d do it, if I could.
But I have not the power, Spirit. I have not the power."

Again it seemed to look upon him.

"If there is any person in the town, who feels emotion caused by this
man's death," said Scrooge quite agonized, "show that person to me,
Spirit, I beseech you!"

The phantom spread its dark robe before him for a moment, like a wing;
and withdrawing it, revealed a room by daylight, where a mother and
her children were.

She was expecting some one, and with anxious eagerness; for she walked
up and down the room; started at every sound; looked out from the
window; glanced at the clock; tried, but in vain, to work with her
needle; and could hardly bear the voices of the children in their
play.

At length the long-expected knock was heard. She hurried to the door,
and met her husband; a man whose face was care-worn and depressed,
though he was young. There was a remarkable expression in it now; a
kind of serious delight of which he felt ashamed, and which he
struggled to repress.

He sat down to the dinner that had been hoarding for him by the fire;
and when she asked him faintly what news

[Illustration: Original manuscript of Page 55.]

(which was not until after a long silence), he appeared embarrassed
how to answer.

"Is it good," she said, "or bad?"--to help him.

"Bad," he answered.

"We are quite ruined?"

"No. There is hope yet, Caroline."

"If _he_ relents," she said, amazed, "there is! Nothing is past hope,
if such a miracle has happened."

"He is past relenting," said her husband. "He is dead."

She was a mild and patient creature if her face spoke truth; but she
was thankful in her soul to hear it, and she said so, with clasped
hands. She prayed forgiveness the next moment, and was sorry; but the
first was the emotion of her heart.

"What the half-drunken woman whom I told you of last night, said to
me, when I tried to see him and obtain a week's delay; and what I
thought was a mere excuse to avoid me; turns out to have been quite
true. He was not only very ill, but dying, then."

"To whom will our debt be transferred?"

"I don't know. But before that time we shall be ready with the money;
and even though we were not, it would be bad fortune indeed to find so
merciless a creditor in his successor. We may sleep to-night with
light hearts, Caroline!"

Yes. Soften it as they would, their hearts were lighter. The
children's faces hushed, and clustered round to hear what they so