A Christmas Carol, Stave I

In this episode, I attempt to bring to life Charles Dickens' epic Christmas tale: A Christmas Carol, all voices done by the narrator, J.C. Rede. Each stave of the Carol will be released as it's own episode.

Theme written by Bernard Kyer for this podcast. Follow the link for more info. https://www.bardmediamusic.com/

Transcript

0:00

Hi, everyone. And welcome again to another episode of forward into the past. I'm JC your host and narrator. And today we're diving into the classic Christmas ghost story, a Christmas Carol written way back in 1843 by Charles Dickens. This story is of course, one of our enduring Christmas traditions, mainly because a lot of our notions of Christmas were enshrined in Dickens descriptions of the holiday. Victorian England. Re-invigorated Christmas into a full blown celebration. Which even by today's standards, we would recognize. Many of the traditions of Christmas were cemented during this time, including Christmas trees, which we borrowed from Germany. Holly and Ivy were in use by the pagan tribes of England since records have been kept. And of course, mistletoe has been a part of holiday celebrations since the Vikings came over to England. According to legend. Mistletoe was the sacred plant of Frigga, the Norse goddess of love, and the mother of Baldor, the God of the summer sun and the harvest. One night Baldor had a dream of death, which greatly alarmed his mother, because if he should die, All life on earth would end as well. Frigga went through the forest and made everything that grew on or under the earth promise that Baldor would not be harmed. Pleased. Frigga all, but forgot about the dream. But Baldor had one enemy Loki, the God of mischief. And he knew of one plant that grew neither on the earth nor under the earth, but on apple and Oak trees, the lowly mistletoe. So Loki made an arrow tip of the mistletoe and gave it to the blind God of winter Hodor, who was tricked by Loki into thinking he was shooting at a stag thus striking Baldor dead. For three months, each element in the universe tried to bring Baldor back to life, but with no success, And for those three months, Frigga grieved for her son, making the world become barren and cold and covered with ice. When it was discovered that it was mistletoe, that was to blame for Baldors death. Frigga made an antidote from the plant, which eventually restored him. It is said that the tears of joy that she shed for her son. I turned into the pearly white berries on the missile tow plant. And in her joy, Frigga declared that whoever should stand under the humble mistletoe. No harm should be fall them only a kiss, a token of love. And so at Christmas time, a young lady standing under a ball of mistletoe, brightly trimmed with evergreens, ribbons, and ornaments. Cannot refuse to be kissed. Such a kiss could mean deep romance or lasting friendship and Goodwill. If the girl remained unkissed she would not expect to marry the following year. And this is just one more of the many customs that were enshrined in Mr. Dickens, immortal classic. A Christmas Carol. This version has been abridged for time. Stave one Marley's ghost. Marley was dead to begin with. There is no doubt, whatever about that. The register of his burial was signed by the clergyman, the clerk, the undertaker, and the chief mourner. Scrooge signed it. And Scrooge's name was good upon exchange for anything he chose to put his hand to. Old Marley was as dead as a doornail. Mind, I don't mean to say that I know of my own knowledge, what there is particularly dead about a doornail. I might've been inclined myself to regard a coffin nail as the deadest piece of ironmongery in the trade. But the wisdom of our ancestors is in the simile and my unhallowed hands shall not disturb it. Or the country's done for. You will therefore permit me to repeat emphatically. That Marley was as dead as a doornail. The mention of Marley's funeral brings me back to the point I started from. There is no doubt that Marley was dead. This must be distinctly understood or nothing wonderful can come of the story I am going to relate. If we were not perfectly convinced that Hamlet's father died before the play began. There would be nothing more remarkable in his taking a stroll at night in an easterly wind upon his own ramparts than there would be in any other middle-aged gentleman rashly turning out after dark in a breezy spot, say St. Paul's churchyard for instance, literally to astonish his son's weak mind. Scrooge never painted out old Marley's name. There it stood years afterwards above the warehouse door, Scrooge and Marley. The firm was known as Scrooge and Marley. Sometimes people new to the business called Scrooge Scrooge and sometimes Marley, but he answered to both names. It was all the same to him. Oh, but he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone Scrooge. A squeezing wrenching, grasping, scraping clutching covetous, old sinner. Hard and sharp as Flint from which no steel had ever struck out. Generous fire secret and self-contained and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shriveled, his cheek stiffened, his gait made his eyes red, his thin lips blue and spoke out shrewdly in his grading voice. A frosty rime was on his head and on his eyebrows and his wirey chin. He carried his own low temperature, always about with him. He iced his office in the dog days. And didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas. External heat and cold had little influence on Scrooge. No warmth could warm. No wintry weather chill him. No wind that blew was bitterer than he. No falling snow was more intent upon its purpose. No pelting rain, less open to entreaty. Foul weather didn't know where to have him. The heaviest rain and snow and hail and sleet could boast of the advantage over him in only one respect. They often came down handsomely and Scrooge never did. But what did Scrooge care? It was the very thing. He liked to edge his way along the crowded paths of life, wanting all human sympathy to keep its distance was what the knowing ones, cold, nuts to Scrooge. Once upon a time of all the good days in the year on Christmas Eve. Old Scrooge sat busy in his counting house. It was cold bleak, biting weather foggy with all, and he could hear the people in the court outside go wheezing up and down, beating their hands upon their breasts and stamping their feet upon the pavement stones to warm them. The city clocks had only just gone three, but it was quite dark already. It had not been light all day and candles were flaring in the windows of the neighboring offices, like ruddy smears upon the palpable brown air. The fog came, pouring it at every chink and keyhole and was so dense without, that although the court was of the narrowest, the houses opposite were mere Phantoms. To see the dingy cloud come drooping down, obscuring everything, one might've thought that nature lived hard by and was brewing on a large scale. The door of scrooges counting house was open that he might keep his eye upon his clerk who, in a dismal little cell beyond a sort of tank, was copying letters. Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk's fire was so very much smaller than it looked like one Cole. But he couldn't replenish it. For Scrooge kept the coal box in his own room. And so surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary for them to part. Wherefore the clerk put on his white comforter and tried to warm himself at the candle in which effort, not being a man of strong imagination. He failed. A Merry Christmas, uncle God save you. Cried a cheerful voice. It was the voice of Scrooge's nephew who came upon him so quickly that this was the first intimation he had of his approach. Bah. Said Scrooge humbug. He had so heated himself with rapid walking in the fog and frost, this nephew of scrooges that he was all in a glow. His face was ruddy and handsome his eyes sparkled and his breath smoked again. Christmas a humbug uncle. Said Scrooge's nephew. You don't mean that I am sure. I do said Scrooge. Merry Christmas, what right. Have you to be merry? What reason have you to be merry, you're poor enough. Come then returned the nephew Gailey. What right. Have you to be dismal? What reason? have you to be morose you're rich enough. Scrooge having no better answer ready on the spur of the moment said bah, Again, And followed it up with humbug. Oh, don't be cross uncle. said the nephew. What else can I be. Returned the uncle when I live in such a world of fools, as this? Merry Christmas. What's Christmas time to you, but time for paying bills without money. A time of finding yourself a year old or a not an hour richer. Uh, time for balancing your books and having every item in them through a round dozen of months presented debt against you. If I could work my will. Said Scrooge indignantly. Every idiot who goes about with Merry Christmas. On his lips should be boiled in is own pudding. And buried with a stake of holly upon his heart. Uncle pleaded the nephew. Nephew. returned the uncle sternly. Keep Christmas in your own way. And let me keep it in mine. Keep it. Repeated Scrooge's nephew, but you don't keep it. Let me leave it alone, then said Scrooge. Much good may it do you. Much good has it ever done you. There are many things from which I might've derived good by which I have not profited. I dare say return the nephew. Christmas among the rest. But I am sure. I have always thought of Christmas time when it has come round. As a good time. A kind forgiving charitable pleasant time. The only time I know of in the long calendar of the year when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow passengers to the grave and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore uncle though, it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket. I believe that it has done me good. And it will do me good. And I say, god bless it. The clerk in the tank involuntarily applauded. Becoming immediately sensible of the impropriety. He poked the fire and extinguished the last frail spark for ever. Let me hear another sound from you. said Scrooge and you'll keep your Christmas by losing your situation. You are quite a powerful speaker, sir. He added turning to his nephew. I wonder you don't go into parliament. Oh, don't be angry, uncle. Come. Dine with us tomorrow. Scrooge said that he would see him. Yes, indeed he did. He went the whole length of the expression and said that he would see him in that extremity first. But why. Cried Scrooge's nephew. Why. Why did you get married? Said Scrooge. Oh, because I fell in love. Because you fell in love, growled, Scrooge as if that were the only one thing in the world, more ridiculous than a Merry Christmas. Good afternoon. Nay uncle, but you never came to see me before that happened. Why give it as a reason for not coming now? Good afternoon said Scrooge. I want nothing from you. I ask nothing of you. Why cannot we be friends Good afternoon! Said Scrooge. I am sorry with all my heart to find you so resolute. We have never had any quarrel to which I have been a party. But I have made the trial in homage to Christmas and I'll keep my Christmas humor to the last. So. a merry Christmas, uncle Good afternoon, said Scrooge. And a happy new year. Good afternoon said Scrooge. His nephew left the room without an angry word. Not withstanding. He stopped at the outer door to bestow the greetings of the season on the clerk who cold as he was, was warmer than Scrooge for, he returned them cordially. There's another fellow muttered Scrooge who overheard him. My clerk with 15 shillings a week and a wife and family talking about a Merry Christmas. I'll retire to Bedlam. This lunatic in letting Scrooge's nephew out had lit two other people in. They were portly gentlemen, pleasant to behold and now stood with their hats off in scrooges office. They had books and papers in their hands and bowed to him. Ah, Scrooge and Marley's I believe. Said one of the gentlemen referring to this list. Uh, have I, the pleasure of addressing Mr. Scrooge or Mr. Marley? Mr. Marley has been dead these seven years. Scrooge replied. He died seven years ago. this very night. Well, uh, we have no doubt. His liberality is well-represented by his surviving partner, said the gentlemen presenting his credentials. It certainly was for, they had been two kindred spirits. At the ominous word, liberality, Scrooge frowned, and shook his head and handed the credentials back. Uh, at this festive season of the year, Mr. Scrooge, said the gentlemen taking up a pen. It is more than usually desirable that we should make some slight provision for the poor and destitute who suffer greatly at the present time. Uh, many thousands are in want of common necessaries. Hundreds of thousands are in want of common comforts, sir. Are there no prisons. Asked Scrooge. Uh, plenty of prisons said the gentleman laying down the pen again. And the union workhouses demanded Scrooge. Are they still in operation? Oh, they are still, replied the gentlemen. I wish I could say they were not. the treadmill and the poor law are in full vigor. Then. Said Scrooge. Both very busy, sir. Oh, I was afraid from what you said at first that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course, said Scrooge. I am very glad to hear that. Um, under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude. Returned the gentlemen. A few of us are endeavoring to raise a fund, to buy the poor some meat and drink and means of warmth. We choose this time because it is a time of all others when want is keenly felt and abundance rejoices. Uh, what should I put you down for? Nothing. Scrooge replied. Oh, you wish to be anonymous. I wish to be left alone. Said Scrooge. Since you asked me what I wish, gentlemen. That is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas. And I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help support these establishment that I've mentioned. They cost enough. And those who are badly off must go there. Oh many can't go there and many would rather die. If they would rather die, said Scrooge. They had better do it and decrease the surplus population. Good afternoon, gentlemen. Seeing clearly that it would be useless to pursue their point. The gentlemen withdrew. Scrooge resumed his labors with an improved opinion of himself and in a more facetious temper than was usual with him. Meanwhile, the fog and darkness thickened, so that people ran about with flaring links, proffering the services to go before horses and carriages and conduct them on their way. The ancient tower of a church whose gruff old bell was always peeping. Slyly down at Scrooge out of a Gothic window in the wall, became invisible and struck the hours and quarters in the clouds with tremulous vibrations afterwards, as if its teeth were chattering in its frozen head up there. The cold became intense. Foggier yet and colder. Piercing searching, biting cold. If the good St Dustin had, but nipped the evil spirits nose with a touch of such weather as that instead of using his familiar weapons then indeed he would have roared to lusty purpose. The owner of one such scant nose gnawed and mumbled by the hungry cold as bones are gnawed by dogs stooped down at scrooges keyhole to regale him with a Christmas Carol. But at the first sound of. God bless you. merry gentlemen. May nothing you dismay. Scrooge seized the ruler with such energy of action that the singer fled in terror, leaving the keyhole to the fog. And even more congenial frost. At length the hour of shutting up the counting house arrived. With an ill will Scrooge dismounted from his stool and tacitly admitted the fact to the expectant clerk in the tank who instantly snuffed his candle out and put on his hat. You'll want all day tomorrow, I suppose. said Scrooge. If quite convenient, sir. It's not convenient. said Scrooge. And it's not fair. If I was to stop, half-a-crown for it. You think yourself ill used I'll be bound. The clerks smiled. faintly. And yet said, Scrooge. You don't think me ill used when I pay a day's wages for no work. The clerk observed that it was only once a year. Huh. A poor excuse for picking a man's pocket every 25th of December. Said Scrooge buttoning his great coat to the chin. But. I suppose you must have the whole day. Be here all the early next morning. The clerk promised that he would, and Scrooge walked out with a growl. The office was closed in a twinkling and the clerk with the long ends of his white comforter dangling below his waist. For he boasted no great coat. Went down a slide on Cornhill at the end of a lane of boys, 20 times in honor of its being Christmas Eve, and then ran home to Camden town as hard as he could pelt to play at blind man's buff. Scrooge took his melancholy dinner at his usual melancholy Tavern and having read all the newspapers and be Giled the rest of the evening with his bankers book. Went home to bed. He lived in chambers, which had once belonged to his deceased partner. They were a gloomy suite of rooms in a lowering pile of building up a yard where it has so little business to be that one could scarcely help fancying it must have run there when it was a young house playing at hide and seek with the other houses and have forgotten the way out again. It was old enough now and dreary enough for nobody lived in it but Scrooge. The other rooms being all let out as offices. The yard was so dark that even Scrooge who knew it's every stone was Fein to grope with his hands. The fog and the frost. So hung about the black, old gateway of the house that it seemed as if the genius of the weather sat in mournful meditation on the threshold. Now. It is a fact that there was nothing at all particular about the knocker on the door, except that it was very large. It is also a fact that Scrooge had seen it night and morning during his whole residence in that place. Let it also be born in mind that Scrooge had not be stowed. One thought on Marley since the last mention of his seven years dead partner that afternoon. And then let any man explain to me if he can, how it happened, that Scrooge having his key in the lock of the door saw in the knocker without it's undergoing any intermediate process of change, not a knocker but Marley's face. Marley's face. It was not an impenetrable shadow as the other objects in the yard were. But had a dismal light about it. It was not angry or ferocious, but looked at Scrooge as Marley used to look with ghostly spectacles turned up on its ghostly forehead. The hair. Was curiously stirred as if by breadth of hot air. And though the eyes were wide open. They were perfectly motionless. That and it's living color made it horrible. But it's horror seem to be in spite of the face and beyond its control, rather than a part of its own expression. As Scrooge looked fixedly at this phenomenon. It was a knocker again. To say that he was not startled or that his blood was not conscious of a terrible sensation to which it had been stranger from infancy. Would be untrue. But he put his hand upon the key. He had relinquished turned it sturdily, walked in. And lighted his candle. He did pause with a moments irresolution before he shut the door. And he did look cautiously behind it first as if he half expected to be terrified with the sight of Marley's pig tail sticking 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 closed it. With a bang. The sound resounded through the house like thunder. Every room above and every cask in the wine merchant sellers below. Appear to have a separate peel 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 to. Trimming his candle as he went. Half a dozen gas lamps out of the street would not have lighted the entry to well. So you may suppose that it was pretty dark with scrooges 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 it was all right. He had just enough recollection of the face to desire to do that. Sitting room. Bedroom. 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. Up on the hob. Nobody under the bed and 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. To fish baskets. Washing stand on three legs. Yes. And the poker. Quite satisfied. He closed his 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 nightcap. And sat down before the fire to take his grool. 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 Caines and Abel's Pharaoh's daughters, Queens of Sheba, angelic messengers, descending through the air on clouds like feather beds. Abraham's belches ours apostles putting off to sea and butter boats, hundreds of figures to attract his thoughts. And yet that face of Marley, seven years dead came like the ancient prophets 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 Marley's old 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's 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've lasted half a minute or a minute. But it seemed an hour. The bells ceased as they had begun together. They were succeeded by a clanking noise, deep down below as if some person were dragging a heavy chain over the casks in the wine merchant seller. 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 towards his door. Yeah. It's humbug still said Scrooge. I won't believe it. Is color change though, went without a pause. It came on through the heavy door and passed into the room before his eyes. Upon it's coming in the dying flame leaped up as though it cried. I knew him. Molly's ghost then fell again. The same face, the very same. Marley. in his pigtail usual, Wescott tights and boots. The tassels on the ladder bristling like his pig tails and his coat skirts and a hair upon his head. The chain he drew was clasped about the middle. It was long and wound about him like a tail and it was made for Scrooge observed it closely. 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 its head and chin, which rapper he had not observed before. He was still incredulous 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. Wow. Who were you then? said Scrooge raising his voice. You're particular for a shade. 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 involve 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. What evidence would you have of my reality beyond that of your own senses? I don't know. 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. No, there's more of gravy than a 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 attention and keeping down his terror. For the specters voice disturbed the very marrow in his bones. To sit staring at those fixed glazed eyes in silence for a moment. Would play Scrooge felt the very deuce with him. There was something very awful too in the specter'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 set perfectly motionless it's hair and skirts and tassels were still agitated as by the hot vapor of an oven. You see this toothpick said Scrooge returning quickly to the charge for the reason just assigned and wishing though it were only for a second to divert this visions, Stony gaze from himself. I do. Reply the ghost. You are not looking at it. Said Scrooge. But I see it not withstanding. said the ghost. 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. Uh, humbug. I tell you humbug. At this, the spirit raised the frightful cry and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling 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 round his head as if it were too warm to wear indoors, it's 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'd 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 returned, that the spirit with even 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, Whoa is me. And witnessed what it can not share, but might have shared on the earth and turned to happiness again, the specter raised a cry and shook its chains and wrung. Its shadowy hands. You are... 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 it's pattern 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 50 or 60 fathoms of iron cable. But he could see nothing. Jacob. He said imploringly .Old jacob Marley tells me more speak comfort to me, Jacob. I have none to give. The ghost replied. But you were always a good man of business, jacob. Faltered Scrooge, who now began to apply this to himself. Business. Cried the ghost ringing its hands again. Mankind was my business. The common welfare was my business. Charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence were all my business! The dealings of my trade we'll build a drop of water. The dealings of my trade were but a drop of water in the comprehensive ocean of my business! It held up its chain at arms length as if that were the cause of its unavailing grief and flung it heavily upon the ground. Again. At this time of the rolling year. The specter said. I suffer most. 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. Don't be hard upon me. Don't be flowery, Jacob prey. How it is 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. Screwed shivered and wiped the perspiration from his brow. That is no light part of my penance. Pursued the ghost. I am here tonight to warn you that you have yet. A chance and hope of escaping my fate. A chance and hope of my procuring. Ebenezer. You always were a good friend to me. said Scrooge. You will be haunted, resume the ghost by three spirits. Scrooges 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 Scrooge. Without their visits. said the ghost, you cannot hope to shun the path I tread. Expect the first tomorrow when the bells toll one. Couldn't I take them 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 12 has ceased to vibrate. Look to me no more. And look that, for your own sake. You'll remember what has passed between us. When it had said these words, the specter 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 chain wound over and about its arm. The apparition walked backward from him. And at every step it took the window raised itself a little. So that when the specter 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 his 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 sounds of lamentation and regret, wailings inexpressibly sorrowful and self accusatory. The spectrum after listening for a moment, joined in the mournful, dirge and floated out. Upon the bleak dark night. Scrooge followed to the window, desperate at 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 ghosts some few, they might be guilty. Governments were linked together. None. We're free. Many had been personally known to Scrooge and their lives. He had been quite familiar with one old ghost in a white Wescott 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 interfere for good in human matters and had lost the power forever. Whether these creatures faded into the missed or missed in shrouded them, he could not tell, but they am 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. Well, thus ends the first stave of a Christmas Carol stave two will be released shortly, and I hope you're enjoying it so far. If you are, please feel free to leave a review on such places as apple podcast. Good pods. Or on the podcast website. Forward into the past podcast.com. I would also appreciate it. If you decide to become a supporter of the show by using the link on your podcast platform that says support the show. Or you can click on the big yellow button on the bottom of the website that has a coffee cup or says, buy me a coffee. Well, as usual, I feel I've rambled long enough. Thanks for listening folks. Keep sharing the stories and be a good human. Bye for now.