1 Marley's ghost

1 Marley's ghost

It is important to remember that Jacob Marley was dead. Did Scrooge know that? Of course he did. Scrooge and Marley had been partners in London for many years, and excellent men of business they were, too.

When Marley died, Scrooge continued with the business alone. Both names still stood above the office door: Scrooge and Marley.

Sometimes people who were new to the business called Scrooge Scrooge, and sometimes Marley, but he answered to both names. He did not care what name they called him.

The only thing that mattered to him was the business, and making money. Oh! He was a hard, clever, mean old man, Scrooge was!

There was nothing warm or open about him. He lived a secretive, lonely life, and took no interest in other people at all.

The cold inside him made his eyes red, and his thin lips blue, and his voice high and cross. It put white frost on his old head, his eyebrows and his chin.

The frost in his heart made the air around him cold, too. In the hottest days of summer his office was as cold as ice, and it was just as cold in winter.

Nobody ever stopped him in the street to say, with a happy smile, 'My dear Scrooge, how are you? When will you come to see me? '

No poor man asked him for money, no children asked him the time, no man or woman ever, in all his life, asked him the way. Animals as well as people were afraid of him.