certainly sent a chill of fear down his back of the kind he had not felt since his short time in the militia or even worse, the few minutes he spent fighting the undead seven years ago.
To sit, staring at those fixed glazed eyes, in silence for a moment, would play, Scrooge felt, the very deuce with him. There was something very awful, too, in the spectre’s being provided with an infernal atmosphere of its own. Scrooge could not feel it himself, but this was clearly the case; for though the Ghost sat perfectly motionless, its hair, and skirts, and tassels, were still agitated as by the hot vapour from an oven.
“You see this toothpick?” said Scrooge, returning quickly to the charge, for the reason just assigned; and wishing, though it were only for a second, to divert the vision’s stony gaze from himself.
“I do,” replied the Ghost.
“You are not looking at it,” said Scrooge.
“But I see it,” said the Ghost, “notwithstanding.”
“Well!” returned Scrooge, “I have but to swallow this, and be for the rest of my days persecuted by a legion of goblins, all of my own creation. Humbug, I tell you! humbug!”
At this the spirit raised a frightful cry, and shook its chain with such a dismal and appalling noise, that Scrooge held on tight to his chair, to save himself from falling in a swoon. He dropped his dagger with the fear of the ghostly apparition ahead of him, before he was able to strengthen his resolve and issue one final challenge to the ghostly figure.
“You could be a simple illusion, one based upon the science of light and glass. Nothing you have told me was of secret to anybody else. Why, you could be one of my competitors trying to steal custom and trade from my very person, perhaps by using some foul poison or drug,” he said with a look of triumphalism to his face.
The Spirit appeared more agitated, crying out in anger and bitterness towards Scrooge but this was not enough, Scrooge was now convinced, deep in his mind that the Spirit was a way of driving him mad or to do something to compromise himself and his business.
“I do not have much time, you should not waste it with your arguments,” he said with effort.
“If you are truly Marley, then tell me something that only you and I do know and not some simple business transaction. Tell me, what happened on the night of your death?” asked Scrooge with a look of mischief in his eye.
“Scrooge, you know too well what happened on that night. I am here for the very reason that you too will soon join me on that path!” it cried.
“Humbug! You tell me nothing new, sir, other than to try and stop my commerce,” he answered with the sound of accomplishment to his voice.
Scrooge looked around the room, presumably looking for a third party or something that helped to control the creature yet saw nothing that could create the fearsome apparition in his very home. He thought for a brief moment of those people that could have gained access to his house and might bear him ill will. “But why would they want to punish me?” he asked himself.
Scrooge turned his gaze back to the Spirit, looking for answers but before he could speak the Spirit opened is jaw and spoke quickly, as though the very time it had remaining were just a few brief seconds.
“Seven years ago you and I, two men with a history of financial prudence and success, were at the centre of the greatest calamity this city has ever seen. Even our short time in the Yeomanry was nothing compared to the horrors we saw that night,” it said as it looked closely at Scrooge.
“Do you remember why we were at the Bank that day?” asked Marley.
“Why do you not tell me if you are so familiar with our history?” Scrooge smirked.
The Spirit looked angry at first and started to move towards Scrooge. It then paused and appeared to be considering the situation. In a far more terrifying turn, it simply grinned in a sinister fashion before continuing and this