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!”