Stave Two: The First of the Three Spirits
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 endeavoring to pierce the darkness with his ferret eyes, when the chimes of a neighboring clock struck the four quarters. So he waited for the hour.
To his great astonishment, the heavy bell went on from six to seven, and from seven to eight, and regularly up to twelve, then stopped. Twelve! It was past two when he went to bed. The clock was wrong. An icicle must have got into the works. Twelve!
He touched the spring of his repeater, to correct this most preposterous clock. Its rapid little pulse beat twelve, and stopped.
“Why, it isn’t possible,” said Scrooge, “that I can have slept through a whole day and far into another night. It isn’t possible that something has happened to the sun, and this is twelve at noon!”
The idea being an alarming one, he scrambled out of bed, and groped his way to the window. He was obliged to rub the frost off with the sleeve of his dressing-gown before he could see anything; and could see very little then. All he could make out was, that it was still very foggy and extremely cold, and that there was no noise of people running to and fro, and making a great stir, as there unquestionably would have been if night had beaten off bright day, and taken possession of the world. This was a great relief, because “three days after sight of this First of Exchange pay to Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge on his order,” and so forth, would have become a mere United States’ security if there were no days to count by.
Scrooge went to bed again, and thought, and thought, and thought it over and over and over, and could make nothing of it. The more he thought, the more perplexed he was; and the more he endeavoured not to think, the more he thought. Marley’s Ghost bothered him exceedingly. Every time he resolved within himself, after mature inquiry, that it was all a dream, his mind flew back again, like a strong spring released, to its first position, and presented the same problem to be worked all through, “Was it a dream or not?”
Scrooge ay in this state until the chimes had gone three quarters more, when he remembered, on a sudden, that the Ghost had warned him of a visitation when the bell tolled one. He resolved to lie awake until the hour was passed; and, considering that he could no more go to sleep than go to Heaven, this was perhaps the wisest resolution in his power.
The quarter was so long, that he was more than once convinced he must have sunk into a doze unconsciously, and missed the clock. At length it broke upon his listening ear.
“Ding, dong!”
“A quarter past,” said Scrooge, counting.
:Ding, dong!”
“Half past,” said Scrooge.
“Ding, dong!”
“A quarter to it,” said Scrooge.
“Ding, dong!”
“The hour itself,” said Scrooge, triumphantly, “and nothing else!”
He spoke before the hour bel sounded, which it now did with a deep, dull, hollow, melancholy ONE. Lights flashed up in the room upon the instant, and the curtains of his bed were drawn.
Most of this is not to be found in screen Carols, not until the clock strikes one. It’s a matter of timing, literally: if you’ve rearranged the time Scrooge goes to bed, you can’t have him getting all upset because twenty-two hours have slipped by. (Furthermore, he lies there thinking about it for an hour: how do you film THAT?) A clock striking one and a worried murmur from our host s about as far as this goes. We want to get on with the GHOSTS.
In Hicks, we watch a lamplighter putting out the streetlights. Scrooge reaches for something in his sleep. The night watchman calls “Twelve o’clock and all’s well!” Scrooge wakes; a light can be seen at the parting of the bedcurtains. Something materializes within this.
Owen’s mantel clock strikes; the candle dies. Scrooge peers out from under the covers and checks his watch. “Humbug!” The clock chimes one; there is sudden light, and the curtains jerk aside by themselves. Scrooge stares.
Sim I has a clock striking, and the room filling with light. Scrooge’s eyes slide to the right; the bedcurtains here slide aside of their own accord.
March lies restlessly in bed, listening. :And now, the hour itself. One o’clock. I’ve only slept a few minutes…or else most of the day.” This is the only reference in these films to Scrooge’s concern about whether it is day or night, and it doesn’t seem to bother him much. He rolls over.
Magoo’s clock goes crazy. Scrooge starts when it strikes one, and grumbles about being unable to sleep.
Haddrick hears a clock striking outdoors; a clock within the room confirms the hour. “One o’clock?” he says. “And no ghost? I must have dreamed up Marley.” He turns to his right and stares in horror.
An overhead shot shows us Sim II in bed. As he wakes with a start, the narrator explains that Scrooge awoke and the room filled with light. A hand moves the bedcurtains from outside.
Finney is just settling into bed when the clock strikes one. The sound shocks him, and he checks his own clock to verify the time. There is a clatter; he raises his eyes to a visitor.
McDuck snores gustily. We see him through the eyes of the Spirit, who bounds into the room, jumps to the bedside table, all of which suggests something small has arrived. We watch him light the candle and then smack the bell of the alarm clock with the handle of his umbrella.
A clock in the tower strikes one, and the watch in the stand by Scott’s bed (a “repeater” like the one in the text) reinforces this by playing a little of the theme song. Scrooge is apprehensive. “One! What was it Marley said?” He looks around. “Nothing! Just a dream.” A wind rises, followed by a twinkling light, and suddenly his visitor is there.
We see Caine in an overhead shot; he is sleeping on top of his covers, still in his dressing gown. The mechanical clock on his mantel strikes one, he opens his eyes, and his candle goes out. Dickens, outdoors, rises to declaim, “Expect the first Ghost when the clock strikes one!” Scrooge’s room is flooded with light.
The clock of Curry’s mantel strikes one. The window curtains are blowen by wind. There is thunder and a small explosion. Scrooge sleeps through all of this, and has to be wakened by a ghost with a diabolical cackle, who tickles his face with a sprig of holly.
Stewart, lying on his bed, still in his dressing gown, newspaper to one side, actually performs the whole “quarter past” sequence. “The hour itself, and nothing’s happened.” Then the clock strikes one, and light streams in. He gasps in horror. A hand parts the bedcurtains.
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