As Scrooge looked, it became a knocker again. He was afraid, but he did not show his fear. He turned the key, opened the door and walked in. He did look around beforehe shut the door, and he did look behind the door, to see
if anyone was hiding there. But there was nothing there.
He shut the door with a bang, to show that he was not afraid.With his one candle he went slowly up the stairs. It
was impossible to see into all the dark corners. Darkness was cheap, and Scrooge liked it. But he remembered the face, so he walked through all his rooms,checking that everything was all right. Nobody under the table or the bed, nobody behind the door! On the small fire in the bedroom there was a pot of soup, and Scrooge’s bowl was ready on the table. Nobody in any of the rooms!
Sure that he was safe now, Scrooge shut and locked his bedroom door behind him. He sat down by the fire to eat his soup.
The fireplace was an old one, with hundreds of pictures on the tiles around
the fire. But Scrooge could only see Marley’s face on every tile.
‘Humbug!’ said Scrooge to the tiles, and walked across the room. When he sat down
again, he noticed a bell on the other side of the room. As he looked, he saw, with great surprise and fear, that the bellwas slowly beginning to move from side to side. Soon it was ringing loudly, and so was every bell in the house.