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Naturally, that was a ruse
meant to take advantage of Scrooge and in time to come,
Marley would continue to take advantage, even after Scrooge
became his business partner. Marley had always known that
he, himself, had no head for numbers; Scrooge had no
patience for deals. Theirs would be a mutually beneficial
partnership, emphasis on Marley: he’d been shamelessly
siphoning money from the business for years, through a
series of false corporations with fake names in empty
offices in his cavernous house, and Scrooge was none the
wiser.
But there was one little
wrinkle.
The lovely Belle Fairchild
had practically thrown herself at Scrooge until the dimwit
finally noticed her presence. Scrooge wanted now to marry
Belle, but her father forbade it as long as Scrooge & Marley
were involved in the soon-to-be-illegal slave trade. For
this reason, Scrooge wanted to divest the business of the
whole endeavor.
Though Marley was courting
Scrooge’s sister, Fan, he put her aside to concentrate on
maintaining the lucrative but illicit slaving operation, in
a way that Ebeneezer wouldn’t notice. He might lose Fan. He
might lose his soul, but there was no way Jacob
Marley was losing any money…
Reading Marley is
like dancing with an octopus wearing stilettos: you’re going
to get kicked by many somethings sharp, and it’s probably
going to be the wit inside this book.
Author Jon Clinch’s Marley
is one of the worst, most irredeemable, most deliciously
despicable characters in literature, having a
near-pathological quest for self-benefit and an evil
indifference to any suffering he may cause. Marley destroys
with unapologetic impunity as Clinch narrates his actions
with the keenest of sarcasm, in a way that lets readers know
that feeling disgust toward Marley is perfectly fine. This –
both story and tone – help to fill in the holes in the
classic novel, and it may change your perceptions of any of
its versions this year: you’ll know why Scrooge was wistful
with the Ghost of Christmas Past, what the Ghost of
Christmas Present knew, and the terror of the Ghost of
Christmas Future.
This is a
curl-up-by-the-fire kind of book but it’s not a happy
Holiday one. Instead, it’s razor-like and scheming and
wonderful. Start Marley, in fact, and you’ll have a
Dickens of a time putting it down. |
