A room made ready
An original fiction passage set in the nineteenth century.
Before the guest arrived, Agnes shook out the curtains, laid fresh linen on the bed and carried a jug of water upstairs. She placed a book beside the lamp because her cousin liked to read before sleeping. Then she noticed the loose window catch. She wedged a folded card beneath it so the frame would not rattle in the wind. At the sound of wheels, she hurried downstairs.
Give two preparations Agnes makes for her cousin’s visit.
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.