The Verse
of
Rhys Hughes
Six
Characters in Search of an Executioner
Rhys
Hughes
(1)
The
first death involves a gallows that operates upside-down. The rope is
one of those lengths of mystic hemp and human hair that jumps erect
in the old Indian trick. So the executioner will have to be a fakir
of sorts; probably a toothless ascetic with ribs like the bars of a
cage and a matted beard. When he claps his hands together, the rope
will spring into the air. But this is too barbaric for our purpose,
so there will have to be modifications. Now the fakir pulls a lever
and a series of weights are set in motion, wheels turn and fan belts
whirr. A mechanical set of hands comes together with the required
clap and tradition and progress are both satisfied.
As
for the condemned prisoner, he is doubtless an insurgent or political
rebel. Petty criminals are separated from their limbs and left for
the crows in the barley fields. Religious dissenters are quartered in
the circus. Republicans alone (and their anarchist brethren) are
preserved for the noose. The affair is an outdoor event; all good
spectacles are available these days for public consumption. It is the
old excuse for a knees-up; songs and dancing and ribaldry. This
fellow, our present doomed specimen, makes a noble speech about
justice and morality. His tone is flat.
The
drum rolls, the trumpets blare, the crowd throws rotten fruit and
cruel jokes. The executioner pulls the lever, but nothing happens.
One of the mechanical hands has been stolen. The other hand flaps
aimlessly: the sound of one-hand clapping is finally revealed to be
that of near-death. It begins to rain. An engineer is called. Later,
in the puddle left by the downpour in front of the gallows, you can
see a man who hangs the right way up, towards the stars.
(2)
In
the second instance, there is a cannibal family somewhere remote who,
for an unspecified and patently ludicrous reason, do not yet realise
that cannibalism is not the norm. So they continue in ignorant bliss
in their old crumbling mansion, snaring hapless travellers in nets
laid across the road, and eating them, boots and all, in a stew
(invariably a stew) washed down with Adam’s-apple cider, a godawful
pun and a godawful drink. They are an odd family; one of them is
certainly a vampire (the grandfather?) while the others are assorted
horrors and cranks. They sleep during the day and, once again,
believe it normal to dream in individual coffins, the lids screwed
down tight.
One
time, they receive a letter from Cousin Stefan, who says he is coming
to visit. There is gaping panic. Cousin Stefan is a vegetarian. How
can they possibly serve him person-broth? No, it will not do! They
will have to make a special effort; Cousin Stefan is a respected
relative they have not seen for more than a decade. After leaving the
old country, he became a successful funeral director out East. So he
has found his niche; and they must do their best to satisfy such an
esteemed guest. Traveller-soup is out of the window; or down the sink
rather, and Pa and Ma must put their heads together (not difficult
considering they are unseparated Siamese twins) to find an
alternative.
When
Cousin Stefan arrives, in a turbocharged Hearse, Pa and Ma and
vampiric Gramps and the little but horrible ’uns and the mythical
pet (a cockatrice perhaps, whose look can kill) and Purdy Absurdy are
standing on the dilapidated steps of the porch. They greet Cousin
Stefan with a smile and mumble a few words in Hungarian to remind
themselves of their origins. Cousin Stefan follows them into the
house and, before long, dinner is served. Connected to a life-support
unit by a score of wires and tubes, a suitable vegetable dish, in
this case a crash victim, waits for grace and the sprouts and salt
and pepper.
(3)
The
third case is similar except that here we have Karl and Julia, who
live on an abandoned farm after some global disaster has wiped out
most of civilisation (or so they believe.) Nature is reclaiming the
land. So Karl goes out hunting while Julia turns what he captures
into sausage. They are not fussy, of course, so Karl brings back in
his sack such delicacies as Robin, Panda, Rhino and Beetle. One day
he says: “Jaguar in the hills. Heard it last night.” Language too
has decayed and Karl was always terse at the best of times. He loads
his rifle and adjusts his necklace of fish bones and scratches his
greasy louse-ridden hair.
Julia
gnaws on an old skull and snarls, her broken face writhing and
contorting in a savage attempt to formulate an opinion. She snorts
and throws the skull away with a menacing gesture and bares her
rotting teeth. “Jaguar too noble to destroy. Karl leave it alone.”
But Karl shakes his head. “Karl kill. Jaguar die. We eat.” Julia
snatches up a femur from the rubbish-strewn floor and lunges at Karl,
who grunts and moves out of range. Julia throws the bone at him. Karl
disappears through the door.
Julia
struggles with strange ideas. Why should anything be too noble to
destroy? As she ponders, she hears a shot. Ten minutes later, Karl is
back, holding up a sack. “Jaguar,” he says, beaming. He moves
into the corridor and then into the room where he keeps his trophies.
Meanwhile, Julia sighs and takes out her knives. There is a knock on
the door. Two people are standing there, on the threshold. One says:
“You must help us! Theres a madman out there, a madman with a gun.”
And Julia nods sympathetically and invites them in. At the same time
in the other room, Karl reaches into his sack and pulls out his
latest trophy, which he nails to the wall next to the others: a
gleaming chrome hubcap.
(4)
The
fourth example concerns a depressed young man, Thomas, who takes
himself to the edge of a sea cliff and throws himself over. What he
is really trying to achieve is anyone’s guess, though the obvious
shouldn’t be overlooked. He spins through space and loses
consciousness; so relaxed is he now that somehow, miraculously, he
survives the landing with no more than a dozen plum bruises on his
legs and torso. Thomas is not to know this, however, and when he
awakes he assumes he is dead. But he is aware of his surroundings, so
he finally decides he must be a ghost. There is no other explanation.
He stands up and brushes himself down and flexes his ghostly muscles.
It
is necessary, he thinks, for him to adopt his role completely. He
will become an evil spirit. He will do his best to harm people. So he
makes his way back towards the nearest village and waits for his
first victim. An elderly man, with a false leg, totters out of the
post office, unsteady on a gnarled stick. Thomas kicks away the stick
and when the man is on the ground he removes his false leg and
proceeds to batter him to death with it. Next he wanders into YE OLDE
TEA SHOPPE and forces a dozen stale scones into the maws of the
entire cast of the local Amateur Dramatics Society’s production of
Blithe
Spirit.
They choke slowly, spitting crumbs and turning blue in real deaths as
corny as any they have ever acted.
Several
outrages later, as he is in the not entirely unwarranted process of
forcing the vicar to eat Mrs Featherstonehaugh’s pink poodle,
collar, leash and Mrs Featherstonehaugh included, he is apprehended
by a vengeful mob of cribbage-players, retired shopkeepers and
ex-servicemen (medals all affixed to jackets at the shortest notice)
who chase him out of the village and scream indigo murder. Thomas is
surprised that they can see him, but isn’t concerned in the least.
They hound him towards the very cliff he earlier had leapt off and
this time he doesn’t hesitate: he is a ghost and ghosts can fly. It
is a pity that he is now so tense, with anticipation, with triumph.
(5)
The
fifth item is both rather more sombre and perverse. We have a loner
who lives in a garret, or a bedsit, and who never speaks to any of
the other tenants in the building. He has no close family (they have
all died in mysterious, and truly grisly, circumstances) but he is
deluged with Aunts. There is Aunt Emily and Aunt Theresa and Aunt
Hilda and Aunt Eva. At the funerals of his mother or father or
brothers or sisters, they each take it in turns to mumble such
platitudes as “you have your father’s eyes” or “you have your
mother's nose” or “you have your sister’s ears” or some such
thing. The loner merely nods and purses his lips. Once back in his
tiny room, he digs up the floorboards and removes the plastic bags
concealed there. He is all despair. “How do they know?” he wails.
(6)
Now
we are back in some grim cold city, ramshackle and asthmatic, during
the depths of winter. A hunched figure moves out of the blizzard,
wrapped tight in a threadbare cloak, complete with hood. He takes a
tiny key out of his pocket and opens a door onto muted warmth and
light. Surely this is the interior of a toy shop? There are puppets
and automatons, wondrous animals suspended on cords from the ceiling,
jack-in-the-boxes and life-sized dummies. With a contented sigh, the
hunched figure throws off his cloak and rubs his hands together
(fingerless gloves naturally) in glee. He has a parcel under his arm.
Lovingly, he places it down on a chair and unwraps it. There is a
mechanical arm, gleaming and strange in the faint illumination. The
hunched figure takes it over to a puppet sitting quietly in the
corner and fits it on carefully. Now the puppet is complete. Now it
has two arms. The hunched figure winds this puppet up and, after this
one, all the others. Soon the shop is full of dancing animals and
people.
There
is a sequence of savage blows on the door. The hunched figure pauses
in his own dance and rushes to unbolt it. It is pushed open and three
sinister men in heavy overcoats and pork-pie hats force entry. “Dr
Coppelius?” they cry, “we have a warrant for your arrest.” They
thrust a crumpled piece of paper under his nose. “We have reason to
believe that you did today wilfully steal part of the execution
apparatus erected by the city council for the punishment of
lawbreakers. Namely, one mechanical arm. Because of this action, the
sentence on an agitator had to be delayed by nearly two hours!”
Dr
Coppelius allows himself to be led away in chains. His trial is brief
and to the point in every respect. As an acknowledgement of his
standing in the academic world, it is judged that to slice off his
limbs and abandon him in a barley field would be inappropriate. So
too the quartering in the circus and the public noose. He is given
the rare honour of facing a firing squad. On the appointed day, shots
cry out and ten bullets strike his heart all at once. Springs sprout
and not a little oil trickles out of his mouth.
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