Charles Dickens: A Christmas Carol

Stave 3: The Second of the Three Spirits (continued)

`Here's Martha, mother.' said a girl, appearing as she spoke.

`Here's Martha, mother.' cried the two young Cratchits. `Hurrah. There's such a goose, Martha.'

`Why, bless your heart alive, my dear, how late you are.' said Mrs Cratchit, kissing her a dozen times, and taking off her shawl and bonnet for her with officious zeal.

`We'd a deal of work to finish up last night,' replied the girl,' and had to clear away this morning, mother.'

`Well. Never mind so long as you are come,' said Mrs Cratchit. `Sit ye down before the fire, my dear, and have a warm, Lord bless ye.'

`No, no. There's father coming,' cried the two young Cratchits, who were everywhere at once. `Hide, Martha, hide.'

So Martha hid herself, and in came little Bob, the father, with at least three feet of comforter exclusive of the fringe, hanging down before him; and his threadbare clothes darned up and brushed, to look seasonable; and Tiny Tim upon his shoulder. Alas for Tiny Tim, he bore a little crutch, and had his limbs supported by an iron frame.

`Why, where's our Martha.' cried Bob Cratchit, looking round.

`Not coming,' said Mrs Cratchit.

`Not coming.' said Bob, with a sudden declension in his high spirits; for he had been Tim's blood horse all the way from church, and had come home rampant. `Not coming upon Christmas Day.'

Martha didn't like to see him disappointed, if it were only in joke; so she came out prematurely from behind the closet door, and ran into his arms, while the two young Cratchits hustled Tiny Tim, and bore him off into the wash-house, that he might hear the pudding singing in the copper.

`And how did little Tim behave. asked Mrs Cratchit, when she had rallied Bob on his credulity, and Bob had hugged his daughter to his heart's content.