'The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain' (1848) by Charles Dickens

'The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain: A Fancy for Christmas-Time' is a novella by Charles Dickens first published in 1848. It is the fifth and last of Dickens's Christmas novellas.

It comprises three short stories :

1. The Gift Bestowed.
Redlaw is a teacher of chemistry who often broods over wrongs done him and grief from his past. He is haunted by a spirit, that can allow him to "forget the sorrow, wrong, and trouble you have known...to cancel their remembrance..."

2. The Gift Diffused.
The Tetterby's live in their shop, which has been all manner of unsuccessful businesses in the past. They have many children and are quite poor. Mrs. Tetterby comes home from marketing and confesses her deep shame that she fantasized about never having married Mister Tetterby when she saw all the things she could not afford. Its is about how transformed people are when they forget the pain in their lives.

3. The Gift Reversed.
Redlaw is disgusted with all the misery he has caused by making people forget. He begs the Ghost to remove the gift from everyone he has infected, even if it means that Redlaw will remain forgetful. The Ghost explains that the barefooted child is the embodiment of Redlaw's curse of forgetfulness. When mankind cannot remember its sorrows, it becomes insensate and feral. The child is an example of what indifference reaps.