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A Midsummers' Carol - Part Seven
by Clint Driftwood

Read the story from the beginning

This Dickens parody was the winner in the prose section of our Summer Parodies competition, and was originally contributed to the Fantasy Archers topic on The Archers .

The Ghost led Aldridge through a small dim entry at the side of the house; they emerged into a back alley. The ghost pointed to a weatherworn gate hanging ajar from one rusty hinge and led him through it. They were in a tiny back yard. In one corner, a dark cloud of angry bluebottles swarmed over a galvanised dustbin. An old woman and two young children sat on old canvas deckchairs in the middle of the yard; they were watching intently, smoke rising from a small disposable barbecue.

"Oh, Gran," said the girl, "When is mum going to be home with the food?"
"Yes, Gran when?" repeated the boy.
"As soon as she is done at the hospital with our Christopher and she has called in the village shop." answered the old woman.
Aldridge with a look of confusion on his face looked up at the Ghost and enquired, "But Spirit, I do not know these people. What have they to do with me?"
"Look!" said the Ghost and pointed at the gate, and Aldridge did so. He saw a woman pushing a young boy in a wheelchair.
"Mum! Mum!" the two childrenÂ’s voices rang out in unison, as they ran to greet her.

"Spirit!" Aldridge cried out in amazement, "ThatÂ’s my secretary, Susan Carter!"
"Now our Emma and Roy let me get in the yard will you? Here Roy push our Christopher for me, thereÂ’s a good lad." said his mother.
"HowÂ’s our Christopher then Susan?" whispered the old woman when she saw that the children were out of hearing.
"Still the same mum, he was as good as gold he was when they examined him, but the doctors say he needs to go to America for treatment."

"Mum! Mum! Food, whereÂ’s the food for the barbecue?" shouted the children.
"Look what I have here," said their mother, producing from her plastic carrier bag a packet of sausages, like a magician pulling a rather skinny rabbit from a well used top hat.
"Now our Emma and Roy do you know what these are?" she held them aloft like a trophy, while the children jumped joyfully around her trying to grab them.
"They are sausages mum." said Roy.
"Yes Roy," said his mother, "But these are special sausages, these are ‘Tom Archer Organic Sausages.’ Betty at the village shop let me have them at cost because they are passed their sell by date. We will barbecue them and then will imagine that instead of this yard, we are on a vast lawn and we will have a midsummer’s day party, just as good as any one any of the Archers are having."
"Come," said the Ghost, "Touch my robe, there is more that you must see before this night is over."
"But what of Christopher, what is his aliment?" asked Aldridge.
"I cannot say," replied the Ghost, "I only see what is now; my brothers and sisters see what has been and what is yet to pass. Now touch my robe, my time is short."

As Aldridge touched the SpiritÂ’s robe the little back yard seemed to change to a grey swirling fog, then it changed again from grey to green and his vision cleared. They stood on a closely mown lawn in the centre of a large well-kept garden. They were in the midst of a party. A barbecue, tended by a young man wearing an apron and white chefÂ’s hat, smouldered on the patio. Around the garden people were eating, drinking, laughing, and talking. Music came from a pair of hi-fi speakers that were positioned each side of open French windows that led onto the patio.

A group of six, three men and three women, sat around a white cast-iron table in the shade of a brightly coloured parasol. One of the men shouted over to the young man at the barbecue, "Hey there, Adam, your Uncle Aldridge mate, what time is he getting here then?"
Everyone around the table chuckled.
"HeÂ’s been invited David, itÂ’s up to him." Adam replied.
"I donÂ’t know why you bother Adam; you know he wonÂ’t come, though it would not be a party if he did turn up, the old miser!" said David.
"I promised my mother to look out for him, and anyway heÂ’s not that bad when you get to know him." said Adam.

"Good boy," said Aldridge, "You tell him Adam."

"You ask his secretary," said one of the women, "She knows him, I donÂ’t know why she puts up with him, and heaven knows She has been through enough. Her first husband what was his name? Oh yes Tucker, he was killed while she was pregnant with her Roy, then she gets married again and he gets killed on a shoot. And her youngest, Christopher, poor little thing, sheÂ’s at her wits' end with his illness. She has three children to clothe and feed, two husbands in the churchyard, and Aldridge to work for on top of it all."
"Anyway I can do without that tight old beggar turning up here and putting a downer on the party," said David, adding sarcastically "HeÂ’s that tight he wouldnÂ’t give a door a slam!"
"Well he canÂ’t be that bad, my mother loved him." Adam explained.
"Maybe she did mate, then," said David, "But as sure as eggs are eggs she wouldnÂ’t love him now!"
"Yes! The mean old lecher! I canÂ’t look at him without cringing." added the woman, "If he came here I would give him a piece of my mind I can tell you."

Aldridge looked at the Ghost, "Take me from here Spirit, I have seen enough", he begged.
The garden became a green swirling thing, and then changed to nothingness.

Read Part Eight

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