THE BALLAD OF EDMUND TUPPENCE
CANTO THE THIRD (PART TWO)
MARK GULLICK
1st June 2020
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XXVI
Of all the parts that Royal Mullins plays
He’s no psychologist. Trick cyclists,
His father used to call them, in the days
When language helped the speaker to enlist
In bold invention, metaphor, which plays
Its own tricks. I suppose, if you insist,
I’ll give a small representative vignette.
(To my best knowledge, poesie’s not a sin yet).
XXVII
We say ‘a busted flush’ for something which
Goes wrong, or pear-shaped. Hold hard! There’s another!
A kettle of fish, a hair’s breadth, and a stitch
In time. These portables announce no other
Than that language is a lush and rich
Companion, sister, lover, friend or brother.
But words for Edmund T still prove elusive.
He says some things, but let’s not be intrusive.
XXVIII
Now something moves in Royal Mullins’ mind.
A buried thought, half-seen but half not seen,
A deep-sea eel which winds and then unwinds,
As black as coal but lit up with a sheen
From time to time. Poor Royal always finds
A cigarette would keep his memory keen.
He used to smoke… But wait! His mind is freed!
It’s Muriel the hypnotist we need!
XXIX
Smoke? Why, what our man Royal did was not
Smoking as we know it. It was far more
A dedicated service, duty, what
Our fathers called ‘necessity of law’,
And eighty snout a day was not a lot
When you had seen what Royal Mullins saw.
To say his job was stressful’s euphemistic.
(I know. That rhyme? I wasn’t optimistic…)
XXX
But Muriel the hypnotist was found
And set to work to get RM off cigs.
She put him under, and when he came round
For cigarettes he cared not fig or figs.
He broke the habit with a single bound,
So why not get her in? Now Mullins twigs
That mesmerism could unchain Ed’s mind,
And ease the ropes that hold, the ties that bind.
XXXI
The wise woman is sent for, and arrives
As on a magic carpet. Over dinner
Sally Q explains how Edmund lives.
His accident, his loss of speech, and in a
Moment Muriel looks up and gives
Young Sal a smile best described as a winner.
A godsend is our mesmerising Muriel.
I honestly believe that she could cure you all.
XXXII
A moment now. Suspend the action, freeze
This therapeutic minute. Can we just
Assume all’s well with nonchalance and ease?
I think not. Yet it seems as though we must
Accept this treatment, if only to please
Young Sally, and in her to place our trust.
She, with no wish to stay a virtual spinster,
Conversed with Muriel, who’s now convinced her.
XXXIII
Hypnosis fascinated Sigmund Freud,
The dark unconscious summoned like a djinn.
His mentor, Charcot, often got annoyed
When critics claimed it was a mortal sin
To render women liable to avoid
The niceties of conversation in
A state of catatonia, alone,
And with a man without a chaperone.
XXXIV
So, Edmund sits with beatific smile,
As Muriel begins her practised art.
She softly talks to Ed, and in a while
His eyelids close, his breathing slows, a part
Of Sally which before was in denial
Can feel faith rise in her expectant heart.
She feels the tears begin to bathe her cheek
As Edmund smiles again and starts to speak.
XXXV
Since coming under Sally’s care our Ed
Has spent his days with children’s picture-books.
For hours, delighted, he has sat and read
Of turtles, bears and bunnies, now he looks
At none of these, but reads them out instead
From memory. Now Sally’s crying brooks
No delay. She is weeping not through choice,
But from the silky sound of Edmund’s voice.
XXXVI
We’ll hurry time again, and crop its hide
To set it at a trot to run ahead.
As Muriel continues work inside
The labyrinth of Edmund’s shapely head,
Sally sees a turning of the tide,
The children’s tales are gone, and now, instead,
The lad partakes of normal conversation,
No more a stranger to communication.
XXXVII
And as the weeks glide past and Edmund T
Learns to talk and laugh and even sing,
His memory returns as perfectly
As though it never left. But here’s a thing.
His recall’s not quite perfect, for, you see,
There’s something not quite there, something missing.
Since meeting Sally he recalls each second.
Before that time? There’s not a moment reckoned.
XXXVIII
Now, let us treat space as we treated time
And move our operations to the west.
It would be foolish to believe that crime
Will let its children be so disposessed.
And though Ed’s future now seems so sublime,
His past still lingers, actions far from blessed
Lurk in the shadows. Deals from Edmund’s past
Are present still, the die was long since cast.
XXXIX
We are the curators of Edmund’s life,
His prior dealings on the tracks’ wrong side,
And dealing drugs will also deal out strife
And cards malevolent. And woe betide
Those who live on the sharp edge of the knife
Should cross another, or offend the pride
Of street-scum whose dark memories are long ‘uns.
And Edmund’s fallen foul of just these wrong ‘uns.
XL
So let us go back to the underworld
We came from when we followed Eddie’s course.
A twilit empire with black flag unfurled,
A country whose inhabitants are coarse
And rough-edged, where obscenities are hurled,
Whose rarest mineral is called remorse.
This nation’s damned, its native population
Is governed by a dark administration.
XLI
Villains, vagabonds and criminals
Are old as time, we never were without them.
They prowl and wait like hungry animals,
And lick their lips and keep their wits about them.
At bus stops, alleyways and terminals
They stalk like jackals, never think to doubt them.
Their path runs close to yours, and if you stray,
You will become their hamstrung, hunted prey.
XLII
This, as we know, was Ed’s environment.
Though violence was never his MO,
Associates of his were violent
Beyond the call of duty. And we know
That violence is vicarious. Absent
Morality, and jungle law rules. So,
Although young Tuppence never hurt a fly,
The spiders may hurt Tuppence, by and by.
XLIII
You see, this world of warped morality
Still has a code of sorts, a type of honour
Which, far removed from our reality,
Is still a binding law graven upon a
Heart of stone. This chill normality
Could turn a transgressor into a goner.
And Ed transgressed, and more than once it seems
Betrayed the folk who stalk our darkest dreams.
XLIV
Now, let us use our arts poetical
To join two miscreants at their abode.
Nappo Clark, wretched and dropsical,
And Clovis Dredger, neither of whom bode
Much good for anyone, and whimsical
Where violence is concerned, and they are owed
A certain sum of money. When all’s told,
The debtor is a cove we know of old.
XLV
A drug deal is a drug deal, or it should be,
But economics is a fickle wench,
And really not as faithful as she could be.
This truth is known to our two untermensch.
They gave young Edmund moneys, said they would be
Waiting on a particular park bench.
And so they were, a warm spring day, and sunny.
But Ed went on the razzle with their money.
XLVI
From that day forth, the squalid pair had vowed
To ‘do’ young Edmund (sorry for the parlance).
They cursed our boy with imprecations loud
And showed themselves as mentally unbalanced.
Ed didn’t care, was positively proud.
Embezzlement was just one of his talents.
But actions long since finished with may yet
Return to haunt the actor, you can bet.
XLVII
This underworld we previously described
As though it were a country or a nation.
And, like a state or land mass circumscribed,
It has a system of communication.
And after Clark and Dredger had both bribed
The quack who ministered Ed’s medication,
They had their means for criminal redress.
A name and, more important, an address.
XLVIII
So now, as we return along the breeze
To Sally, Ed and Royal, we must own
We feel discomfited, and our unease,
Matches our impotence. They are alone.
Had we a choice, and were ourselves to please,
We’d warn them, bid them pack up and begone.
But poets, though we seem omnipotent,
Are but mere scribblers, all too impotent.
XLIX
Now Napper Clark and Clovis Dredger own
The means of their revenge; they hire a crew
Of n’er-do-wells. They dare not go alone.
They know of Royal Mullins’ presence. You
Should know his reputation sets a tone
Of fear that runs from Canning Town to Kew.
He is preceded by his reputation
For knocking heads together with elation.
L
And as the twilight falls this motley horde
Like Midians do prowl and prowl around,
Their hideous intention underscored
By weaponry they’ve bought and stole and found.
An army now, in violent accord,
Are in the garden, still without a sound.
And now they wait. We fear the worst, my friends.
We dread to think how this offensive ends.
The author of The Ballad of Edmund Tuppence will be taking a rest from his labours for a month or two. Edmund will return later in the summer.
Mark Gullick is a philosophy PhD from London, England, who went on holiday to Costa Rica four years ago and forgot to go home. He now works there as a musician. His debut novel, Cherub Valley, is available as an ebook here'.