At the pawnbroker’s counter
An original fiction passage set in the nineteenth century.
Caleb placed the silver watch on the counter and said that his uncle had sent him to sell it. Mr Baines did not reach for his money box. Instead, he turned the watch over and read the initials engraved on its case.
‘What do these letters stand for?’ he asked.
‘My uncle’s names, I suppose,’ Caleb replied, rubbing an ink stain on his thumb.
Mr Baines opened the watch and pointed to the maker’s name inside. ‘And who made it?’
Caleb glanced towards the door. ‘It has always been difficult to open, so I have never seen that.’
Mr Baines closed his ledger without writing in it and pushed the watch back across the counter.
Give one action by Mr Baines before Caleb’s first reply and one action after Caleb’s second reply that suggest he doubts Caleb’s account of the watch.
456 exam-style questions on Edexcel GCSE English Language 1.3 Content: prose fiction study requirements, covering 1.3.1 Read challenging prose fiction for the unseen 19th-century extract. Each one has a worked solution and a mark scheme showing where the marks go.