Scrooge is a cynical old man whose greatest concern is money. On Christmas Eve, he is visited by the ghost of Jacob Marley, his former business partner, who arranges for Scrooge to be visited by three spirits. Begins with a sequence set in 1857, the site of a live reading by the renowned Dickens. As he begins his story a woman screams because she has seen a mouse and Dickens points out that his story begins with a mouse. Dickens explains that the mouse, named Gabriel, carries a glimmer of hope amidst the glaring co-existence of rich and poor in the streets of London.