“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.