“Do you desire to perform your part toward making the morrow bright for some one who otherwise would find it all clouds? Do you wish to plant seeds of love and mercy and tenderness in some heart that has heretofore borne only thistles? To bring a smile to some weary face, warmth to shivering limbs, light and hope to dreary lives?”
“I do! I do!” exclaimed the rich man, eagerly starting up from his chair.
“And are you ready to sacrifice your ease and comfort, this stormy night, for such as they?”
Mr. Broadstreet seized his fur cap and ulster from the rack in the hall. “Try me!” he cried. “I’m ready for anything!”
The Ghost smiled pleasantly upon him, at the same time seeming to lift its hand involuntarily, as in blessing. Then it spoke for the last time.
“Hitherto you have known only the bright side of Christmas,” it said gently. “It has been full of joy to you and yours. But there are those among your fellow creatures, nay, among your very neighbors, who dwell in such continued misery that when Christmas comes it but reminds them of their unhappy state, and by its excess of light upon others deepens the gloom about themselves. This is the Shadow of Christmas Present, and it falls heavily upon many a heart and many a household, where the day, with its good cheer and blessed associations, should bring naught but delight.” The kind Spirit’s voice wavered slightly. “I, myself, can do but little to dispel this shadow. It grieves me sorely, year by year, but it remains, and I fear I sometimes but make it worse, with my bluff ways and keen winter breezes. It is for those who love me most to carry such light and comfort to those upon whom it rests, that it shall be banished never to return. The shadow grows less year by year, but it is still broad, broad.”
The Ghost was silent a moment. It beckoned to the other, and motioned to him to step behind it. “In my Shadow you shall move to-night,” it concluded, in a firmer voice. “It shall accompany you wherever you go, and your work shall be to turn it away, with whatever kind deeds your hand shall find to do, or cheering words you may have the power to speak.”
It said no more. Mr. Broadstreet, who, when a child, had often longed to peep behind a picture, found himself actually fulfilling his wish. As he drew nearer the printed page, he heard a dull roar, like surf beating upon a rocky coast. He advanced further, picking his way around the pile of poultry and vegetables and glistening holly upon which the Ghost sat enthroned. A moment more and the room vanished in utter blackness of night, the roar grew grander and deeper, until it throbbed in his ears like the diapason of a mighty organ, a fierce blast of snow-laden wind struck his bewildered face, the street-lamp upon the corner flickered feebly in a mist of flakes—he was standing before his own door, knee-deep in a snow-drift, and buffeted above, below, and on every side by the storm that was abroad that Christmas Eve.