Puppet, p.4
Puppet, page 4
They looked together at this thing that suddenly did almost seem to have a life of its own. Silvester lifted it and turned it towards Fleur.
“My name is Twiglet,” he made it say in a twiggish voice. “Hello, Fleur.”
“Hello, Twiglet,” she replied.
She widened her eyes. She picked up an oval-shaped stone and held it between her fingers. She made it speak.
“My name is Stone. Hello, Twiglet.”
“Hello, Stone,” the twig replied.
“See?” said Silvester. “The world is filled with puppets.”
He let the twig fall back onto the grass.
“It’s magic!” said Fleur.
“Yes,” agreed Silvester. “Yet it’s just twigs and stones and voices and not difficult at all.”
They laughed together at the strangeness of it.
Then Silvester felt tired again. He said they really had to go.
“Will I see you again?” asked Fleur. “Will I see Kenneth again?”
Silvester didn’t know.
“You could come and visit us,” said Fleur. “We could have tea and make puppets in the garden.”
Silvester nodded. “Perhaps we could.” He realized he would like that.
“Would you like that, Kenneth?” asked Fleur.
“Jam!”
“That means yes, doesn’t it?” she said.
“It does,” agreed Silvester.
“We live in a place called Crow Hall.”
“Crow Hall?”
Fleur laughed. “Well, it’s not much of a hall. It’s more like a battered old cottage.”
“It sounds lovely.”
“It is! And the garden’s more like a wilderness than a garden. But it’s very peaceful and lovely in its own way.”
Silvester smiled. “I’m sure it is,” he said.
“We’re trying to bring it all back to life again.”
“And are you managing to do that?”
“Yes. We’re starting to.”
“That’s good.”
Silvester looked down at Puppet. “Would you like to see Fleur again?” he asked.
“Jam!” said Puppet.
Fleur quickly ran to her mum and just as quickly ran back again.
“Mum says come any time. How about tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow? OK, tomorrow.”
She wrote the address and drew a little map on a sheet of paper and gave it to him.
Silvester led Puppet away.
“Bye-bye, Kenneth!” Fleur called.
Puppet turned to look back at her.
He waved.
Silvester and Puppet left the park, crossed the road and headed back across the square.
Outside Dragone’s cafe, the men were still sitting at the table with their coffee and their cards.
“Hello again,” called Louis.
Silvester nodded.
“Had a good time?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“The young ’un looks a bit worse for wear.”
The men at the table all leaned over to look at Puppet.
Silvester looked at him too. Face all scratched and scraped. Clothes torn where he had fallen off the swing. One of his legs was even more wonky.
“Yes,” he said. “He has been in the wars today.”
“It can be tough sometimes, being young,” said Louis. “Would he like a biscuit? There’s a couple left over here.”
Silvester shook his head. “No, thank you. Best get him home, I think.”
“Bath and a mug of hot chocolate, maybe.”
“Something like that,” agreed Silvester. “He’s called Kenneth, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Kenneth. I’m Louis.”
He put out his hand. Puppet just looked at it.
“Nice to meet you,” Louis said again.
“Jam!” said Puppet.
Louis smiled kindly. “Enjoy your bath, son. And your hot chocolate.”
“Come along, Kenneth,” said Silvester. “Let’s get you home.”
And homewards they walked.
Poor Puppet. Poor Silvester.
Both worn out.
Silvester sprawled on the sofa with Puppet tucked in at his side.
“Poor you,” Silvester said. “You really have been in the wars.”
Puppet didn’t move.
“But we made a friend. Fleur. Remember?”
Puppet didn’t move, didn’t speak. Silvester gently tapped his head.
“Puppet?”
No answer.
“Puppet. Is it over already, Puppet?”
Silvester tapped himself on the head. Maybe he’d been asleep all this time.
Maybe all of this had been just a dream.
He looked at the picture of Belinda on the wall.
“He’s just wood and wire and wax and paint,” he said to her. “How on earth can he be alive?”
She gazed back at him with gentle brown eyes.
“Or maybe life just comes and goes,” he said. “Ah, well.”
He took a scrapbook from a shelf. He sat on the sofa and turned its pages. So many photographs: dozens of old puppet shows, hundreds of old puppets. Newspaper cuttings and reviews. Letters from people around the world. The best of them were from children, saying how much they’d laughed, how they’d been terrified, how they’d felt sad, and how they’d laughed and laughed and laughed again.
Sometimes the children had sent little puppets that they had made themselves.
“We were a force for good in the world,” he said to Belinda in the photograph. “Weren’t we, my love?”
Yes, she whispered, from long ago. Yes, my love, we were.
And Puppet stirred.
“Puppet?” said Silvester.
Puppet looked up at him.
“Hello again,” Silvester softly said. “I thought you might have gone away.” He turned the pages of the book. “Have a look at this! This was our van.”
There it was, the old van, in an ancient photograph.
The name was written in bright multicoloured letters across its side:
Around the words were pictures of puppets, all bright and alive, dancing and dangling, grinning and snarling.
“And look, Puppet. This is me, with my beautiful Belinda at my side.”
There they were together, in front of the van, with sunlight pouring down on them. Silvester had long dark hair. He wore a top hat, and a bright satin waistcoat decorated with stars and comets and moons. A puppet dangled from strings in his hand. Belinda wore a long tight sky-blue dress. She had on a yellow necklace and bright red earrings, and she held a dancing puppet too.
Both of them so young and free, so full of life.
Puppet watched as the pages turned.
“You’d have loved it. And we’d have loved to have you with us, there in the van! We went everywhere. Cities and villages and theatres and country fairs. We did the shows on riverbanks and beaches and in marketplaces and schools and children’s homes. Everywhere we went, they cheered and clapped. Everywhere, they laughed and screamed and gasped and cried.”
Silvester closed his eyes, drifted through time, present to past and back again.
He smiled at himself. “Sorry, Puppet. Keep going off to dreamland.”
He turned more pages.
“The children fell in love with the show. They’d move like puppets, dance like puppets, talk as if they were puppets themselves. And the adults? They turned into children again for an hour or so in their busy and troubled lives.”
Another page.
There was the van in front of a dark stone building with great steel heavy gates.
“That’s a prison, Puppet. Once or twice we performed in there, in that dark and dour and desolate place. We performed for men who had done the wickedest deeds. And they laughed and cried like they were little boys again.”
Silvester pointed to a picture of a great muscular man with tattoos of snakes on his cheeks.
“Ah yes. Frederick. As the warders led him back to his cell, he leaned over to me and whispered, ‘You released me, Silvester. Thank you. My name is Frederick. You made me free.’”
Silvester turned the pages and turned the pages.
“How strange,” he said. “These things happened long before you came to life, when you were just bits and pieces on a bench upstairs. And now Belinda’s at rest, the van conked out and was turned to scrap, and all the puppets have gone to the museum.”
He shrugged and smiled. “Now it’s just me and you.”
A little paper puppet slid out from between the pages into Puppet’s lap.
Silvester picked it up. There was a label tied to it.
Thank you for the show. His name is Claude. With love from Antonia.
Two lengths of thread were attached to Claude’s hands.
“Hello, Claude!” said Silvester. “What a nice surprise.”
He showed Puppet how to use the threads to move Claude’s hands. Puppet tried to copy him, and Silvester helped. Puppet moved Claude’s legs, held Claude up to his face, looked into Claude’s little pencilled eyes, touched Claude’s crayoned cheeks. On his pocket was written a faded letter C.
“Say hello, Claude,” said Silvester.
“Hello.”
Puppet played. He moved Claude from side to side through the empty air. He made him fly. He made him dance.
“Ha ha, Puppet,” laughed Silvester. “You’re a puppeteer too!”
And they played like that as the sky darkened and evening approached.
And they came to rest.
Later, Silvester inspected Puppet’s scratched cheek. He looked at his torn clothes, his scrawny hair.
“We need to fix you up,” he decided. “We’re seeing Fleur again tomorrow, and we need her and the world to see how beautiful and strong you really are. Don’t we?”
“Jam!”
An owl hooted somewhere.
“That’s an owl,” Silvester said. “It comes at night. Say ‘hello, owl’.”
“E-O,” said Puppet.
They sat quietly as the silvery light shone in on them. A baby cried somewhere and then quietened.
“And sleep,” Silvester said softly. “Sleep comes at night as well. It’s when we close our eyes and disappear from the world. Sleep, Puppet. Sleep. Close your eyes, my little one. Night-night.”
And Silvester closed his eyes and slept, there on the sofa with Puppet at his side.
And Puppet became still as timber, still as stone, with little Claude lying against his chest.
Deep into the night, Silvester woke and carried Puppet up the steep stairs.
The moon shone in through the window to the sky.
He laid Puppet on the workbench.
He switched on the desk light.
He took Claude from Puppet’s arms and carefully laid him beside him on the bench.
An owl hooted. A cat yowled. A moth came, fluttering in the lamplight. And another. A mouse scuttled on the floor. And here came the dangling spiders, and the dark woodlice at the edges of the bench.
“Hello, everyone!” Silvester whispered. He laughed. “You’ll never guess what happened to this little lad today!”
He told them everything. The mouse squeaked. The moth fluttered.
“And look at the mess of him now,” he said sadly. He stroked Puppet’s cheek. “I’m sorry, Puppet,” he whispered. “I haven’t taken enough care with you.”
He shook his head. “I didn’t realize what I was really doing, Puppet. I didn’t realize that you would come to life!”
He talked to the spiders and he laughed out loud.
“I didn’t realize he would come to life!”
He lifted a piece of sandpaper and, very gently, he sanded the scratches on Puppet’s face. He smoothed Puppet’s body, arms and legs.
And all through the rest of that night, beneath the lamp and the moon, Silvester worked to make Puppet the best puppet it was possible for him to be. He tightened Puppet’s joints. He reshaped Puppet’s face. He smoothed and waxed his skin. He thickened Puppet’s hair. He brightened his green eyes.
As he worked, his body relaxed; his mind relaxed. He was like the old Silvester, the bold magician of the puppet theatre. He was like the little boy making his first puppets to show to his mam.
He remembered how nothing ever seemed quite fixed. He might start off making a boy but find himself making a girl. Making a queen that became a king. Making a cat that became a dog. He loved the way the puppets would move and shift between his hands, the way all puppets would seem to seek their own true shape, the way they really did seem to seek true life.
This would be Silvester’s final puppet; he knew that. Puppet was brand new, but he was made from bits of ancient puppets, scraps and fragments, stuff that seemed nearly useless. He was, as Fleur had said, both young and old. He had bits of Silvester in him, bits of Belinda, bits of memories, bits of dream. He had grown from all the puppets that had gone before, and he would lead to all the puppets that were still to come.
When Silvester was done, he smiled.
Yes, Puppet was still odd and twisted, a funny-looking thing.
No, he would never be perfect, but he was beautiful.
He was beautiful and imperfect, as all the most beautiful things are.
Silvester dressed him anew: black cotton trousers, a black cotton top with pockets, the kind of simple clothes he’d given to so many of his puppets in the past. He put a blue cap on Puppet’s head. He tucked Claude into Puppet’s breast pocket.
“You look wonderful, my little Puppet,” said Silvester. “You truly are the puppet that you were meant to be.”
He laid him carefully back on the bench.
Then the spiders dangled closer and all the little creatures watched as Silvester lowered his head and slept again.
Silvester stirred. He rubbed his eyes and yawned.
Puppet lay beside him, bathed in daylight. Claude lay in Puppet’s pocket.
“Puppet?” Silvester whispered.
Puppet didn’t move.
He tried again. “Puppet?”
Nothing.
He held Puppet by the shoulders and stood him on the bench.
“You look so splendid,” he said.
He let go and Puppet clattered to the bench. He tried again and Puppet fell a second time.
“Is it time to put strings on you?”
Nothing.
Silvester sighed. “Perhaps it is,” he said. “Perhaps it’s all been just an illusion.”
He searched for a box and found it. Inside were many tiny sharp hooks. He took out five of them and wiped them clean. One for each hand, one for each knee, one for the top of Puppet’s head.
He searched again and found an ancient cross-shaped piece of wood that the strings would dangle from.
He picked up one of the hooks and tested it against his own skin. Yes, sharp enough.
He took a deep breath. He paused, then pressed its point against the back of Puppet’s left hand and began to turn.
Puppet flinched. He opened his eyes.
Silvester gave a sigh of relief. He took the hook away.
“Hello,” he said.
“E-O,” said Puppet.
“I stopped believing in you for a moment,” admitted Silvester. “Please forgive me.”
“Jam.”
Silvester stared into Puppet’s bright green eyes. “Did I hurt you?”
“Jam.”
“And am I cruel, to bring you back again?”
“Jam.”
“This is the world. Do you remember? I am Silvester. We’re off to see our friends today. We’re going to visit their garden. Do you remember?”
No answer.
Silvester frowned. Was it cruel to bring these sticks to life again? Should he have left Puppet as he was, just scattered fragments lying in the dust?
But Puppet struggled to his feet. He took Claude from his pocket and held him in both hands and gazed at him.
“E-O,” he said.
Claude said nothing, of course. He didn’t stir.
Silvester carried them both down the steep stairs to the kitchen. He made tea and bread and jam and they breakfasted together. Puppet swiped the jam across his mouth and went “Mmm, mmm.” He touched some jam to Claude’s mouth too and went “Mmm, mmm” as if Claude were speaking.
Silvester laughed. “Puppet the puppeteer!” he exclaimed.
After breakfast he had a bath and shaved his stubble. He trimmed his hair. He got out some clothes he hadn’t worn for years: a pair of blue jeans, a blue shirt with white birds on it.
He looked at himself in the mirror.
“Not quite as you used to be,” he said. “But better than you were just yesterday.”
He lifted Puppet and held him up to the mirror too.
“That is me and that is you,” he said. “Look how smart we are!”
He waved, and Silvester in the mirror waved too.
He lifted Puppet’s hand and made it wave, and the puppet in the mirror waved too.
Puppet craned forward in Silvester’s arms until his nose almost touched the mirror.
“Do you understand?” asked Silvester. “That is both of us, reflected back.”
Puppet swung his right leg and kicked, and his hard little foot struck the wall.
Silvester laughed. “No,” he said. “It’s you, Puppet. It’s you with me. There’s no need to be scared. They’re called reflections.”
Puppet leaned again, closer, closer. Then he held up Claude, and there was Claude in the mirror too.
He moved Claude as if he were flying, and Claude in the mirror flew too.
They all gazed into and out from the mirror, the three faces.
“Don’t we look wonderful?” Silvester said.
Then he turned them all away.
“Right, we have a garden to get to, my lovely friends,” he said. “Are you prepared?”
“Jam,” said Puppet. “Jam.”
The men were sitting in the square again, outside Dragone’s, bathed in morning light.
“You’re in much better fettle today,” said Louis. “What a dapper pair you are!”
“Indeed we are!” Silvester agreed.
“One could almost think you’re off to set up a puppet show.”
