A MacCallister Christmas by William W. Johnstone

Author:William W. Johnstone [Johnstone, William W.; Johnsto]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pinnacle Books
Published: 2020-08-20T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 21

“I was wonderin’, Mr. Scrooge, if ’twould be possible for me to have Christmas Day free from work,” Duff said. His eyes kept cutting down to the words printed on the paper he held in his hand. The cast had just started rehearsals, and he was a long way from having his lines memorized. Just being able to remember so much seemed like a daunting task.

“No work on Christmas Day?” Andrew rasped. No one was in costume yet, of course, but he had adopted a stooped posture for his role as Ebenezer Scrooge. “Bah! What is this world coming to?”

“’Tis just tha’ I’d like t’ be home wi’ me family, ye ken, sir.”

When they had started rehearsing earlier this morning, Andrew had tried to get Duff to speak without such a thick Scottish accent. Duff’s burr wasn’t as strong as it had been when he had come to America, of course, but it was still easy to tell where he came from. As Andrew had explained, “Scrooge and Bob are Englishmen, you see.”

Duff’s eyes had narrowed. “So ’tis wantin’ me to talk like an Englisher, ye are.”

Andrew had frowned and said, “And being a good Highlander, you’re not that fond of the English, are you?”

“Ye could say that.”

“But talking like them doesn’t really mean anything. It’s just acting, like Rosanna said.”

Duff’s glower had made it plain how he felt about that.

In the end, Andrew had said, “I don’t see why I can’t add a line about Bob Cratchit immigrating to London from, say, Glasgow. It doesn’t really change anything in the plot, and it will explain your accent.”

Fiona had spoken up then, saying, “’Twill explain why he has a good Scottish wife, too.”

“Yes, I, uh, suppose so.”

Only a day had passed since Andrew had told Duff about the idea of putting on a production of A Christmas Carol. Andrew, full of energy now that he had a new project, had bustled around town and done a good job of recruiting a cast and crew.

Biff Johnson, true to type, would be playing an innkeeper. R.W. Guthrie had agreed to take on the role of the Ghost of Christmas Past. As a politician and the former mayor of Chugwater, he was accustomed to speaking in public. Rosanna would be the woman Scrooge had loved and lost in that bittersweet past. The burly deputy Thurman Burns, showing an unexpected desire to be a thespian, had volunteered for the role of the Ghost of Christmas Present and read selected lines well enough in an audition for Andrew to award him the role.

That left Bob Cratchit’s wife, their child Tiny Tim, and the Ghost of Christmas Future as the main roles to fill. As Fiona had pointed out, Andrew and Rosanna had agreed that she could play Mrs. Cratchit, and they didn’t want to go back on their word. Fiona had been the first actual member of the cast.

And since Duff had shaken hands on it, he couldn’t go back on his agreement to play Bob Cratchit, either.

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