A Christmas Carol — Stave One : Marley's Ghost (part 2)

by Charles Dickens          

   He did pause, with a moment's irresolution        
before he shut the door; and he did look cau-       
tiosly behind at first, as if he expected to be       
terrified with the sight of Marley's pigtail stick-      
ing out into the hall.  But there was nothing       
on the back of the door, except the screws and     
nuts that held the knocker on, so he said, "Pooh,       
pooh!" and closed it with a bang.        
   The sound resounded through the house like       
thunder.  Every room above, and every cask in       
the wine merchant's cellars below, appeared to     
have a separate peal of echoes of its own.     
Scrooge was not a man to be frightened by    
echoes.  He fastened the door, and walked     
across the hall, and up the stairs; slowly, too:       
trimming the candle as he went.
   You may talk vaguely about driving a coach-      
and-six up a good flight of stairs, or through     
a bad young Act of Parliament; but I mean to        
say you might have got a hearse up that stair-       
case, and taken it broadwise, with the splinter-         
bar toward the wall and the door toward the      
balustrades: and done it easy.  There was plenty      
of width for that, and room to spare; which is      
perhaps the reason why Scrooge thought he saw      
a locomotive hearse going on before him in the     
gloom.  Half-a-dozen gas-lamps out of the street      
wouldn't have lighted the entry too well, so you      
may suppose that it was pretty dark with        
Scrooge's dip.           
   Up Scrooge went, not caring a button for that.      
Darkness is cheap, and Scrooge liked it.  But,      
before he shut his heavy door, he walked through     
his rooms to see that all was right.  He had          
just enough recollection of the face to desire     
to do that.         
   Sitting-room, bed-room, lumber-room.  All as     
they should be.  Nobody under the table, nobody     
under the sofa; a small fire in the grate; spoon       
and basin ready; and the little saucepan of         
gruel (Scrooge had a cold in his head) upon the       
hob.  Nobody under the bed; nobody in the      
closet; nobody in his dressing-gown, which was        
hanging up in a suspicious attitude against the     
wall.  Lumber-room as usual.  Old fire-guard,       
old shoes, two fish-baskets, washing-stand on      
three legs, and a poker.           
   Quite satisfied, he closed the door, and locked    
himself in; double-locked himself in, which was     
not his custom.  Thus secured against surprise,       
he took off his cravat; put on his dressing-gown      
and slippers, and his night-cap; and sat down      
before the fire to take his gruel.          
   It was a very low fire indeed; nothing on such      
a bitter night.  He was obliged to sit close to it,    
and brood over it, before he could extract the         
least sensation of warmth from such a handful      
of fuel.  The fireplace was an old one, built by       
some Dutch merchant long ago, and paved all      
round with quaint Dutch tiles, designed to        
illustrate the Scriptures.  There were Cains and     
Abels, Pharaoh's daughters, Queens of Sheba,     
Angelic messengers descending through the air     
on clouds like feather-beds, Abrahams, Belshaz-       
zars, Apostles putting off to sea in butter boats,      
hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts; and     
yet that face of Marley, seven years dead, came       
like the ancient Prophet's rod, and swallowed up        
the whole.  If each smooth tile had been a blank       
at first, with power to shape some picture on its      
surface from the disjointed fragments of his       
thoughts, there would have been a copy of old     
Marley's head on every one.          
   "Humbug!" said Scrooge, and walked across     
the room.          
   After several turns, he sat down again.  As        
he threw his head back in the chair, his glance      
happened to rest upon a bell, a disused bell, that      
hung in the room, and communicated for some       
purpose now forgotten with a chamber in the     
highest story of the building.  It was with great        
astonishment, and with a strange, inexplicable     
dread, that as he looked, he saw this bell begin        
to swing.  It swung so softly in the outset that     
it scarcely made a sound; but soon it rang out      
loudly, and so did every bell in the house.        
   This might have lasted half a minute, or a      
minute, but it seemed an hour.  The bells ceased        
as they had begun, together.  The were suc-       
ceeded by a clanking noise, deep down below,       
as if some persons were dragging a heavy chain      
over the casks in the wine merchant's cellar.          
Scrooge then remembered to have heard that      
ghosts in haunted houses were described as         
dragging chains.             
   The cellar door flew open with a booming     
sound, and then he heard the noise much louder,     
on the floors below; then coming up the stairs;      
then coming straight toward his door.       
   "It's humbug still!" said Scrooge.  "I won't     
believe it."        
   His color changed though, when, without a      
pause, it came on through the heavy door, and      
passed into the room before his eyes.  Upon      
its coming in, the dying flame leaped up, as     
though it cried, "I know him!  Marley's ghost!"      
and then fled again.            
   The same face; the very same.  Marley in his     
pig-tail, usual waistcoat, tights, and boots; and     
tassels on the latter bristling like his pig-tail,     
and his coat-skirts, and the hair upon his head.       
The chain he drew was clasped about his middle.       
It was long and wound about him like a tail;          
and it was made (for Scrooge observed it close-       
ly) of cash-boxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds,       
and heavy purses wrought in steel.  His body      
was transparent; so that Scrooge, observing him,       
and looking through his waistcoat, could see the       
two buttons on his coat behind.            
   Scrooge had often heard it said that Marley      
had no bowels, but he had never believed it     
until now.          
   No, nor did he believe it even now.  Though he      
looked the phantom through and through, and       
saw it standing before him; though he felt the        
chilling influence of its death-cold eyes; and       
marked the very texture of the folded kerchief      
bound about his head and chin, which wrapper     
he had not observed before; he was still in-     
credulous, and fought against his senses.         
   "How now!" said Scrooge, caustic and cold as      
ever.  "What do you want with me?"        
   "Much!" — Marley's voice, no doubt about it.        
   "Who are you?"            
   "Ask me who I was."        
   "Who were you, then?" said Scrooge, raising     
his voice.  "You're particular, for a shade."  He    
was going to say "to a shade," but substituted      
this, as more appropriate.            
   "In life I was your partner, Jacob Marley."             
   "Can you – can you sit down?" asked Scrooge,        
looking doubtfully at him.           
   "I can."      
   "Do it, then."           
   Scrooge asked the question, because he didn't        
know whether a ghost so transparent might find     
himself in a condition to take a chair; and felt      
that in the event of its being impossible, it     
might involved the necessity of an embarrassing       
explanation.  But the ghost sat down on the            
opposite side of the fireplace, as if he were     
quite used to it.                 
   "You don't believe in me," observed the Ghost.      
   "I don't," said Scrooge.       
   "Why do you doubt your senses?"       
   "Because," said Scrooge, "a little thing affects     
them.  A slight disorder of the stomach makes    
them cheats.  You may be an undigested bit of       
beef, a blot of mustard, a crumb of cheese, a      
fragment of an underdone potato.  There's more      
of gravy than of grave about you, whatever    
you are!"        
   Scrooge was not much in the habit of cracking        
jokes, nor did he feel in his heart by any means        
waggish then.  The truth is, that he tried to be     
smart, as a means of distracting his own atten-      
tion, and keeping down his terror; for the          
spectre's voice disturbed the very marrow of    
his bones.          
   To sit, staring at those fixed gazed eyes, in       
silence for a moment, would play, Scrooge felt,      
the very deuce with him.  There was something       
very awful, too, in the spectre's being provided      
with an infernal atmosphere of its own.  Scrooge      
could not feel it himself, but this was clearly the       
case; for though the Ghost sat perfectly motion-      
less, its hair, and skirts, and tassels, were still         
agitated as by the hot vapor from an oven.              
   "You see this toothpick?" said Scrooge, re-      
turning quickly to the charge, for the reason      
just assigned; and wishing, though it were only     
for a second, to divert the vision's stony gaze      
from himself.         
   "I do," replied the Ghost.       
   "You are not looking at it," said Scrooge.         
   "But I see it, said the Ghost, "notwith-     
standing."         
   "Well!" returned Scrooge, "I have but to        
swallow this, and be for the rest of my days      
persecuted by a legion of goblins, all of my own      
creation.  Humbug, I tell you; humbug!"         
   At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and         
shook its chain with such a dismal and appal-       
ling noise that Scrooge held on tight to his     
chair, to save himself from falling into a swoon.        
But how much greater was his horror, when, the         
phantom taking off the bandage wound round      
his head, as if it were too warm to wear in-doors,        
its lower jaw dropped down upon its breast!         
   Scrooge fell upon his knees, and clasped his      
hands before his face.            
   "Mercy!" he said.  "Dreadful apparition, why      
do you trouble me!"         
   "Man of the worldly mind!" replied the Ghost,      
"do you believe in me or not?"       
   "I do," said Scrooge.  "I must.  But why do     
spirits walk the earth, and why do they come     
to me?"           
   "It is required of every man," the Ghost re-        
turned, "that the spirit within him should walk        
abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and        
wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life,      
it is condemned to do so after death.  It is       
doomed to wander through the world — oh, woe      
is me! — and witness what it cannot share, but       
might have shared on earth, and turned to      
happiness!"                
   Again the spectre raised a cry, and shook its      
chain and wrung its shadowy hands.         
   "You are fettered," said Scrooge, trembling.       
"Tell me why?"        
   "I wear the chain I forged in life," replied      
the Ghost.  "I made it link by link, and yard      
by yard; I girded it on of my own free will,     
and of my own free will I wore it.  Is its pat-      
tern strange to you?"         
   Scrooge trembled more and more.          
"Or would you know," pursued the Ghost,       
the weight and length of the strong coil you      
bear yourself?  It was full as heavy and as long      
as this, seven Christmas Eves ago.  You have      
labored on it since.  It is a ponderous chain!"           
   Scrooge glanced about him on the floor, in      
the expectation of finding himself surrounded by     
some fifty or sixty fathoms of iron cable; but       
he could see nothing.         
   "Jacob," he said imploringly.  "Old Jacob Mar-       
ley, tell me more.  Speak comfort to me, Jacob!"          
   "I have none to give," the Ghost replied.  "It      
comes from other regions, Ebenezer Scrooge, and       
is conveyed by other ministers, to other kinds of         
men.  Nor can I tell you what I would.  A very     
little more, is all that is permitted to me.  I        
cannot rest, I cannot stay, I cannot linger any-       
where.  My spirit never walked beyond our     
counting-house — mark me! — in life my spirit      
never roved beyond the narrow limits of our     
money-changing hole; and weary journeys lie     
before me!"          
   It was a habit with Scrooge, whenever he    
became thoughtful, to put his hands in his      
breeches' pockets.  Pondering on what the Ghost      
had said, he did so now, but without lifting up      
his eyes, or getting off his knees.         
   "You must have been very slow about it,       
Jacob," Scrooge observed, in a business-like       
manner, though with humility and deference.           
   "Slow!" the Ghost repeated.          
   "Seven years dead," mused Scrooge.  "And      
traveling all the time?"        
   "The whole time," said the Ghost.  "No rest,     
no peace.  Incessant tortures of remorse."         
   "On the wings of the wind," replied the Ghost.  
"You might have got over a great quantity of      
ground in seven years," said Scrooge.        
   The Ghost, on hearing this, set up another        
cry, and clanked its chain so hideously in the      
dead silence of the night, that the Ward would       
have been justified in indicting it for a nuisance.          
   "Oh! captive, bound, and double-ironed," cried        
the phantom, "not to know that ages of incessant       
labor, by immortal creatures, for this earth must      
pass into eternity before the good of which it is        
susceptible is all developed.  Not to know that       
any Christian spirit working kindly in its little       
sphere, whatever it may be, will find its mortal      
life too short for its vast means of usefulness.        
Not to know that no space of regret can make        
amends for one life's opportunities misused!             
Yet such was I!  Oh! such was I!"          
   "But you were always a good man of business,       
Jacob," faltered Scrooge, who now began to      
apply this to himself.         
   "Business!" cried the Ghost, wringing his      
hands again.  "Mankind was my business.  The        
common welfare was my business; charity, mercy,     
forbearance, and benevolence, were all my busi-           
ness.  The dealings of my trade were but a drop      
of water in the comprehensive ocean of my     
business!"           
   It held up its chain at arm's length, as if that      
were the cause of all its unavailing grief, and        
flung it heavily to the ground again.              
   "At this time of the rolling year," the spectre     
said, "I suffer most.  Why did I walk through        
crowds of fellow-beings with my eyes turned       
down, and never raise them to that blessed       
Star which led the Wise Men to a poor abode!          
Were there no poor homes to which its light       
would have conducted me!"              
   Scrooge was very much dismayed to hear the     
spectre going on at this rate, and began to     
quake exceedingly.       
   "Hear me!" cried the Ghost.  "My time is        
nearly gone."           
   "I will," said Scrooge.  "But don't be hard        
upon me!  Don't be flowery, Jacob!  Pray!"         
   "How is it that I appear before you in a 
shape that you can see, I may not tell.  I have          
sat invisible beside you many and many a day."           
   It was not an agreeable idea.  Scrooge shivered,        
and wiped the perspiration from his brow.          
   "That is no light part of my penance, pursued       
the Ghost.  "I am here to-night to warn you that       
you have yet a chance and hope of escaping my        
fate.  A chance and hope of my procuring,           
Ebenezer."           
   "You were always a good friend to me," said      
Scrooge.  "Thank 'ee!""        
   "You will be haunted," resumed the Ghost,         
"by Three Spirits."           
   Scrooge's countenance fell almost as low as         
the Ghost's had done.      
   "Is that the chance and hope you mentioned,      
Jacob?" he demanded, in a faltering voice.        
   "It is."        
   "I — I think I'd rather not," said Scooge.          
   "Without their visits," said the Ghost, "you       
cannot hope to shun the path I tread.  Expect        
the first to-morrow, when the bell tolls One."          
   "Couldn't I take 'em all at once, and have it      
over, Jacob?" hinted Scrooge.            
   "Expect the second on the next night at the      
same hour.  The third, upon the next night when      
the last stroke of Twelve has ceased to vibrate.            
Look to see me no more; and look that, for your       
own sake, you remember what has passed be-     
tween us!"              
   When it had said these words, the spectre       
took its wrapper from the table and bound it        
round its head, as before.  Scrooge knew this by        
the smart sound its teeth made, when the jaws        
were brought together by the bandage.  He          
ventured to raise his eyes again, and found his      
supernatural visitor confronting him in an erect      
attitude, with its chains wound over and about        
its arm.          
   The apparition walked backward from him;         
and at eery step it took, the window raised      
itself a little, so that when the spectre reached        
it, it was wide open.  It beckoned Scrooge to       
approach, which he did.  When they were within        
two paces of each other, Marley's Ghost held up          
its hand, warning him to come no nearer.            
Scrooge stopped.               
   Not so much in obedience, as in surprise and      
fear; for on the raising of the hand, he became       
sensible of confused noises in the air; incoherent        
wailings of lamentation and regret; wailings in-           
expressibly sorrowful and self-accusatory.  The        
spectre, after listening for a moment, joined in      
the mournful dirge; and floated out upon the      
bleak, dark night.               
   Scrooge followed to the window: desperate in      
his curiosity.  He looked out.          
   The air was filled with phantoms, wandering      
hither and thither in restless haste, and moaning      
as they went.  Every one of them wore chains              
like Marley's Ghost; some few (they might be        
guilty governments) were linked together; none         
were free.  Many had been personally known to      
Scrooge in their lives.  He had been quite         
familiar with one old ghost, in a white waist-        
coat, with a monstrous iron safe attached to its      
ankle, who cried piteously at being unable to       
assist a wretched woman with an infant, whom       
it saw below upon a doorstep.  The misery with       
them all was clearly, that they sought to inter-      
fere, for good, in human matters, and had lost        
the power forever.       
   Whether these creatures faded into mist, or        
mist enshrouded them, he could not tell.  But         
they and their spirit voices faded together; and        
the night became as it had been when he walked         
home.          
   Scrooge closed the window, and examined the      
door by which the Ghost had entered.  It was      
double-locked, as he had locked it with his       
own hands, and the bolts were undisturbed.  He      
tried to say "Humbug!" but stopped at the first      
syllable.  And being, from the emotion he had      
undergone, or the fatigues of the day, or his        
glimpse of the Invisible World, or the dull         
conversation of the Ghost, or the lateness of the      
hour, much in need of repose, went straight to      
bed, without undressing and fell asleep upon the         
instant.

Robert K. Haas, Inc., Publishers, New York, N.Y.
Little Leather Edition, pp. 18 - 31