Although they had but that moment left the school behind them, they were
now in the busy thoroughfares of a city, where shadowy passengers
passed and repassed; where shadowy carts and coaches battled for the
way, and all the strife and tumult of a real city were. It was made
plain enough, by the dressing of the shops, that here, too, it was
Christmas time again; but it was evening, and the streets were lighted
up.
The Ghost stopped at a certain warehouse door, and asked Scrooge if he
knew it.
"Know it!" said Scrooge. "Was I apprenticed here?"
They went in. At sight of an old gentleman in a Welsh wig, sitting
behind such a high desk, that if he had been two inches taller he must
have knocked his head against the ceiling, Scrooge cried in great
excitement:
"Why, it's old Fezziwig! Bless his heart; it's Fezziwig alive again!"
Old Fezziwig laid down his pen, and looked up at the clock, which
pointed to the hour of seven. He rubbed his hands; adjusted his
capacious waistcoat; laughed all over himself, from his shoes to his
organ of benevolence; and called out in a comfortable, oily, rich, fat,
jovial voice:
"Yo ho, there! Ebenezer! Dick!"
Scrooge's former self, now grown a young man, came briskly in,
accompanied by his fellow-'prentice.
"Dick Wilkins, to be sure!" said Scrooge to the Ghost. "Bless me, yes.
There he is. He was very much attached to me, was Dick. Poor Dick! Dear,
dear!"
"You ho, my boys!" said Fezziwig. "No more work to-night. Christmas Eve,
Dick. Christmas, Ebenezer! Let's have the shutters up," cried old
Fezziwig, with a sharp clap of his hands, "before a man can say Jack
Robinson!"
You wouldn't believe how those two fellows went at it! They charged into
the street with the shutters--one, two, three--had 'em up in their
places--four, five, six--barred 'em and pinned 'em--seven, eight,
nine--and came back before you could have got to twelve, panting like
race horses.
"Hilli-ho!" cried old Fezziwig, skipping down from the high desk, with
wonderful agility. "Clear away, my lads, and let's have lots of room
here! Hilli-ho, Dick; Chirrup, Ebenezer!"
Clear away! There was nothing they wouldn't have cleared away, or
couldn't have cleared away, with old Fezziwig looking on. It was done in
a minute. Every movable was packed off, as if it were dismissed from
public life for ever more; the floor was swept and watered, the lamps
were trimmed, fuel was heaped upon the fire, and the warehouse was as
snug, and warm, and dry, and bright a ball-room, as you would desire to
see upon a winter's night.
In came a fiddler with a music-book, and went up to the lofty desk, and
made an orchestra of it, and tuned like fifty stomach-aches. In came
Mrs. Fezziwig, one vast substantial smile. In came the three Miss
Fezziwigs, beaming and lovable. In came the six young followers whose
hearts they broke. In came all the young men and women employed in the
business. In came the housemaid, with her cousin, the baker. In came the
cook, with her brother's particular friend, the milkman. In came the boy
from over the way, who was suspected of not having board enough from his
master; trying to hide himself behind the girl from next door but one,
who was proved to have had her ears pulled by her mistress. In they all
came, one after another; some shyly, some boldly, some gracefully, some
awkwardly, some pushing, some pulling; in they all came, anyhow and
everyhow. Away they all went, twenty couple at once, hands half round
and back again the other way; down the middle and up again, round and
round in various stages of affectionate grouping; old top couple always
turning up in the wrong place; new top couple starting off again as soon
as they got there; all top couples at last, and not a bottom one to help
them. When this result was brought about, old Fezziwig, clapping his
hands to stop the dance, cried out, "Well done!" and the fiddler plunged
his hot face into a pot of porter, especially provided for that purpose.
But scorning rest upon his reappearance, he instantly began again,
though there were no dancers yet, as if the other fiddler had been
carried home, exhausted, on a shutter; and he were a bran-new man
resolved to beat him out of sight, or perish.
There were more dances, and there were forfeits, and more dances, and
there was cake, and there was negus, and there was a great piece of Cold
Roast, and there was a great piece of Cold Boiled, and there were
mince-pies, and plenty of beer. But the great effect of the evening came
after the Roast and Boiled, when the fiddler (an artful, dog, mind! The
sort of man who knew his business better than you or I could have told
it him!) struck up "Sir Roger de Coverley."[284-11] Then old Fezziwig
stood out to dance with Mrs. Fezziwig. Top couple, too; with a good
stiff piece of work cut out for them; three or four and twenty pair of
partners; people who were not to be trifled with; people who _would_
dance, and had no notion of walking.
[Illustration: THE FIDDLER STRUCK UP "SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY"]
But if they had been twice as many: ah, four times: old Fezziwig would
have been a match for them, and so would Mrs. Fezziwig. As to _her_, she
was worthy to be his partner in every sense of the term. If that's not
high praise, tell me higher, and I'll use it. A positive light appeared
to issue from Fezziwig's calves. They shone in every part of the dance
like moons. You couldn't have predicted, at any given time, what would
become of 'em next. And when old Fezziwig and Mrs. Fezziwig had gone all
through the dance; advance and retire, hold hands with your partner; bow
and curtsey; corkscrew; thread-the-needle, and back again to your place;
Fezziwig "cut"--cut so deftly, that he appeared to wink with his legs,
and came upon his feet again without a stagger.
When the clock struck eleven, this domestic ball broke up. Mr. and Mrs.
Fezziwig took their stations, one on either side the door, and shaking
hands with every person individually as he or she went out, wished him
or her a Merry Christmas.
When everybody had retired but the two 'prentices, they did the same to
them; and thus the cheerful voices died away, and the lads were left to
their beds; which were under a counter in the back-shop.
During the whole of this time, Scrooge had acted like a man out of his
wits. His heart and soul were in the scene, and with his former self. He
corroborated everything, remembered everything, enjoyed everything, and
underwent the strangest agitation. It was not until now, when the bright
faces of his former self and Dick were turned from them, that he
remembered the Ghost, and became conscious that it was looking full upon
him, while the light upon its head burnt very clear.
"A small matter," said the Ghost, "to make these silly folks so full of
gratitude."
"Small!" echoed Scrooge.
The spirit signed to him to listen to the two apprentices, who were
pouring out their hearts in praise of Fezziwig: and when he had done so,
said,
"Why! Is it not? He has spent but a few pounds of your mortal money:
three or four, perhaps. Is that so much that he deserves this praise?"
"It isn't that," said Scrooge, heated by the remark, and speaking
unconsciously like his former, not his latter, self. "It isn't that,
Spirit. He has the power to render us happy or unhappy; to make our
service light or burdensome; a pleasure or a toil. Say that his power
lies in words and looks; in things so slight and insignificant that it
is impossible to add and count 'em up: what then? The happiness he
gives, is quite as great as if it cost a fortune."
He felt the Spirit's glance, and stopped.
"What is the matter?" asked the Ghost.
"Nothing particular," said Scrooge.
"Something, I think?" the Ghost insisted.
"No," said Scrooge. "No. I should like to be able to say a word or two
to my clerk just now! That's all."
His former self turned down the lamps as he gave utterance to the wish;
and Scrooge and the Ghost again stood side by side in the open air.
"My time grows short," observed the Spirit. "Quick!"
This was not addressed to Scrooge, or to any one whom he could see, but
it produced an immediate effect. For again Scrooge saw himself. He was
older now; a man in the prime of life. His face had not the harsh and
rigid lines of later years; but it had begun to wear the signs of care
and avarice. There was an eager, greedy, restless motion in the eye,
which showed the passion that had taken root, and where the shadow of
the growing tree would fall. He was not alone, but sat by the side of a
fair young girl in a mourning dress; in whose eyes there were tears,
which sparkled in the light that shone out of the Ghost of Christmas
Past.
"It matters little," she said, softly. "To you, very little. Another
idol has displaced me; and if it can cheer and comfort you in time to
come, as I would have tried to do, I have no just cause to grieve."
"What idol has displaced you?" he rejoined.
"A golden one."
"This is the even-handed dealing of the world!" he said. "There is
nothing on which it is so hard as poverty; and there is nothing it
professes to condemn with such severity as the pursuit of wealth!"
"You fear the world too much," she answered, gently. "All your other
hopes have merged into the hope of being beyond the chance of its sordid
reproach. I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until
the master-passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?"
"What then?" he retorted. "Even if I have grown so much wiser, what
then? I am not changed towards you."
She shook her head.
"Am I?"
"Our contract is an old one. It was made when we were both poor and
content to be so, until, in good season, we could improve our worldly
fortune by our patient industry. You _are_ changed. When it was made,
you were another man."
"I was a boy," he said impatiently.
"Your own feeling tells you that you were not what you are," she
returned. "I am. That which promised happiness when we were one in
heart, is fraught with misery now that we are two. How often and how
keenly I have thought of this, I will not say. It is enough that I
_have_ thought of it, and can release you."
"Have I ever sought release?"
"In words, no. Never."
"In what, then?"
"In a changed nature; in an altered spirit; in another atmosphere of
life; another Hope as its great end. In everything that made my love of
any worth or value in your sight. If this had never been between us,"
said the girl, looking mildly, but with steadiness, upon him; "tell me,
would you seek me out and try to win me now? Ah, no!"
He seemed to yield to the justice of this supposition, in spite of
himself. But he said with a struggle, "You think not."
"I would gladly think otherwise if I could," she answered, "Heaven
knows! When _I_ have learned a Truth like this, I know how strong and
irresistible it must be.
"But if you were free to-day, to-morrow, yesterday, can even I believe
that you would choose a dowerless girl--you who, in your very confidence
with her, weigh everything by Gain: or, choosing her, if for a moment
you were false enough to your one guiding principle to do so, do I not
know that your repentance and regret would surely follow? I do; and I
release you. With a full heart, for the love of him you once were."
He was about to speak; but with her head turned from him, she resumed.
"You may--the memory of what is past half makes me hope you will--have
pain in this. A very, very brief time, and you will dismiss the
recollection of it, gladly, as an unprofitable dream, from which it
happened well that you awoke. May you be happy in the life you have
chosen!"
She left him, and they parted.
"Spirit!" said Scrooge, "show me no more! Conduct me home. Why do you
delight to torture me?"
"One shadow more!" exclaimed the Ghost.
"No more!" cried Scrooge. "No more. I don't wish to see it. Show me no
more!"
But the relentless Ghost pinioned him in both his arms, and forced him
to observe what happened next.
They were in another scene and place; a room, not very large or
handsome, but full of comfort. Near to the winter fire sat a beautiful
young girl, so like the last that Scrooge believed it was the same,
until he saw _her_, now a comely matron, sitting opposite her daughter.
The noise in this room was perfectly tumultuous, for there were more
children there than Scrooge in his agitated state of mind could count;
and, unlike the celebrated herd in the poem, they were not forty
children conducting themselves like one, but every child was conducting
itself like forty. The consequences were uproarious beyond belief; but
no one seemed to care; on the contrary, the mother and daughter laughed
heartily, and enjoyed it very much; and the latter, soon beginning to
mingle in the sports, got pillaged by the young brigands most
ruthlessly. What would I not have given to be one of them! Though I
never could have been so rude, no, no! I wouldn't for the wealth of all
the world have crushed that braided hair, and torn it down; and for the
precious little shoe, I wouldn't have plucked it off, God bless my soul!
to save my life. As to measuring her waist in sport, as they did, bold
young brood; I couldn't have done it; I should have expected my arm to
have grown round it for a punishment, and never come straight again. And
yet I should have dearly liked, I own, to have touched her lips; to have
questioned her, that she might have opened them; to have looked upon the
lashes of her downcast eyes, and never raised a blush; to have let loose
waves of hair, an inch of which would be a keepsake beyond price: in
short, I should have liked, I do confess, to have had the lightest
license of a child, and yet been man enough to know its value.
But now a knocking at the door was heard, and such a rush immediately
ensued that she with laughing face and plundered dress was borne towards
it the centre of a flushed and boisterous group, just in time to greet
the father, who came home attended by a man laden with Christmas toys
and presents. Then the shouting and the struggling, and the onslaught
that was made on the defenceless porter! The scaling him with chairs for
ladders to dive into his pockets, despoil him of brown-paper parcels,
hold on tight by his cravat, hug him around the neck, pommel his back,
and kick his legs in irrepressible affection! The shouts of wonder and
delight with which the development of every package was received! The
terrible announcement that the baby had been taken in the act of putting
a doll's frying-pan into his mouth, and was more than suspected of
having swallowed a fictitious turkey, glued on a wooden platter! The
immense relief of finding this a false alarm! The joy, and gratitude,
and ecstasy! They are all indescribable alike. It is enough that by
degrees the children and their emotions got out of the parlour, and by
one stair at a time, up to the top of the house; where they went to bed,
and so subsided.
And now Scrooge looked on more attentively than ever, when the master of
the house, having his daughter leaning fondly on him, sat down, with her
and her mother at his own fireside; and when he thought that such
another creature, quite as graceful and as full of promise, might have
called him father, and been a spring-time in the haggard winter of his
life, his sight grew very dim indeed.
"Belle," said the husband, turning to his wife with a smile, "I saw an
old friend of yours this afternoon."
"Who was it?"
"Guess!"
"How can I? Tut, don't I know?" she added in the same breath, laughing
as he laughed. "Mr. Scrooge."
"Mr. Scrooge it was. I passed his office window; and as it was not shut
up, and he had a candle inside, I could scarcely help seeing him. His
partner lies upon the point of death, I hear; and there he sat alone.
Quite alone in the world, I do believe."
"Spirit!" said Scrooge in a broken voice, "remove me from this place."
"I told you these were shadows of the things that have been," said the
Ghost. "That they are what they are, do not blame me!"
"Remove me!" Scrooge exclaimed, "I cannot bear it!"
He turned upon the Ghost, and seeing that it looked upon him with a face
in which in some strange way there were fragments of all the faces it
had shown him, wrestled with it.
"Leave me! Take me back. Haunt me no longer!"
In the struggle, if that can be called a struggle in which the Ghost
with no visible resistance on its own part was undisturbed by any effort
of its adversary, Scrooge observed that its light was burning high and
bright; and dimly connecting that with its influence over him, he seized
the extinguisher-cap, and by a sudden action pressed it down upon its
head.
The Spirit dropped beneath it, so that the extinguisher covered its
whole form; but though Scrooge pressed it down with all his force, he
could not hide the light, which streamed from under it, in an unbroken
flood upon the ground.
He was conscious of being exhausted, and overcome by an irresistible
drowsiness; and further, of being in his own bedroom. He gave the cap a
parting squeeze, in which his hand relaxed; and had barely time to reel
to bed, before he sank into a heavy sleep.