The army enjoyed rifle inspection every day at 8:00 p.m. Rifles at that time consisted of Springfields and Enfields. The former a nice piece. The latter a club that purportedly worked. The army also insisted on smooth operations at rifle inspections. The Springfield owners had no trouble. The Enfield owners had abundant. Namely .... the lieutenant would stand in front of you, grab the rifle, hold it up to the light after opening the bolt, inspect it and immediately shove it back to you and you were immediately supposed to clear the bolt --- all in one faultless motion. Springfield owners did this faultlessly. Enfield owners had to push the follower down first and then close the bolt. This sounds easy but skinned fingers were common, not to mention the clumsy look which did not add to military precision.
But some brilliant PFC decided that before inspection if someone put a nickel in the follower, it would depress it just enough to close the bolt smoothly and then you would look like a Springfield owner. This worked fine.
Now for the point of this story. There was a guy named Gauss. He could neither read nor write. He came into the army nothing and went out the same way, but in between he managed to make Sergeant ... honorary of course. Latrine sergeant to be exact. He was a man physically. He liked to eat, drink and do things. Beyond that he didn't care. While cleaning the latrine the "smarter" people used to bug him with such things as throwing paper towels on the floor, which he didn't like.
One day he seemed actually to get done. He had a girlfriend! He wanted to go to town that night but had no money. So naturally he started borrowing. Nickels, dimes, anything to round up five bucks. Some of the boys went for it with dimes and nickels but no bills. They knew that Gauss thought borrowing meant a gift. Well, he wasn't doing too good. His girl was about to arrive, which she did. There was him and there was her.
Now desperation forced his mind to work and it worked very well. About 45 minutes later his pockets were bulging and he grabbed his girlfriend and headed for the bus. All the guys said, "Hey, Gauss. Where are you going with no money?" He just patted his bulging pockets. Before the light dawned among the onlooking men, Gauss was on the bus cruising out of sight. As one man, the group rushed to their respective barracks to find every nickel in every Enfield was gone - gone with Gauss!
He might have been ignorant, but he wasn't stupid when the occasion demanded.
Art Pranger
(circa 1990)
