Mr. Darcy's Christmas Carol Read Online Free PDF

He was pacing up and down the room in anticipation.
    The door opened; the master said in a somewhat chilly voice, “Mr. Darcy, you have a caller, a female caller. As you know this is frowned upon, Mr. Darcy. However, in this case, I am prepared to make an exception for an exceptional young lady.”
    A little girl, much younger than Darcy, came darting in, and putting her arms about his neck and often kissing him, addressed him as her “Dear, dear brother.”
    â€œI have come to bring you home, dear brother!” said the child, clapping her tiny hands and bending down to laugh. “To bring you home, home, home!”
    â€œHome, little Georgie?” returned the boy.
    â€œYes!” said the child, brimful of glee. “Father is awaiting you in the coach. I asked him if we might come and fetch you home, for the holiday will be much longer if we do not have to wait days and days for you to arrive. Papa said ‘Yes, we should,’ and sent me in here to bring you. And you’re to go Cambridge,” said the child, opening her eyes. “And are never to come back here; but first, we’re to be together all the Christmas long and have the merriest time in all the world.”
    â€œYou are quite a magpie, little Georgie!” exclaimed the boy.
    She clapped her hands and laughed, and tried to touch his head, but being too little, laughed again and stood on tiptoe to embrace him. Then she began to drag him, in her childish eagerness, towards the door; and he, nothing loathe to go, accompanied her.
    A voice in the hall cried, “Bring down Master Darcy’s box, there!” and in the hall appeared the schoolmaster himself, who smiled on Master Darcy and shook hands with him. He then conveyed Darcy and his sister into his parlor. Here he produced a pot of tea and a block of curiously heavy cake, and administered installments of those dainties to the young people while at the same time sending out a meager servant to offer a glass of something to Mr. Darcy, who answered that he thanked the gentleman, but if it was the same wine as he had tasted before, he had rather not. Master Darcy’s trunk being by this time tied on to the top of the chaise, the children bade the schoolmaster good-bye right willingly and, getting into it, drove gaily down the garden-sweep, the quick wheels dashing the hoarfrost and snow from off the dark leaves of the evergreens like spray.
    â€œAlways a beautiful creature,” said the Ghost. “And she has a large heart!”
    â€œSo she has,” returned Darcy. “You are right. I will not gainsay it, Spirit. God forbid!”
    â€œShe is now a woman,” said the Ghost, “and will have, I think, many suitors.”
    â€œShe has had one suitor already,” Darcy returned bitterly, “but he only cared for her money. He never cared for Georgiana.”
    â€œTrue,” said the Ghost. “Young George Wickham never cared about anyone save himself.”
    Darcy seemed uneasy in his mind that the Spirit should know so much about his personal business and answered briefly, “Yes.”
    Although Darcy and the Spirit had but that moment left Eton behind them, they now were in the thoroughfares of Cambridge, where shadowy strangers passed; where shadowy carts and coaches tumbled along the way, and all the other tumults of a city. It was made plain enough, by the dressing of the shops, that here too it was Christmas time again; but it was evening and the streets were lighted up.
    The Ghost stopped at a certain pub door and asked Darcy if he knew it.
    â€œKnow it?” Darcy was incredulous. “Why, I spent many nights here while at Cambridge! It is the Fuzzy Whig!”
    They went in. An old gentleman in a Welch wig was standing behind the bar. If he had been two inches shorter, he could not have seen over the top of the bar.
    Darcy cried in great excitement. “It is Old Peterson alive again! Many hours we spent in the