Mystery for Christmas and Other Stories

Whatever Became of Ebenezer Scrooge? by Tom Tolnay

So Ebenezer Scrooge, that squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner was led into the past, the present, and the future by three apparitions on Christmas Eve, and the horrors that he witnessed, which were his own life and death, convinced him that he’d better repent or else. Not merely in word, but in deed, for his fears of moral retribution were profound. Next morning, while still in his nightcap, he rewarded a boy handsomely to run to the poulterer’s and have a turkey the size of Tiny Tim sent to the humble home of the Cratchit family. After consuming a bowl of gruel and a cup of tea with more relish than such feeble fare justified, he brushed the coal dust from his cuffs and went off on a cold, clear, Christmas Day to join his nephew Fred and family at their holiday feast. Scrooge delighted the children with gifts in his hard-as-flint fists and astonished the grownups with a steady smile on his bloodless face. He tasted of the spiced wassail and joined in the carols in bold voice and bounced their son and daughter upon his knee. It was like old times, with the kind of merriment he had enjoyed so unashamedly at Fezziwig’s establishment. (Those were the days when he was a mere apprentice with Dick Wilkins, good old Dick Wilkins, who had been very attached to him — long before Ebenezer’s soul had been twisted into an ugly thing by the connivances of commerce.) Later that night, when the cheer had simmered down, and the fire had withdrawn its flames, and a slab of clouds had blocked out the stars, and a cold mist was pressing against the windows, Ebenezer Scrooge, with a wave of his hand, alighted from the glowing doorway of his nephew’s home and headed into the gloom of nineteenth century London. It was that sort of penetrating gloom which of times follows hard on the heels of a frolicsome occasion, the way the brightest and most pleasant of rooms becomes dank and dreary when plunged into the bitter darkness of a winter’s night. It was the gloom of death itself.

Ebenezer stepped cautiously through the slippery skin of snow that had settled upon the cobblestones, for he was mortal and, as he had reminded the Ghost of Christmas Past, liable to fall. It was feet-stamping cold, and his breath crystallized with each exhalation. The bleakness was so concentrated it seemed to muffle the sputtering gas lamps along his route, but it did not extinguish the gladness in Scrooge’s heart, which radiated on the fuel of his recent salvation. So altered was his attitude that as he walked in the direction of his chambers, he kept an expectant eye out for a carriage to carry him forth. Not since he’d been young and wasteful had he hired a carriage; on this particular evening, however, he felt a strong desire to be accompanied by the happy clacking of hoofs and to impress the cabman with a generosity befitting the season. Scrooge spotted a few such conveyances, shiny through the frozen mists, one of them with holly wound in the spokes of its great wheels. But each was loaded with people and packages and the sounds of mirth, hurrying on toward yet another festivity in celebration of the birth of Christ. By the time he came upon a carriage that was free — a young couple was laughing as they stepped down from the sturdy black vehicle, its springs jouncing from the quick loss of weight — Scrooge had already covered three-quarters of the distance to his rooms. And though the air was as harsh as a rasp, he decided to complete his journey by foot. It seemed more trouble to get in and out of the carriage than the short trip warranted. Besides, a long walk on Christmas night was good for the heart and satisfying to the soul, and a man of business in his time of life had to be attentive to both.

The windows of the low brick houses were gleaming with candles and oil lamps, and the scent of baked breads and sweetmeats wafted over the streets. A few men and women wrapped in green and red scarves bobbed past him on the narrow walk. “Merry Christmas!” said they, raising their hats or saluting, though he did not recognize any of them. Scrooge fingered the brim of his tall hat and smiled as best he could, his cracked face aching from having crowded thirty years of smiling into a single day. What the ghosts had demonstrated to him the previous evening appeared to be decidedly true: There was joy, perhaps even a certain profit, to be collected from being pleasant, from being charitable to others.

Not everyone on that particular London street, on that particular Christmas night, was unknown to Ebenezer Scrooge. Hurrying along on the opposite walk was one Jonathan Wurdlewart, who had business with the firm of Scrooge & Marley. Indeed, his loan was due that very night. And when Wurdlewart spotted a gray-faced old man in a tall black hat moving slowly but with a distinct delight in his step, greeting people as they passed, the debtor ducked into an alley and stared out from the shadows. “It can’t be,” Wurdlewart muttered, rubbing his tired eyes, “it just can’t be.” After the old man had passed, and the debtor saw that it was indeed Scrooge himself, he cursed him under his breath as a hypocrite as well as a usurer. For a long while Wurdlewart remained in the shadows, as if pondering what course of action to take. At last he began moving in the direction Scrooge had gone.

Scrooge turned off the broad street and down a narrow byway, and before long this brought him into the district of warehouses and factories and counting houses, not far from where he had inhabited a suite of rooms as cheerless as the London morgue. Those who had a choice did not wish to live amidst the clank of machinery and the clink of coins, to hear the cries of children when they were struck for lack of productivity. Scrooge resided here to be closer to his commercial interests at all times and because rents were far cheaper. (The rest of the rooms in the lowering pile of stone in which he resided were let out as offices.) Others lived out their time nearby because there was nowhere else for them to go. On this singular night of the year the workers were huddled in their drafty, wretched dwellings, many without coal for their fires; some had no more than boiled potatoes for their tables, the skins of which were served as a side dish to introduce variety to their meals. Their windows were mostly dark. In this district the streets were solitary, and the doorways were cut into black relief, and loose windows rattled in their frames, and the debris of manufacture flapped in the gutters, and the alleys were as grim as the grave. Considering all this, it is little wonder that Scrooge was gradually overtaken by a feeling that someone was following him, and he turned around quickly, but saw no one. It is little wonder the smile fell away from his face and he began to think about time: In a few days yet another year in his paltry allotment of years would be gone, and he would not be another hour richer.

As he came upon his countinghouse, with the weathered sign nailed above the door — Scrooge & Marley — the old man spotted something that made him feel as if a headstone had toppled over into his soul. Across the street from his place of business there was a single lamp burning in the window of Pennerpinch, Ltd. So Gladnought Pennerpinch, Ebenezer’s long-time and despised competitor, was working on Christmas night, trying to grab an advantage over Scrooge & Marley! Ebenezer stood as dead-still as a doornail on the crusty walk, regretting passionately having given Cratchit the day off. At year’s end we should both have been going over the accounts so as not to fall behind, he thought, so as not to permit that scoundrel Pennerpinch to steal the bread from my mouth! And he clenched his bony fist and shook it at the smoke-blackened brick establishment across the way.

Just then the figure of Pennerpinch, as slick and rigid as an icicle, passed by the window carrying a large ledger, his shadow looming behind him. It was clear to Scrooge that his nemesis was going to do his accounts long into the night. “It’s not fair!” Scrooge moaned, and he shivered from standing still too long in the cold. Though he yearned to be home and to free his feet from the tight boots, rather than allow his competitor to expand on the advantage already gained, he turned up the stairs of his counting-house. Scrooge slid his hand inside his coat, yanked the ring of numerous keys from his vest pocket, and unlocked one, two, three bolts. Just as he reached out to grip the knob, however, he saw a facial configuration on the iron knocker and quickly withdrew his hand. “Not again!” he declared. Looking more closely, Scrooge realized it was an illusion created by a coating of frost. “Humbug!” Entering and closing the door behind him hastily, he proceeded to relock each of the three devices.

The stale dampness made the office feel colder than the night streets. He passed from Cratchit’s outer cell into the larger space, moving to his desk in the dimness the way a blind man feels his way through familiar surroundings. Turning his chair so he could keep an eye on Pennerpinch out the window, he sat down. It was too cold to remove his heavy coat, but unlike Cratchit, Scrooge could work without burning his coal as if it were rubbish. After rubbing his hands together briskly to acquire some free warmth, he struck a match into flame and lit the lamp, bringing the chamber into view. The big desk looked overworked, and dusty wooden shelves were stacked with yellowed ledgers, each representing a year of commerce. The iron stove was as cold and black as its owner’s heart. At last Scrooge felt some small glimmer of satisfaction, for he knew that sooner or later Pennerpinch would notice the light coming from Scrooge & Marley.

In the flickering paleness, Scrooge opened the ledger stamped 1843 and began to slide his finger down the long list of debtors. This was how he started every business day, for it comforted him to know that he was owed so much. A quick addition of the receivables alarmed him, however. Cratchit had shortchanged him by nine pence. “The sneaking scoundrel!” he declared out loud, for being alone so much had taught him to speak to himself. Again he added up the figures, this time with more care, and the amount totaled up as it should have. To be absolutely certain, he added them yet again, and again the balance appeared to be correct. “You don’t know how close you came to losing your position, Cratchit,” he said to the empty outer cell. Scrooge moved the tin cash box off the blotter, unlocked the center drawer, and pulled out a sheath of crisp white collection notes. Flipping through them, he slipped out one in particular. In accordance with their agreement, Scrooge & Marley would take possession of Jonathan Wurdlewart’s house and shop if the debt were not paid in full by twelve o’clock midnight, Christmas, 1843. Wurdlewart had not wanted to put up his home as collateral, but Scrooge had insisted, and the baker was so convinced the shop would bring him a quick return that he agreed. Alas, the interest was so high he couldn’t keep up with the payments, and now his time was almost gone. Ebenezer Scrooge checked the clock against the bare wall: eleven forty-six. “In fourteen minutes,” he said, “it will all be mine.” The glittering eyes of his nephew’s children and the joyful chime of the city’s bells were no more than dreams of what seemed like a long lost past.

As Scrooge calculated the value of the neat cottage and the busy shop, there was a knocking in the outer chamber. Afraid it might be Wurdlewart, come to pay off the loan, Scrooge quickly blew out the lamp. After all, the countinghouse was shut for Christmas Day so how could he accept a payment? In the dreary darkness he sat, cold in his bones, peeking out the shutter. A gaslight flickered on the street, but the steps of his establishment were set in, making it impossible to see who was at the door. The knocking sounded again, and growing edgy, Scrooge arose quietly and crept into the outer cell. If Wurdlewart had the money in hand, he would be forced to settle the account and would not be able to claim the house and shop. Faced with the possibility of such a loss, Scrooge felt miserable.

At the door he heard the sound again, but it seemed to be coming not from the knocker but above the door. Scrooge determined that Pennerpinch had seen his light and gotten angry, and was out there tampering with his sign! Quickly he began freeing the three locks, and in a few moments swung open the door and cried out, “What d’ya think you’re doing?” To his surprise there was no one there, or so he thought at first. Through the thick, frozen mist there did seem to be someone, or something, drifting toward him, and as the shape drew closer he saw that it was his deceased partner, Jacob Marley, dragging his long and heavy chain after him.

“Jacob! You assured me I would not be visited again, that I would be saved.”

Marley gurgled. “Already you have forgotten your promise, Ebenezer.”

“Well, now, Jacob, I must say I had a pleasant time of it today. But Christmas is finished now, and it is time to get back to business.”

“The spirit of Christmas must be honored by every man through the long calendar of the year.”

“But don’t you see that light in Pennerpinch’s window? He is working on Christmas night to gain an advantage over your former partner — I cannot allow that.”

“Pennerpinch is forging his own chain, link by link, just as I did. Just as you are doing.”

“Pennerpinch is making a fortune!”

Marley wailed, and Scrooge begged him to calm down.

“This is your last opportunity for salvation,” Marley murmured. “Your last forever and anon.”

“I’ll be hanged before I hand everything I’ve worked for over to that wretch!”

“I am sorry for you, Ebenezer,” Marley hissed, and the hollow voice, along with the wispy substance that was his body, instantly melted like smoke. The chains, too, had evaporated.

The sudden disappearance of his old partner made Scrooge feel apprehensive. “Marley? Where are you? Speak comfort to me, Jacob.”

There was no reply, only the sound of wind gasping in the alley. Now Scrooge spotted a greenish glow sifting out of the mist — rather like the shape of that gruesome, shrouded figure of the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come. Scrooge backed inside and slammed the door shut, but before he could secure any of the locks, the spirit stood before him, pointing his finger of bone at his chest. Terrified, Scrooge fled into the back office and grabbed hold of Marley’s knobbed cane, which he kept in the corner as a warning to charity seekers. Raising the cane as if ready to strike, he waited for the apparition, but there was no movement or sound in the outer cell, and after what seemed a long time, weary, he dropped onto his seat and set the cane across the blotter in front of him. “Humbug!” he snarled.

Reluctant to give anyone or anything a better view of him, and to save oil, Scrooge did not relight the lamp. He simply waited for something to happen. The shadows held their places, however, and feeling less ill at ease, Scrooge proceeded to watch the large black hands of the clock, faintly discernible in the band of gaslight from outside. In three minutes he would acquire the Wurdlewart properties, and the next day would put them on the market for triple their value. All remained quiet and still in the dismal office, while every tick of the clock seemed to be making him richer. At the exact moment of twelve o’clock midnight, Scrooge heard not the stroke of the hour but the clink of a chain — just a breath after the icy iron links yanked brutally tight about his heart.

Bob Cratchit discovered Ebenezer Scrooge the next morning, slumped back against his chair, and exclaimed, “Oh, my God!” After recovering from the shock, the short, skinny clerk pulled a coarse cap over his brittle hair and went to notify the police. Within the hour an officer arrived at the countinghouse, buttoned up in a heavy blue coat and blue vested suit. Cratchit showed him in. Inspector Ignatius Grabbe was a narrow-shouldered man with a wide red mustache and tiny, black, suspicious eyes. As the inspector snooped and sniffed around the chamber and cell for several minutes, the clerk, still shaken, watched in silence, his eyes avoiding the heap of humanity at the desk.

Grabbe, who was rather vain when it came to his powers of deduction, noted out loud that the stiffness of the deceased’s skin indicated he had been dead for some hours. “It would appear,” the inspector theorized, “that your employer had stopped by his office last night to pick up something important he had forgotten.”

“What could he have forgotten, sir?” Cratchit asked, knowing that his master had possessed a powerful memory.

“Well, it could be almost anything,” Inspector Grabbe hedged, eyeing the cane in the corner. “How dependent was he on that stick?”

“Oh, that belonged to his partner, Jacob Marley, who is long dead,” Cratchit said with a quaver in his throat.

“I see,” Grabbe grumbled. “Well, then, perhaps it was for some vital business papers.”

“On Christmas night? I should think not.”

Annoyed at being foiled, the inspector declared irascibly: “Certainly the deceased did not intend to stop for very long, for he hadn’t removed his coat and the ashes in the stove are quite cold.”

Cratchit refrained from mentioning that Scrooge hated to burn his coal.

Having finally silenced the clerk, Grabbe proceeded with his investigation. He lifted the rusty lid of a small square box on the desk, leafed through a ledger, opened a drawer, flipped through a stack of bills. Then he noticed that the daily calendar was turned to December 26, and that there were no appointments listed. “Hmmm.”

Cratchit’s eyebrows rose, but his lips remained shut.

Now the inspector looked closely at the latch on the window, which had rusted solid from years of non-use. “Have you keys of your own to these rooms?”

“No one but his own self was permitted to possess keys.”

“How did you gain entry this morning, Mr. Cratchit?”

“Upon my arrival the door was unbolted.”

Inspector Grabbe looked at Cratchit sadly. “Did you and your employer have... harmonious relations?”

Surprised by the directness of the question, the clerk stammered, “Why only yesterday Mr. Scrooge sent a giant turkey to my home for Christmas dinner.”

“Would that be the one that had been filling out the window of the poulterer’s on the next street?”

“The very bird,” Cratchit conceded.

A low whistle emitted from the inspector’s lips, and he suddenly did a right-face turn on his heel and moved beside the slumped form of Ebenezer Scrooge, looking over the deceased’s head, neck, face. Apparently dissatisfied with his findings, he began reviewing the objects on the desk again. At last he stopped, and put one finger of thought under his chin. The chamber was dense with silence for a few moments.

“Is anything wrong?” Cratchit asked guardedly.

“Not precisely, Mr. Cratchit, but I do find it odd that the cash box is empty.”

“Mr. Scrooge would never leave cash in the office. Never.”

The conviction with which this statement was delivered did not go unnoticed, and the inspector, taking a deep breath of frustration, suddenly felt compelled make some display of conclusiveness. “It would appear,” he proposed grandly, “it would appear the gentleman known as Ebenezer Scrooge returned to his office to look up his appointment calendar for the following day, suffered an internal malfunction, and expired in his chair.”

“Poor, poor Mr. Scrooge,” said Cratchit.

Because the clerk had not seemed terribly impressed with the mental process that had led to his deduction, the inspector added, “Of course, there is the lamp to consider.”

“The lamp?”

“Either the oil should have all burned out,” observed the inspector, “or it should have been lit.” At this moment he whipped out the burnt match. “Voila!”

His eyes widening at this new evidence, Cratchit said, “Is it possible a draft had blown it out, sir?”

“Anything is possible,” Grabbe admitted, raising one sharp eyebrow doubtfully.

The inspector did an abrupt left-face turn on his heel, and resumed nosing about the premises. But it was clear to Cratchit, who stood hard by in modest silence, that no new evidence was being uncovered. At long last two men wearing white gloves and white faces arrived at Scrooge & Marley. Without a word they loaded the remains of Ebenezer Scrooge onto a wooden plank and carried their leaden cargo, with some unsteadiness, down the front steps. Here the body was dumped into a wooden box supported by four iron wheels with wooden spokes. Along the street the men pushed their earthly burden, as the curious drew closer to learn which of their number had been called to account for his life. The coarse gray shroud flapped grimly in the smoky breeze, and with a distinct smear of disappointment in his tight face, Inspector Ignatius Grabbed joined in the solemn procession.

At the doorway of the countinghouse stood Cratchit, head slightly bowed, in respect. But something caught his eye. Across the way, the pale visage of Gladnought Pennerpinch had appeared in a window, watching the proceedings intensely; and even at that distance, or so it seemed to Cratchit, there was an expression of pleasure discernible upon the wizened face of Scrooge’s fiercest competitor.

For all the inspector’s deductions, Bob Cratchit had his own theory. When he’d arrived at the countinghouse, as he’d revealed to the police, the door had been left unlocked. What he did not mention was that this was extremely unlike his master. Moreover, Scrooge’s hand was clenched tightly about Jacob Marley’s cane, and lying on the blotter was the collection note on the Jonathan Wurdlewart account. This debt, Cratchit knew, was due on Christmas night; this debt would ruin a man and his family. And most telling of all was the smudge of rust that Cratchit had noticed across the old sinner’s chest, as if he’d been struck by a blunt metal object. Cratchit quickly came to some conclusions, and then he did something strange: The clerk unpried Mr. Scrooge’s fingers from the cane and stood it in the corner, and placed the Wurdlewart bill in the stove and set it afire. He mixed the new ashes with the old, and left the door of the office ajar a few minutes to clear the scent of smoke. Finally he brushed away the rust on Scrooge’s coat. Only then did Cratchit go to the police. But he never mentioned these clues to them, nor to anyone else — not even to Mrs. Cratchit. After the coroner had reviewed the corpse at the London morgue, and following a period of customary bureaucratic procrastination, the incident went down in police records as “Death by natural causes.” When this news reached Cratchit, the humble clerk thought: You’re not so smart as you think, Inspector Grabbe.

Upon the death of Jacob Marley seven years hence, the countinghouse of Scrooge & Marley had passed into the hands of Ebenezer Scrooge, although he’d never gotten around to painting over Marley’s name on the sign. Now that Scrooge was gone, these assets, considerably greater by 1844, became the lawful property of the only blood survivor the authorities could locate. However, Scrooge’s nephew Fred had no talents or interests in this direction, nor any wish to benefit from the misery of others. Not long after his uncle had been laid out and returned to his Maker, the young man visited the bare, chilly abode of Mr. Bob Cratchit and his family. The children were frail and seemed frightened, and one of them, he noticed, leaned on a crutch. Little Mrs. Cratchit, too poor to offer a cup of tea to their guest, said not a word as she sat woodenly on the rough-hewn chair in a black dress washed so often it had turned gray.

The tall young gentleman, holding the brim of his hat with both hands, straight away asked Cratchit: “Would you kindly consider managing Scrooge & Marley on behalf of my family?”

Expressing great surprise — partly because he was surprised, and partly because it was good manners — Cratchit said gratefully, nay, heartily: “It would be an honor and a pleasure.” That evening everyone in the Cratchit family received an extra spoonful of turkey bone soup.

The first action Bob Cratchit took as manager of Scrooge & Marley was to light a good fire in the office and to heap on the coal. His second action was to write a letter to Jonathan Wurdlewart in which he offered an extension of time and a much more equitable interest rate. Three days later Wurdlewart, looking lean and bewildered, showed up at the countinghouse and inquired cautiously of Cratchit: “Have I understood the terms of your letter correctly?”

“I should think you have.”

At which reply Wurdlewart grabbed Cratchit’s hand and nearly shook his arm out of its socket. “Thank you so much, kind sir, from me and my family. Thank you so very, very much.”

Grinning happily, Cratchit replied. “You’re most welcome, I’m sure.”

By the following Christmas the baker was free and clear of his debt, and his shop began to prosper. During that period Bob Cratchit and Jonathan Wurdlewart became friends, and several times their families dined together. But not a word about the evidence, or about Cratchit’s suspicion, passed between them. Nor did Wurdlewart mention that he had followed Scrooge back to his countinghouse that fateful Christmas night with the idea of appealing to him for more time. After standing out in the dreadful cold awhile, however, Wurdlewart saw through the mist someone who looked thin and short as Cratchit approach and enter the establishment of Scrooge & Marley. But Wurdlewart lost his courage, and so he had wandered back home to seek the comfort of his family. It was only after he heard about Scrooge’s death at his desk that he remembered how the old man had viciously belittled Cratchit in front of several people, and Cratchit’s fists had clenched in humiliation. So Wurdlewart came to some conclusions of his own, but he never mentioned what he saw that Christmas night — except to his wife, in whom he confided all things.

One autumn evening, when the Cratchits were visiting the Wurdlewarts, Mrs. Wurdlewart, a robust lady famed for her hot toddies, stirred up a great bowl of spirits and kept ladling it into the men’s cups. Soon the two husbands were red in the face and sentimental in the heart. Expressing the need for some air, they stepped out onto the moonlit cobblestones and took a walk. In a burst of protective feeling for his friend, Cratchit said to Wurdlewart: “You can be sure of one thing, Jonathan, no matter how long I live, I shall never breathe a word of what I know to another living soul.”

Wurdlewart stopped and turned unsteadily toward his friend. “Strange,” he said, “I was about to say very much the same thing to you, Bob.”

At this time they each revealed their suspicions to one another.

“As God is my witness,” said Wurdlewart, “though the thought had passed through my head in a weak moment, I never brought harm to Scrooge. It’s not in my nature.”

“May God strike me dead if I had anything to do with Mr. Scrooge’s demise,” declared Cratchit. “It never once entered my mind.”

In a flash the two friends knew that the other was speaking the truth. Cratchit realized that the rust he had removed from Scrooge’s coat was very likely a marking the old man had acquired when brushing against the rusted lid of the cash box, and Wurdlewart realized that what he had seen that night was probably a configuration of mist, not of man. In the glare of the moon both of their minds continued to wander a few moments: Cratchit thought about Pennerpinch, and Wurdlewart thought about yet another of Scrooge’s debtors whom he had heard threaten the usurer in his office. But in a short time both men dismissed these possibilities as highly improbable, and their minds converged on one idea. At virtually the same moment the two friends had concluded that God, in His infinite wisdom, to satisfy His everlasting desire for justice, and by way of one of His innumerable spiritual agents of mercy, had struck down the old miser.

“God is just,” said Cratchit, thinking that Inspector Grabbe had been correct about Scrooge’s death after all.

“God is good,” said Wurdlewart, thinking that his wife had been correct about Cratchit’s innocence after all.

With an arm around each other’s shoulder, and much more refreshed, the friends swaggered back toward the house to rejoin the festivities.

Postscript

Under Bob Cratchit’s hard-earned experience and thrifty management the establishment of Scrooge & Marley flourished, and within a few years he was able to move his wife and five children out of the mercantile district into a modest yet handsome house (with three fireplaces) far from the sounds of manufacture. Now when the Wurdlewarts appeared at their home, Mrs. Cratchit served crumpets as well as fancy tea, and she became quite a bit more talkative, especially along these lines: “Bob, I’ll be needing a new dress to replace this old rag.” Tiny Tim, who did not die as foreshadowed by the last of the ghostly triumvirate, grew stronger every day and, finally, threw away his crutch altogether. At the same time he was growing smarter. One day he joined the firm as his father’s apprentice. The lad learned quickly, helping to ease the workload on his father considerably. It was not long before Tim was earning a regular wage, and he began expanding the company’s services. In time, the Cratchits were able to buy out Scrooge’s nephew, who was pleased to be finished with such business entirely. The following week a new sign appeared over the door of the counting-house — Cratchit & Son — and Tim, who was no longer so tiny, became shrewder and, with every pound won in commerce, hungrier for more and more profit. And so, as Big Tim observed the following Christmas, “God bless us with another client!”