Deleted Scenes From A Christmas Carol, found in the archives at The Charles Dickens Museum, Portsmouth. Scholars presume these sections were removed by Dickens himself to maintain economy of the story. The pages were also only recently transcribed thanks to radiographic analysis. Earlier reading was impossible due to the pages being heavily stained with port wine.
Section 1
When Scrooge awoke, it was so dark, that looking out of bed, he could scarcely distinguish the transparent window from the opaque walls of his chamber. He was endeavouring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes, when the chimes of a neighbouring church struck three quarters.
Then the air before him shimmered as though it had come to life and a tall, thin figure wearing a silvery gown appeared before him. From its countenance it seemed to be a woman, and upon her nose she wore spectacles; from either end of these descended chains of pearls that extended behind her neck.
Scrooge tried to say “Humbug!” but the word caught in his throat. Instead he gasped, “You are the first spirit?”
The woman took a step back and a child appeared before her holding a Latin primer. Then she spoke.
“I might have been the Ghost Of The Subjunctive Pluperfect were I to have appeared here upon the…oh, something, look, do you mind if I go back and start again?”
Section 2
Awaking in the middle of a prodigiously tough snore, and sitting up in bed to get his thoughts together, Scrooge had no occasion to be told that the bell was again upon the stroke of a quarter past. The room around him was filled with lights the likes of which he had never seen before; they appeared as sections of church windows illuminated by sun, yet they hung in the air. All shapes and sizes they winked on and off, accompanied by strange whistles and chirps such as Scrooge had never heard before.
A figure stepped forward. It wore a heavy black woolen robe with a thickly rounded collar about its neck, but its head was bare and silver, and red eyes glowed evilly from within its sockets.
Scrooge drew back.
“Are you, as promised, the Ghost Of Christmas Yet To Come?”
The ghost sighed and said, “Actually I’m The Ghost Of Christmas Of The Really Distant Future. I wanted to get here ahead of the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Come before he could give me any more grief about muscling in on his territory. Look, I know you’re a businessman and I just wanted to drop some advice. Write a note for Bob Cratchit’s great-great grandkids telling them to invest in Apple.”
Scrooge pondered this.
“You wish them to purchase orchards? Perchance to feed the poor and undernourished?”
The Ghost chuckled. “Oh, something like that. Let’s just say I’m planting seed money for future investors.”
And with that it took forth a small black rectangle which it tapped a few times with a silvery finger and disappeared.
Section 3
Scrooge tossed in his bedclothes then, upon hearing the sound of bugles and other brass instruments, pulled the curtains aside. There before him appeared a stage and, in the middle of it, a bright green figure that, though made of cloth, had something of the countenance of a frog. In the darkness behind it was just visible the figure of a tall, lean, bearded man.
“Oh Spirit,” said Scrooge, “many wondrous and strange things I have seen tonight but you are the strangest yet. Tell me, Spirit, what Christmas are you?”
The voice was high and sounded as though spoken through the nose as it said, “I am the Ghost Of The Best Adaptation Of Your Story There Will Ever Be. I wish you to know, Ebenezer Scrooge, that children and adults alike shall, each Christmas, gather around boxes to see your story. They shall rejoice in it in many languages, many forms, and with many players, but none shall exceed that one which I and my partners shall bring to life. Rejoice in this, Ebenezer!”
Scrooge smiled. “Is it true, then, Ghost? I am redeemed and shall be loved and share love with others until the end of my days?”
“Greater rewards than that await you,” said the Ghost, “for you shall be played by Michael Caine!”
With that the Ghost disappeared and the morning churchbells began to ring.
And so, as your readers observed, “Bless you and your brilliant ideas, every one.”
ANN J KOPLOW recently posted…Day 4001: Lighten Up
Thank you for not being a Scrooge with the comments, Ann.
Good job they told him to invest in Apple and not Twitter lol!
mydangblog recently posted…The Bees’ Knees
The tricky thing with investments is there was a time when investing in Twitter was a good idea. That’s over now, for the moment anyway. Maybe Elon will get out of it–unlikely, I know–and the value will go back up.