The Hanged Man

He's looking at me! He thinks I don't know it, but I do! 1

"I can see you, Happy. I can see you!" 2

He sits on an old wooden chair in the corner of my quivering room. Lonely. The room cowers as there is nothing but silence, I'm afraid, but I can feel his cold harsh stares. As long as I live he'll haunt me, taunt me, then destroy me.3

There's only one escape for me ... for both of us. 4

Piercing, painted doll-like eyes stare out of that wooden head. Sneering at me. There was a time I could ignore him. Drop him in his box at the end of the act and forget him until the next performance. That was long ago, when I first started as a ventriloquist. Back then it was, 'The amazing Edward'. That's how the billing read. No mention of 'Happy' ... just me, Edward. 5

But slowly he weaselled in on the act. First they changed the billing to, 'Edward and his lifelike dummy'. Happy didn't like that. Didn't like being called a dummy. 6

"The crowd don't see me as a dummy," he scorned. "They see me as a real person. Real flesh and blood. So why destroy the illusion?" 7

The only illusion was that people thought I pulled the strings to make Happy come to life. In fact, Happy pulled my strings. He was the master and I was the puppet. He knew exactly how to handle me. 8

Happy indulged in the humiliation and merciless sluice of my personality, destroying my confidence, and ridiculing me in front of others. That's how he got his kicks, that's what made him...Happy. 9

In the end there was no stopping him. Theatre, radio, television. Everyone wanted him. He even went to a Royal Variety Performance Show, and the Press took pictures of him shaking hands with royalty while my face was blanked out in the background. When the reporters wanted an interview it was Happy who answered their questions. When we appeared on a T.V. Chat Show it was Happy who was interviewed, not me. I kept quiet, said nothing ... just like a dummy. 10

"If it goes on like this," Happy said to me, “you'll soon be redundant. You'd better start looking for another career. I can always find another knee to sit on, but without me, you've got nothing. You're dead, man! Dead!" 11

As long as I live he'll haunt me, taunt me, then destroy me. There's only one escape for me ... for both of us. Tomorrow they'll find us hanging from a beam in the centre of this room ... two stiff, inanimate puppets on the ends of our strings, our faces blackened and contorted by tightened rope. The master and his puppet. Perhaps then they'll know ... will understand ... will look closely at the two bodies hanging side by side, and will see the inescapable resemblance ... the face of the dummy and the face of the hanged man.