ring. Alf’s roommate came back later and said he would get Alf to take it back. The Boo never learned what was eating Alf, what restless, ineluctable guilt lived inside of him that he could not verbalize or release. He wanted to talk, he wanted to expurgate his guilt, and he wanted to do some symbolic act in retribution, this The Boo was sure of. He never found out. For Alf never came back.
Poor, skinny Ulysses S. Simmons distinguished himself the very first week he was at The Citadel. Now anyone whose first name and subsequent initial summon up visions of the general who humbled Robert E. Lee is going to find it hard plowing in the school which prides itself on firing the first shot of the Civil War. Ulysses indeed felt the grinning corporals with the grits and gravy voices were tougher on him than on other freshmen. The whole system upset him so much, in fact, that on the fourth morning he was at The Citadel he woke up feeling strangely, looked in the mirror, and saw that he was bracing for no reason. When he tried to relax, he found that he could not, that he had lost all control of his throat muscles and that no matter how hard he tried, his chin remained rigidly tucked against his throat. This worried Ulysses a great deal. When the upperclassmen learned of his malady, they hooted and hollered, giggled and snickered at poor Ulysses twice as vigorously as they had before. They ordered him to relax, to stand “at ease,” to stick his chin out as far as he could—all to no available, for the chin of Ulysses remained fixed and riveted in the bracing position. After great deliberation, Ulysses went to the hospital for treatment. Doctor Hugh Cathcart scratched his head, admitted puzzlement, muttered something about psychology and mental chaos, and put Ulysses to bed. Ulysses braced in his sleep and when he was awake, when he ate breakfast and when he went to the bathroom. He was not goldbricking. Finally, through an act of God, the involuntary bracing stopped after seven days. Ulysses went back to the Corps with considerable fame and notoriety earned from his strange and unexplained week. All the generals, the colonels, the secretaries, and the street cleaners on campus knew the story of Ulysses, the knob who couldn’t stop bracing. The Boo met Ulysses on one of his daily visits to the hospital and asked him how he was getting along. They chatted every day that week. When it was over, The Boo had made a friend for a four-year period. The only requirement Boo had passed in the eyes of Ulysses was kindness and concern when the world about him mocked the name and eccentricity of Ulysses S. Simmons.
So they became friends. After a disconcerting beginning Ulysses started to adjust to the life in the corps. He talked to Colonel Courvoisie every time they met on campus and even went over to see The Boo and his wife at night, just to chat and swap stories, if nothing else. The boy wanted someone to talk to, this was obvious to both Colonel and Mrs. Courvoisie, so they encouraged his visits. After a year or two of visiting and becoming comfortable in the Courvoisie household, Ulysses related how the tension between him and his father was becoming almost unbearable, that the father barely spoke to him at home, and that the father was very displeased that Ulysses was very unathletic and had failed to gain rank in the Corps of Cadets. True, Simmons did not gain immense popularity at The Citadel. A tinge of effeminacy did little to bolster his status among cadets very conscious of the masculine image they felt a military school should project. He never got rank. Nor did he ever make an athletic squad. But he did several things at The Citadel which The Boo felt Mr. Simmons should recognize.
Ulysses won gold stars at The Citadel for two consecutive semesters, no small feat in a school where the spit-shined shoe is often more admired than the quality point. He also was an avid participant in the intramural program in his company, and even though he was basically one of the poorest athletes ever produced above the Mason-Dixon line, he tried like hell to play whatever sport was in season. But Mr. Simmons was not interested in any accomplishments of his older son. He was more concerned with Ulysses’ younger brother, an athletic, handsome kid four years younger than Ulysses. The younger boy was a star halfback on his high school football team and very popular with everyone at the school. The younger son represented and embodied everything Mr. Simmons had hoped for in Ulysses; the younger son, in essence, was the son Mr. Simmons had wanted and finally gotten. He simply didn’t give a damn about Ulysses.
> In November of his senior year, Ulysses came over to the Courvoisie house looking a bit more dejected than usual. “What’s wrong, Bubba, you look like judgment day is here and gone?” “Colonel, it’s the Ring Hop,” Simmons answered. “Don’t you have a date? We can arrange that if you want.” “No, Colonel, I have a date. Mom’s coming down to watch me go through the ring. My grandfather is coming, too. But Dad isn’t coming, Colonel.” “Why not, Bubba? Is he sick, dead, or just dying?” “None of those. My brother has a football game that night and Dad doesn’t want to miss it.” “Well, that’s a shame, Bubba, I’m awful sorry.” “I just wanted to tell you, Colonel.” “Thanks, Ulysses.”
The next day Colonel Courvoisie called Mrs. Simmons on the phone. He called hesitatingly. He had a habit of calling parents who were putting too much pressure on their sons and asking them to lay off a bit. At anytime the parent could tell him to go to hell or go flush himself down the nearest commode and there would be nothing he could do about it. But he usually called anyway.
Mrs. Simmons answered the phone. “Hello, Madame. This is Courvoisie of The Citadel.” “Is Ulysses in trouble?” Mrs. Simmons asked in a frantic, customary maternal response. “I don’t think so, Mrs. Simmons. But he might be. He came over to my house last night a little upset. He said his father wasn’t coming to the Ring Hop because he wanted to see his other son play a football game.” “Yes, Colonel, I tried to talk to my husband, but he doesn’t seem to understand.” “Yes, Ma‘am, I understand. Maybe you should try to tell him how important the Ring Hop is to the cadet, what it means to him and what it should mean to the cadet’s parents. Your son has been greatly hurt by your husband, Madame. I just called to see if you could persuade your husband to give up one football game for the sake of his oldest son. I think it would do Ulysses a great deal of good. He loves his father very much, but doesn’t seem to think his father feels the same way.” “I’ll try to persuade him, Colonel. Thanks so much for calling.”
The next night Ulysses walked through the ring with his girl. His mother was very proud. So was his father, even though he later went back to his motel room to call his younger son to see who won the game.
A corollary to the story of Ulysses: Ulysses won a scholarship to graduate school after he graduated from The Citadel. The younger brother came to The Citadel as a freshman a year later. He played mediocre football and performed disastrously in the classroom. He flunked out in his sophomore year.
Cadet Harlent was one of the most creative salesmen ever to peddle sandwiches at The Citadel. He perfected what he considered a fool-proof method for making money without getting busted by the Commandant’s Department. He would take all his sandwiches and put them on the bench in the shower room. He placed a cigar box beside the sandwiches. Famished cadets could walk in the shower room, put their money in the cigar box, and take one sandwich. Meanwhile, Harlent had removed his pants and was sitting on a commode doing his homework and watching his profits soar. He sat on the commode for three hours each night. The only occupational hazard he noticed was a tendency for his behind to go asleep.
Kroghie Andressen, nationally ranked punter for the football team, was the official pigeon-killer of Padgett-Thomas Barracks in the off season. Kroghie was such a disaster militarily, but such a deadly marksman that The Boo figured he could be of some service to The Citadel by thinning out the pigeons who left their feces in so many conspicuous places around the campus.
One night Colonel and Mrs. Courvoisie were returning to campus when they spotted a cadet’s car parked just outside the gates. Whenever cadets got itchy feet or the restless urge to depart after Taps and All-in, they would station their cars outside the campus perimeter, then follow the railroad tracks to the relative safety of Hampton Park. From there, the wine and lusts of Charleston were easily available. The Boo knew this ploy well. The sticker on the car showed this particular cadet was a Company Commander with the improbable name of Casey Batt. At nine o’clock, Cadet Batt received a phone call. “Bubba, is your car parked off campus?” “Yes, Sir.” “Bubba, were you planning to sneak off campus after lights were out tonight?” “Yes, Sir.” “Well, Bubba, I wouldn’t do that if I were you.” “No, Sir. I won’t, Sir.” When Cadet Batt hung up his roommate asked who was calling. “That was The Boo telling me not to sneak off campus tonight.” “How in the hell did he know?” “I don’t know, but he sure doesn’t want to me to go.” The roommate never believed him.
Cadet Ron Ellison, having devised the perfect plan for getting out of confinements, stormed confidently into the Colonel’s office one Thursday afternoon. Ellison, an acknowledged wit, was on one of his initial forays into the world of The Boo and had heard by rumor that The Boo admired brashness and creative approaches by cadets inspired by the necessity of getting away from The Citadel on weekends. Therefore, he had practiced his line well. “Colonel,” he said, “you’ve got to postpone my confinements this weekend. I’ll do anything. I’ll wash your car, mow your lawn, or date your ugly daughter.”
With this, The Boo leapt from his seat and nose to nose said to Ron, “What ugly daughter are you talking about? My daughter is as pretty as any girl you’ve ever seen.” Meekly, very meekly, the young lamb whispered, “Colonel, I didn’t know you had a daughter.” With this, he slinked out of the room.
A green night gown, which The Boo still wears, was forthcoming. A kind of peace offering from one who had survived.
Joe Blank used to keep an ample supply of gin in his hair tonic bottle.
Cadet Benny Kern rushed into The Boo’s office waving a telegram which said that Mrs. Kern was sick in the hospital. The Boo said he knew for sure that Benny’s mother was not in the hospital and refused to let him go on emergency leave. Benny introduced his wife to the Colonel on graduation day.
Courvoisie’s sense of the dramatic sometimes got the best of him. To break the doldrums of winter tour formation, The Boo had two bandsmen exchange rifles for drums. They beat a steady, evocative cadence for two solid hours enlivening a dull and tedious exercise of cadet discipline.
Courvoisie was walking across the parade ground one afternoon when he spotted a figure two hundred feet away from him. The figure wore a grey hat, so The Boo instantly thought a cadet was out of uniform. He yelled the good yell, froze the cadet in mid-step, bawled him out, then apologized when he realized the boy was a visiting keydet from VMI, reputedly a military school between Charleston and West Point.
Band Company had two traditions which were honored by her members religiously. One was an annual occurrence. The Band Company knobs would wake up at 3 a.m., blow the bugle for reveille, beat on drums, blow on horns, roll out on the quadrangle, then race back for their rooms as bleary-eyed upperclassmen stumbled out of their rooms to begin a new day. The sweat parties after the celebration of this tradition were also legendary. The other tradition was a bit more specialized. Every fourth year, the seniors would initiate a crackdown on the under three classes. They would go through the rooms of the juniors, tear them apart, throw laundry on the floor, rip open presses, tear the beds to pieces, and give each junior fifteen or twenty demerits so their visit would be remembered. The sophomores and freshmen fared as poorly. The seniors then inspected the furious underclassmen at formation, burned them for improperly shined shoes, smudged brass, and wrinkled trousers. For two weeks this harassment continued. The juniors and sophomores rankled under this pressure. They cursed and mumbled expletives under their breaths. They planned mutinies, uprisings and murders. At the end of two weeks, the seniors invited the entire company to the company commander’s room. The company commander then informed the underclassmen that the prior two weeks had been a joke, the demerits did not count and the seniors were treating the entire company to a party. The seniors then brought in several cakes and cases of soft drinks to appease the anger and smoothe the feathers of their subordinates.
J. C. Hare is a lawyer in Charleston who graduated from The Citadel. Whenever a cadet ran afoul of the law, The Boo sent
the cadet to Mr. Hare. Hare helped twenty or thirty cadets out of jams and charged them nothing for his services.
The Tourist Club was one of Boo’s most popular creations during his reign as Assistant Commandant. A cadet won membership in the Tourist Club after he had walked 100 tours on the second battalion quadrangle. The cadet received a certificate specifying that he was a member of the most exclusive club on campus. The document was signed and dated by The Boo. Cadets eligible for the club, but overlooked by The Boo often came looking for him to receive their certificate. One cadet wrote for his certificate after his graduation.
Gene Loring did not go to parade his senior year. He got so fat that he could not fit into his full dress blouse.
