When Scrooge awoke it was so dark that he could hardly make out where the walls ended and the window began. He was just trying to discern which way was up when he heard the chimes of Marley’s old clock downstairs begin to ring and listened to learn the hour.

To his astonishment, the chimes continued to intone, six, seven, eight, all the way to twelve. Yet, how could this be when it was past two when he had gone to bed? Was it possible he had slept through an entire day and it was now the following night? He glanced at the red glow of the alarm clock and verified it was midnight.

He lay in bed puzzling yet could make nothing of it and decided to think on it no more, for he had more pressing matters to dwell upon. Only an hour until the promised visit of the first spirit! He vowed to stay awake until the hour had passed, desperate to convince himself that it was all but a dream. He watched the clock as the minutes slipped by. A quarter past! A half passed! A quarter to it! He watched in anticipation as the hour crept closer and watched the digits flip.

“The hour itself,” said Scrooge triumphantly, “and nothing else!”

He spoke before the hour chime from the old clock below, which now sounded with a deep, hollow, melancholy ONE. Light flashed upon the room in an instant and Scrooge found himself face to face with an unearthly visitor.