The cellar steps
An original fiction passage set in the nineteenth century.
The noise came again: three taps beneath the kitchen floor. Margaret laid down the knife. The servants had left an hour earlier, and the cellar should have been empty. She called her brother’s name, though she knew he was still at the market. No answer followed. The familiar kitchen objects seemed to wait with her.
She opened the cellar door. The air smelled of damp stone and apples. On the third step, she heard something move below. She held the lamp out before her, its light shaking across the wall. A basket rolled into view. Then a cat emerged behind it, dragging a length of cord. Margaret laughed, but she kept one hand against the doorframe until the animal had climbed past her.
Analyse how the writer uses language and structure to build suspense as Margaret investigates a noise. Support your answer with references to the passage.
120 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.