"Gustav Hasvord. The Short-Timers " - читать интересную книгу автора

The recruit says that his name is Leonard Pratt.
Gunnery Sergeant Gerheim takes one look at the skinny red-neck and
immediately dubs him "Gomer Pyle."
We think maybe he's trying to be funny. Nobody laughs.
Dawn. Green Marines. Three junior drill instructors screaming, "GET IN
LINE! GET IN LINE! YOU WILL NOT MOVE! YOU WILL NOT SPEAK!" Red brick
buildings. Willow trees hung with with Spanish moss. Long, irregular lines
of sweating civilians standing tall on yellow footprints painted in a
pattern on the concrete deck.
Parris Island, South Carolina, the United States Marine Corps Recruit
Depot, an eight-week college for the phony-tough and the crazy-brave,
constructed in a swamp on an island, symmetrical but sinister like a
suburban death camp.
Gunnery Sergeant Gerheim spits. "Listen up, herd. You maggots had
better start looking like United States Marine Corps recruits. Do not think
for one second that you are Marines. You just dropped by to pick up a set of
dress blues. Am I right, ladies? Sorry 'bout that."
A wiry little Texan in horn-rimmed glasses the guys are already calling
"Cowboy" says, "Is that you, John Wayne? Is this me?" Cowboy takes off his
pearl-gray Stetson and fans his sweaty face.
I laugh. Years of high school drama classes have made me a mimic. I
sound exactly like John Wayne as I say: "I think I'm going to hate this
movie."
Cowboy laughs. He beats his Stetson on his thigh.
Gunnery Sergeant Gerheim laughs, too. The senior drill instructor is an
obscene little ogre in immaculate khaki. He aims his index finger between my
eyes and says, "You. Yeah-you. Private Joker. I like you. You can come over
to my house and fuck my sister." He grins. Then his face goes hard. "You
little scumbag. I got your name. I got your ass. You will not laugh. You
will not cry. You will learn by the numbers. I will teach you."
Leonard Pratt grins.
Sergeant Gerheim puts his fists on his hips. "If you ladies leave my
island, if you survive recruit training, you will be a weapon, you will be a
minister of death, praying for war. And proud. Until that day you are pukes,
you are scumbags, you are the lowest form of life on Earth. You are not even
human. You people are nothing but a lot of little pieces of amphibian shit."
Leonard chuckles.
"Private Pyle think I am a real funny guy. He thinks Parris Island is
more fun than a sucking chest wound."
The hillbilly's face is frozen into a permanent expression of oat-fed
innocence.
"You maggots are not going to have any fun here. You are not going to
enjoy standing in straight lines and you are not going to enjoy massaging
your own wand and you are not going to enjoy saying 'sir' to individuals you
do not like. Well, ladies, that's tough titty. I will speak and you will
function. Ten percent of you will not survive. Ten percent of you maggots
are going to go AWOL or will try to take your own life or will break your
backs on the Confidence Course or will just go plain fucking crazy. There it
is. My orders are to weed out all nonhackers who do not pack the gear to
serve in my beloved Corps. You will be grunts. Grunts get no slack. My