The man who hated Christmas

This story begins just after Queen Victoria came to the throne. Jacob Marley had been dead for seven years. His business partner, Ebenezer Scrooge, was the meanest man in London.

Scrooge was so mean he would not even pay for a coat of paint to remove Marley's name from the office sign. It still read, "Scrooge and Marley."

It was a cold, foggy Christmas Eve, and a small boy with a bright red nose bent down to the keyhole to sing a carol:

"God rest you merry, gentlemen,

May nothing you dismay!"

Scrooge rushed out with a long wooden ruler, to take a crack at the boy's head, but he scurried off. Scrooge hated Christmas and everything to do with it. He was a mean, close-fisted old miser, who never did a kind action or gave a penny away.

He looked as if the cold had got right inside him. His thin lips were blue. His nose looked shrivelled and nipped. His eyebrows, wiry hair and stubbly chin looked silver with frost.

But his heart was the coldest of all. It made his office chilly, even in summer. At Christmas the temperature was freezing. He only had a tiny fire and kept the coal bucket by his desk. His clerk could not fetch a fresh piece of coal without asking.

His clerk's name was Bob Cratchit. He sat perched on a high stool in the outer office, writing in a huge account-book.

He wore mittens, but his fingers were so cold he could hardly hold his quill pen. The ink was freezing in his ink-well. He wore a long scarf he called his "comforter", wrapped three times round his neck for warmth. His wife had knitted it, for Bob could not afford an overcoat. Scrooge only paid him fifteen shillings a week.

Even Scrooge's name sounded mean—EBENEZER SCROOGE!

People were going past in the foggy London streets, coughing and wheezing. The air was smoky, so it was dark, even though it was only three o'clock in the afternoon. Scrooge could hardly see the houses opposite, and candles were lit in all the City offices. Bob Cratchit tried to warm his hands at his candle-flame, with little success.

Although it was so dark and foggy, everyone was cheerful. Tomorrow was Christmas Day and the shops were full of Christmas good cheer, and blazing with lights. There were turkeys and geese, piles of oranges and apples, nuts, cakes and sweets—but not everybody had the money to buy them.

Some ragged boys clustered round a roaring fire in an iron brazier, at the corner of the dark street. It had been lit by workmen.

Suddenly Scrooge's office door opened and a cheery voice cried, "Merry Christmas, Uncle!"

It was Scrooge's nephew, Fred. He was glowing red in the face, from walking quickly. His eyes sparkled, and his breath was like smoke in the cold air.

"Bah!" said Scrooge. "Humbug! What reason have you to be merry? You're poor enough!"

His nephew laughed. "What reason have you to be miserable? You're rich enough!"

"Merry Christmas!" growled Scrooge. "Down with Christmas! If I had my way, every idiot that goes about saying 'Merry Christmas' should be boiled with his own pudding and buried with a stake of holly through his heart!"

"You don't mean that, I'm sure, Uncle! Come and have Christmas dinner with us tomorrow and let's be friends!"

But Scrooge refused.

"I'm going to wish you a Merry Christmas in spite of your bed temper, Uncle. And a Happy New Year!"

"Bah!" Scrooge snapped as his nephew went out, with a friendly word to Bob Cratchit as he left.

As Fred went out of the door, he stood back to let in two plump, pleasant-faced gentlemen. They were collecting money for the poor: to give them a bit of comfort at Christmas time.

"Mr Marley?" asked one of them.

"Marley's dead. I'm Scrooge!" barked Ebenezer.

He refused to give anything to the collection. "Are there no prisons?" he demanded. "Are there no workhouses? I support those with my taxes. Let the poor go there!"

"Many can't go there, and many would rather die!"

"Let them die, then!" said Scrooge. "There are far too many poor people!"

The gentlemen went away, disappointed.

The fog got deeper and the afternoon darker. Soon it was time to shut the office. Bob put out his candle.

"I suppose you want the day off, tomorrow," grumbled Scrooge. "I shall have to pay you a whole day's wages for no work!"

"It's only once a year," said Bob, timidly.

"And that's once too often!" growled Scrooge, but he had to let the clerk go.

Bob ran off, like a lad let out of school, in his white comforter. He slid down a frozen hill twenty times, at the end of a line of boys. Then he hurried home to play Blind Man's Buff with his family.

Scrooge ate a lonely supper in a miserable inn, and read the financial papers.

Marley's Ghost

Scrooge lived alone in rooms in a gloomy old house that had belonged to Jacob Marley, his old partner. It was so dark in the yard that Scrooge had to feel his way up to the gatepost. He was putting his key in the door when he noticed the knocker. It was a big old-fashioned one, with nothing special about it. But tonight it was different. It was not an ordinary knocker at all! It was MARLEY'S FACE!

Marley's face was a dismal shade of green, rather like bad fish glowing in the dark. Ghostly spectacles were perched on its ghostly forehead, and its hair moved gently, as if a breeze were stirring it. Its eyes had a fixed stare. As Scrooge looked hard at it, it turned back into a knocker again!

Scrooge was not frightened. He did not believe in ghosts. He entered the house, lighted his candle and looked at the inside of the door. He expected to see the back of Marley's head, with its old-fashioned pig-tail, but there were only screws and nuts.

He banged the door and went up the wide staircase. Was something going up ahead of him? He told himself firmly that Marley had been dead for seven years.

Upstairs everything was as usual. There was nothing under the bed, or under the table. A little saucepan of porridge was on the hob, by a small coal fire. Scrooge put on his slippers, dressing-gown and night-cap and sat down to eat his porridge. But first he made sure the door was locked.

There were pictures of Bible characters on the tiles around the fireplace—Cain and Abel, the Queen of Sheba, Abraham and Isaac. They all looked like Jacob Marley to him.

"Humbug!" said Scrooge.

Just then a bell high above the fireplace began to swing to and fro. It had not been used for years. Now it began to ring, and every bell in the house rang loudly for about a minute.

Then came a clanking noise, deep in the house, as if someone were dragging a heavy chain up from the cellar.

"It's humbug!" cried Scrooge. "I won't believe it!"

But the cellar door opened and the noise came up the stairs, through the heavy door and into the room, before his very eyes. The flame in the fire leaped up as if it cried; "I know him! MARLEY'S GHOST!"

And there was Marley, with his pig-tail, wearing his usual waistcoat, tight trousers and boots. The chain around his waist was very long and wound around him like a tail. It was made of cash-boxes, keys, padlocks, account books and heavy metal purses. Scrooge could see right through his body to the two buttons on his coat behind.

"You don't believe in me, do you?" said the Ghost.

"I don't," said Scrooge. "You could be the result of an upset stomach. Perhaps you're an undigested bit of beef, or a crumb of cheese!"

The Ghost took no notice of Scrooge's feeble joke. Instead it gave a frightful cry and rattled its chain.

"What is that chain you are wearing?" asked Scrooge.

"I made this chain in life, link by link and yard by yard. You have one too, just as heavy and thick as mine. But you have had seven years more, so yours is much longer."

Scrooge looked down at himself, but could not see anything.

"I only thought about money. I lost so many chances to do good," sighed the Ghost.

"But you were a good business man, Jacob!"

"Business! Human beings were my business! I neglected them, and now I'm being punished for it!"

"Why have you come to me?" asked Scrooge.

"To warn you, so that you can escape my fate. You are going to be visited by three Spirits, who will come to you as the church clock strikes one."

"I'd much rather they didn't!" said Scrooge.

But the Ghost wrapped its tail round its arm and walked backwards towards the window, which began to open wide. The Ghost floated out into the night air. Scrooge heard sad cries, and saw that the sky was full of figures like Marley. They were crying out sadly and trying to reach the suffering human beings they had not helped while they were alive.

Suddenly Scrooge felt very tired. He crept into bed, and fell asleep right away.

The Spirit of Christmas Past

Scrooge woke up with a start when the church bell chimed midnight. Was it a dream or was a spirit really going to appear to him at one o'clock? He lay awake listening, until at last the bell boomed out, "ONE".

The lights all flashed up in his room and the curtains on his four-poster bed were drawn.

There stood a strange small figure, with a smooth face like a child, but with long white hair, like an old man. It wore a white tunic and held a branch of holly in its hand. A bright clear light shone from the top of its head. It carried a cap like a fire extinguisher, which it could use to put out this light.

"Who or what are you?" asked Scrooge.

"I am the Ghost of Christmas Past."

"Long past?"

"No, your past."

"What brings you here?"

"To remind you. To help you. Get up and come with me!"

Scrooge got out of bed in his night-clothes and took the Spirit's hand.

They were suddenly in the country, in a small market town. Boys were riding along the road. Some were on ponies, some in farmers' carts, and they were all calling to one another excitedly. They were going home for the Christmas holidays. Scrooge knew who they were—his old school friends.

He began to cry. He remembered how he had been left behind that Christmas, in a cold cheerless schoolroom, forgotten by everybody. He could see himself as a boy, sitting reading. Behind him, outside the window, the people in the book came to life.

"There's Robinson Crusoe with his parrot, and Man Friday running along the Sandy beach!" Scrooge called out excitedly. But the pictures faded. He dried his eyes on his sleeve.

"I wish—" he said.

"What?" asked the Ghost.

"There was a boy singing carols outside my office tonight. I wish I'd given him something."

The Spirit waved its hand.

"Let's look at another Christmas."

It was the same schoolroom. The boy was older, alone again. Suddenly the door opened and a little girl rushed in and hugged him. It was his sister. She'd been sent to bring him home for Christmas.

"She was never strong. She died young," said Scrooge.

"And left one child, I believe," said the Spirit. "Your nephew."

"Yes," said Scrooge, thoughtfully.

Then they left the school behind, and found themselves in a huge city. It was Christmas Eve and the streets were lit up. They stopped at a warehouse door.

"Do you know it?"

"Know it! I was apprenticed here!" said Scrooge excitedly.

There was a jolly party in full swing. Old Fezziwig, Scrooge's employer, was celebrating Christmas with his family and work-people. There was a splendid supper: a great piece of Cold Roast, a great piece of Cold Boiled, mincepies, cake and beer. Best of all, there was a fiddler who played for country dancing!

Mr and Mrs Fezziwig were the "top couple" in Sir Roger de Coverley. Old Fezziwig seemed to be everywhere at once, winking with his legs, and Mrs Fezziwig kept up with him! Scrooge was delighted. He enjoyed it all as much as he had all those years ago. At the end, he looked up at the Spirit.

"Is anything the matter?"

"No," said Scrooge. "I just wished I could say a word to my clerk, that's all."

The next picture was not so cheerful. Scrooge was older and looked meaner. He was talking with his sweetheart. She told him he cared more about money than about her, and gave him back his engagement ring.

Scrooge was upset. Next, he saw his sweetheart happily married to someone else, while he sat alone in his office, with only a candle for company.

"Take me away!" he cried out, and struggled with the Spirit. He tried to press down the cap on the light of Memory that shone from its head. Suddenly, he was in his own bedroom. He fell on his bed, and sank into a deep sleep.

The Spirit of Christmas Present

Scrooge woke again with a jump, just as the clock was striking One. A blaze of light seemed to be coming from the room next door.

He heard a voice calling him: "Come in, Scrooge!"

He put on his slippers and shuffled to the door. His room looked quite different. It was decorated with holly, ivy and mistletoe, and there was a huge crackling fire in the grate. Heaped up on the floor to make a kind of throne he saw turkeys, geese, chickens, joints of beef, strings of sausages, mincepies, Christmas puddings and pyramids of fruit.

On top of them sat a jolly Giant, holding a torch shaped like a Horn of Plenty. He held it up to shine its light on Scrooge as he came peering round the door.

"Come in, man, and get to know me!" said the Giant. "I am the Ghost of Christmas Present!"

The Spirit was dressed in a deep green robe, edged with white fur and wore a holly wreath on its brown curly hair.

"Spirit," said Scrooge humbly, "I know you have come to do me good. Please take me with you!"