A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens

Stave 4 - The Last of the Spirits

THE Phantom slowly, gravely, silently, approached. It was shrouded in a deep black garment, which left nothing of it visible save one outstretched hand.

“I am in the presence of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come?” said Scrooge.

The Spirit pointed onward with its hand.

“You are about to show me shadows of the things that will happen,” Scrooge pursued. “Is that so, Spirit?” Scrooge feared this silent shape so much that his legs trembled beneath him.

“Ghost of the Future!” he exclaimed, “I fear you more than any spectre I have seen. But as I know your purpose is to do me good, and I am prepared to bear you company, and do it with a thankful heart. Will you not speak to me?”

It gave him no reply. The hand was pointed straight before them.

“Lead on!” said Scrooge. “Lead on! The night is precious time to me, I know. Lead on, Spirit!”

The Phantom moved away. There they were, in the heart of the city; amongst the merchants; who hurried up and down, and chinked the money in their pockets, as Scrooge had seen them often.

The Spirit stopped beside one little knot of business men, pointing to them, Scrooge advanced to listen to their talk.

“No,” said a great fat man with a monstrous chin, “I don’t know much about it. I only know he’s dead.”

“When did he die?” inquired another.

“Last night, I believe.”

“Why, what was the matter with him?” asked a third. “God knows,” said the first, with a yawn.

“What has he done with his money?” asked a red-faced gentleman.

“I haven’t heard,” said the man with the large chin, yawning. “It’s likely to be a very cheap funeral, for I don’t know of anybody to go to it.

Suppose we make up a party and go?”

“I don’t mind going if a lunch is provided,” observed one gentleman.

Scrooge knew the men, and looked towards the Spirit for an explanation.

Quiet and dark, beside him stood the Phantom, with its outstretched hand. Scrooge fancied that the Unseen Eyes were looking at him keenly. It made him shudder, and feel very cold.

They went into an obscure part of the town, where the shops and houses reeked with crime, with filth, and misery.

There was a shop where iron, old rags, bottles, bones, and greasy junk, were bought. Scrooge and the Phantom came into this shop, just as two women and a man carried in bundles. They all three burst into a laugh.

The first woman threw her bundle on the floor. But the man produced his plunder first. A pencil-case, sleeve-buttons, and a brooch of no great value, were all. They were examined and appraised by old Joe, who chalked the sums for each, upon the wall, and added them up into a total.

“That’s your account,” said Joe. “Who’s next?” Mrs. Dilber was next. Sheets and towels, two old-fashioned silver teaspoons, a pair of sugar-tongs, and a few boots. Her account was stated on the wall in the same manner.

“And now undo my bundle, Joe,” said the first woman. Joe dragged out a large and heavy roll of some dark stuff.

“Bed-curtains!” said Joe. “You don’t mean to say you took ’em down, rings and all, with him lying there?”

“Yes I do,” replied the woman. “Why not?”

“His blankets too?” asked Joe.

“Whose else’s do you think?” replied the woman. “Ah! you may look through that shirt till your eyes ache; but it’s the best he had, and a fine one too. They’d have wasted it, if it hadn’t been for me.”

“What do you call wasting of it?” asked old Joe.

“Putting it on him to be buried in, to be sure,” replied the woman with a laugh. “Somebody was fool enough to do it, but I took it off again.”

Scrooge listened to this dialogue in horror.

“Ha, ha!” laughed the same woman, when old Joe paid the three out. “This is the end of it, you see! He frightened every one away from him when he was alive, to profit us when he was dead! Ha, ha, ha!”

“Spirit!” said Scrooge, shuddering from head to foot. “I see, I see. The case of this unhappy man might be my own. - Merciful Heaven, what is this!”

He recoiled in terror, for the scene had changed, and now he almost touched a bed: a bare, uncurtained bed: on which, beneath a ragged sheet, there lay the body of this man. He lay, in the dark empty house, with no one to say that he was kind to me in this or that.

“Spirit!” he said, “this is a fearful place. Let us go!”

Still the Ghost pointed with an unmoved finger to the head.

“If there is any person in the town, who feels emotion caused by this man’s death,” said Scrooge quite agonised, “show that person to me, Spirit, I beseech you!”

The Ghost conducted him through several streets familiar to his feet. They entered poor Bob Cratchit’s house; the dwelling he had visited before; and found the mother and the children seated round the fire.

Quiet. Very quiet. The noisy little Cratchits were as still as statues in one corner, and sat looking up at Peter, who had a book before him. The mother and her daughters were engaged in sewing. But surely they were very quiet! The mother laid her work upon the table, and put her hand up to her face.

“The colour hurts my eyes,” she said. “ It must be near your father’s time.”

“Past it rather,” Peter answered, shutting up his book. “But I think he has walked a little slower than he used, these few last evenings, mother.”

At last she said, “I have known him walk with Tiny Tim upon his shoulder, very fast indeed. But he was very light to carry, and his father loved him so, that it was no trouble: no trouble. And there is your father at the door!”

She hurried out to meet him. His tea was ready for him on the hob.

He broke down all at once. He couldn’t help it. They drew about the fire, and talked; the girls and mother working still. Bob told them of the extraordinary kindness of Mr. Scrooge’s nephew, whom he had scarcely seen but once.

“‘I am heartily sorry for it, Mr. Cratchit,’ he said, ‘and heartily sorry for your good wife.’ It really seemed as if he had known our Tiny Tim, and felt with us. I am sure we shall none of us forget poor Tiny Tim—shall we?”

“Never, father!” cried they all.

“Spectre,” said Scrooge, “something informs me that our parting moment is at hand. Tell me what man that was whom we saw lying dead?”

The Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come conveyed him straight on, until they reached an iron gate.

A churchyard. Here, then; the wretched man whose name he had now to learn, lay underneath the ground.

The Spirit stood among the graves, and pointed down to one.

“Answer me one question,” said Scrooge. “Are these the shadows of the things that Will be, or are they shadows of things that May be, only?”

Scrooge crept towards the stone, trembling and following the finger. He read upon the stone of the neglected grave his own name, EBENEZER SCROOGE.

The finger pointed from the grave to him, and back again.

“No, Spirit! Oh no, no!”

The finger still was there.

“Spirit!” he cried, tightly clutching at its robe, “hear me! I am not the man I was. Why show me this, if I am past all hope!”

For the first time the hand appeared to shake.

“Good Spirit,” he pursued, “I will honour Christmas in my heart, and try to keep it all the year. I will live in the Past, the Present, and the Future. The Spirits of all Three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach. Oh, tell me I may sponge away the writing on this stone!”

In his agony, he caught the spectral hand. The Phantom’s hood and dress shrunk, collapsed, and dwindled down into a bedpost.