Scrooge Returns Home

Scrooge takes his melancholy dinner in his usual melancholy tavern, reads the newspapers, and beguiles the rest of the evening with his banker's book before going home to his chambers. These chambers once belonged to his deceased partner, Jacob Marley, and are a gloomy suite of rooms in a dark, dreary yard. The fog and frost hang about the black old gateway. This setting establishes the atmosphere of isolation and foreboding that precedes the supernatural visitation.