Summary: "He blinked, twice, but the unwelcome vision of the past refused to disappear." A Christmas Carol one-shot, set a few years after the events of the book. Should fit with any version you might know, be it the book or the Muppets…

Disclaimer: I own nought but the idea, which I thought up on Saturday and wrote during the week in a mad rush when I should have really been writing my epic masterpiece 'Courage and Insubordination'. This is what comes when you've religiously read 'A Christmas Carol' every year for the past five years, and you miss a year because the book is in another country…

The Second Refrain

Scrooge stamped the snow from his boots outside the counting house, pausing for breath after each foot. He was finding that he had to pause for breath a lot more often of late, and he put this undeniable fact down to the unpleasant mixture of rapidly approaching old age and rapidly worsening weather. Every year the snowfall seemed heavier, and every week the wind blew colder, chilling him to the bone. At least there was always a warm fire waiting for him in the counting house when he had finished his business in the city and battled with the crowded and bustling streets. Scrooge wondered why people did not prepare things in advance. Then there would be no such mad rushes on Christmas Eve. He had always been a man of fastidious preciseness, but as his years had advanced, so Scrooge had come to rely on order and fear chaos even more.

Just then, chaos decided to make itself very present in his life once more when a snowball splattered against the dark wood of the door next to him, missing his hat by an inch-and-a-half. The suddenness startled him, and he felt his heart give an unusual skip as he turned to glare at the culprit who had nearly hit him.

"Sorry Uncle Scrooge, sir."

Scrooge's expression softened slightly at the apology from the boy whom he considered to be a second nephew, but he still determined that it would be safer for him to ensconce himself on the other side of the door, watching the riotous fun of the snowball fight continue as he hung up his coat and hat. Tim – he could no longer really be called Tiny having reached a height comparable to his father's – had grown into a strong and healthy young man, a process that Scrooge had thoroughly enjoyed being witness to over the past few years. Soon he would be going into an apprenticeship, ready to become a man of business, and Scrooge would be sad not to see him as often as he did now, playing outside the counting house as he waited for his father to finish work.

Scrooge sighed, a sound of contentment and tiredness. He was tempted to give Cratchit the rest of the day off and go home early to cocoa and blessed sleep, but Bob's voice in his ear fast put paid to this idea.

"There is a lady here who wishes to speak with you Mr Scrooge, a Mrs Cartwright, on a matter of 'some importance'."

"Did she give any indication as to the importance?" Scrooge asked Cratchit as he moved into the counting house proper from the doorway.

"No sir."

Scrooge went through his list of clients mentally; he could not recall any Cartwrights amongst them.

"Good afternoon Mrs Cartwright. How may I be of assistance? I don't believe that you are established on our books at present," he said as he approached the woman sitting at his desk, her black-clad back to him.

"Oh no Mr Scrooge, I am here on personal business, not financial. May we speak privately?"

She had stood and turned at this point, and Scrooge was frozen in a way wholly unrelated to the temperature. The woman was such a likeness to the love that he had walked away from so many years before that it took him a few moments to recover his senses. He blinked, twice, but the unwelcome vision of the past refused to disappear. He nodded, calling to his clerk.

"Cratchit."

"Yes Mr Scrooge?" Bob peered out from behind the frame that led to his small room.

"It's Christmas Eve, Cratchit, and I believe your son is having far too much fun waiting for you." He smiled, an action that still managed to leave Bob rather surprised even after all this time.

"Ah, right sir. Merry Christmas Mr Scrooge, Madame."

"Merry Christmas, Mr Cratchit."

Scrooge waited until Bob was walking away down the street from the counting house before turning to Mrs Cartwright once more. She was not Belle, Scrooge knew this. He had, after seeing her again with the Ghost of Christmas Past, made an effort to locate her, only to discover that Belle was dead, as dead as Marley. But Marley had not seemed quite so dead that night… Scrooge had thought that his dealings with the spirit world were well and truly over, but perhaps this was not the case.

"Mr Scrooge," said Mrs Cartwright presently, "my maiden name was Clarke, Elizabeth Clarke. I believe you knew my mother, Belle."

Scrooge nodded, his unease both intensified and quelled. On the one hand he knew that the woman he saw before him now was most definitely of living flesh and bone and not miasma. On the other hand, he was intrigued and unnerved by what had brought her to his counting house at this time.

"I am not sure whether you are aware, Mr Scrooge, but my mother has been dead these past ten years. Despite this, it is only recently that I have discovered some of her possessions. Amongst them were some letters, addressed to you but never sent."

Mrs Cartwright drew a bundle of letters from her coat pocket. They were all written in Belle's neat script, still familiar to him after all these years. To Mr Ebenezer Scrooge Esq. They were all unopened. Impulsively, Scrooge seized the letter opener on his desk and sliced through the seal of the topmost as he sat down, wondering what could be held inside.

My dear Ebenezer.

Perhaps this will be the letter that I am brave enough to send, but I doubt it. My courage is such a feeble thing.

I wish you could see little Lizzie now; she patters about quite happily without me holding her hands. It is such a joy to watch, but it brings me such sadness because every time I look in her eyes I can see you…

Scrooge stopped reading, feeling the blood drain from his face. He looked up at Mrs Cartwright, who was wearing a nervous expression.

"I felt it right to give the letters to their proper intended recipient," she explained. "But also, Mr Scrooge, there is a more selfish reason. I believe you are my father."

Scrooge nodded, but his mind was no longer in the room with them. It was miles away, back in the past, but he could remember it as if it was yesterday. It had all started with a kiss, a kiss in the middle of an argument. Desperate to prove, however wrongly, that he did indeed still love her, and that his money did not come first, he had grabbed Belle around the waist and pressed his lips against hers, but his usual manner was swept away in the heat of the moment and he had been far more passionate than he had truly intended, meaning that the action did not have the desired effect.

"Well why don't we," Belle had snarled as she broke away, anger and lust and love battling for dominance in her eyes. "Why not live in sin, since you seem determined not to marry me any time soon?"

Scrooge, exasperated and out of arguments, his head in complete disarray, had let primal instinct overtake him.

"Why not?"

And so they had, a night of angry, bitter passion that did nothing to repair the wounded pride that the evening's dispute had engendered. The next day had been Christmas Eve, and in the cold and sober light of day, they had made their choices, said their goodbyes and politely ignored what had happened the night before. Ebenezer had not seen her again, not until the Ghost had forcibly reminded him.

He slowly came back to the present and looked at Mrs Cartwright hard, trying to find the traces of himself in her features.

"How did you…" he began, but he was not quite sure how to continue the sentence. He was not altogether certain of what he was asking in the first place.

"My mother informed me at a fairly young age that the man I had always thought of as my father was not actually so. It made no difference to me – he was and always will be my papa. But I knew that it made her sad sometimes; I knew that I was a constant reminder that she had once loved another." Mrs Cartwright paused. "I only received my first impression of your identity much later. Mother was feverish before she died; the doctors said that she was hallucinating. She repeated your name over and over: Ebenezer, Ebenezer." The young woman's eyes were sad and distant, remembering the incidents as if they were unfolding in front of her once more. Gradually she seemed to become aware of her surroundings and she composed herself once more. "When I found the letters I had no doubt that you were the one."

Scrooge nodded dumbly, looking down at the papers in his hands.

"She never told me," he muttered to himself. She had wanted to, evidently, but her courage had failed her every time. Had he really been so cold towards her at the end of their time together that she was afraid of his reaction should she inform him of the existence of their daughter? Scrooge wondered: how exactly would he have reacted? He couldn't tell; he couldn't remember, but he knew that the letters would be of little use now. They described a past long forgotten, and Scrooge knew that at his time of life, when there was so little of the present left to enjoy, that living in the past was a dangerous thing. He pressed the wad of envelopes back into his daughter's hands.

"You keep them," he said. "I am sure that you will learn more from them than an old fool like I am can."

"Are you certain?" asked Mrs Cartwright warily.

"I am certain. But please, do not judge me too harshly on what you find within them. I was not always the man that I am now. Your mother and I… We parted for a reason."

The young woman nodded.

"She always thought of you, even at the end. A lot of what she said was incomprehensible, hard to hear, but she spoke of wanting a second chance."

Belle had wanted a second chance? Scrooge could not believe it; such things were more than he deserved. It should be he who was begging for a second chance, something that he had done within his heart many a time since that fateful Christmas Eve, but something that he had never spoken about, keeping it locked away in the bowels of his mind, stubbornly refusing to let such weakness show to the world.

"I should leave you in peace," she continued. "I just had to meet the man who had such an impact on Mother's life. And I am very glad that I did. After all, Christmas is a time for family." She glanced at the clock on the mantel. "And mine is probably worried about me."

Mrs Cartwright rose to leave, placing a small address card on Scrooge's desk.

"You will always be welcome in our family, Mr Scrooge, especially at this time of year. I would very much like for you to meet your grandchildren."

Scrooge finally regained his tongue, which had deserted him for the past few minutes.

"I would very much like to meet them too."

Mrs Cartwright smiled.

"A very merry Christmas to you, Mr Scrooge."

"And to you, Mrs Cartwright."

Mrs Cartwright. Elizabeth. His daughter.

Scrooge remained seated at his desk for a long, long time before he locked up the counting house for the holidays.

XXX

That night, Scrooge dreamed. He dreamed of a familiar bench in a familiar snow, and a familiar figure sitting on it.

"Ah, Belle. As lovely as when I left you. You had a good life. A happy life."

She took his arm and pulled him down onto the seat beside her.

"So did you."

"Hardly."

"You did in the end. There is always redemption, Ebenezer." She paused, regarding him with a soft and shy smile. "You met our Lizzie."

Scrooge nodded.

"I don't know why she always reminded you of me. She's the spitting image of you, Belle!"

The woman who should have been his wife laughed.

"You are a short-sighted old man, Ebenezer, and love has blinded you."

"I daresay it has."

They stayed in a companionable silence, sitting on the bench. The air was warm and pleasant despite the snow. Finally Scrooge gave voice to the thought that had been running through his mind for the past few hours, ever since Elizabeth had left the counting house.

"What did you do? How did you cope, an unmarried woman with child?"

Belle's smile faded slightly, and she shrugged her shoulders.

"I lied," she said simply. "I left London and travelled North, to where my family had originally come from. I told everyone I was a widow. Then I met Richard, and he made everything alright. We returned to London when Lizzie was a few years old." She gave Scrooge a stern look. "I loved Richard, Ebenezer. I still love him, dearly. We were wonderfully happy together. But even without Lizzie, I would never have forgotten you, never truly forgotten you. There has always been a place for you in my heart."

Scrooge wanted to echo the sentiments, but he did not know how to do so without sounding insincere. Thankfully, Belle seemed to know what he was thinking, and she gave him a forgiving smile before looking down along the road.

"You walked away from me down that path," she said, standing up and staring down into the white horizon. "I am intrigued to hear your account of what you found at the end of it. Come, Ebenezer. Tell me about your life, and I will tell you about mine. It has, after all, been a long time since we've seen each other."

Scrooge needed no further encouragement, and he stood, linking his arm through hers and walking with her in the direction that he had once taken, all those many years before…

XXX

When Fred Bowley called at his uncle's house in the wake of his non-appearance at Christmas dinner, he found Scrooge still lying in bed, as cold and stiff as stone, but with a warm, genuine and peaceful smile on his face.

Note: Well, I think we've just proved two things. Firstly, I have no respect for the accepted norms of early Victorian society because it is highly doubtful that Belle and Scrooge would have got together in that way before marriage, no matter how much they shouted at each other. Secondly, I do not care about the first point because I am a hopeless romantic.

It's not exactly Dickens-quality, but I had the idea and I was in the mood for writing a fluffy, if completely unbelievable, Christmas tale.

Note2: Ok, I'll be serious now. I wish you all a peaceful and prosperous New Year and I hope you enjoyed this Christmas gift.