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question 71
TEST ECCE 01
Reading Pssage 1A
I believe I could still take that walk with my eyes closed. First of all I used to go up the extension of Avonmore Road, past two lamp-posts, thinking that the newer odd numbers looked more interesting houses than the stiff line of even numbers where we lived. However, none of the odd numbers was anything like as interesting as the house of Hope-Pinker, who was an artist in stone, and if the door to his workroom was open
I would be able to catch sight of that great marble lion. Then came a quick look at the sorting-office, always a scene of great activity, it seemed, with postmen hurrying in and emptying bags of letters and with rows of clerks stamping those letters with postmarks. By the sorting-office, Avonmore Road made a sudden right-angled turn past a broken-down tarred fence. Through gaps in this fence could be seen a large shadowy garden, covered with pale green under trees with trunks as black as coal. Beyond the garden was a large decayed house with big bare windows showing here and there among the creeper which covered it.
After this Avonmore Road continued on the right in the same direction as the extension. The houses were smaller now, and the bricks of which they were built were a deeper red than those of 54 Avonmore Road and its neighbours, They had no rooms below ground level and one could see into their dining-rooms, so close were they to the pavement. Opposite were the odd number houses, also without rooms below ground level.
After 2 Avonmore Road there was a narrow stretch of waste ground in which was a tall advertisement-board, the pictures on which were sometimes of great interest. On the other side of the road was the back of a large council school. Beyond the school were Avonmore Mansions, seeming tall and splendid with their yellowish bricks. I knew that these were fiats and I had heard them spoken of in our kitchen as an up-to-date but unnatural way of living. However, I thought that the doorkeeper, sitting on a chair in the entrance hall, must be a great protection against thieves; I used to wish that we lived in the safety of a fiat.
Then, to the right, there came about half a dozen shops, one of them a tobacconist's, one a second hand bookshop, one an ice-cream shop with a barber's at the back, and one an umbrella shop which showed in the window a row of thick heavy sticks called Night Companions. They were priced at a shilling each. I longed for one of these Night Companions to sleep beside me, and to my joy one afternoon Nanny, having stayed out longer than usual on her walk, arrived with two of these Night Companions, one of which she presented to me and the other to my brother Frank, who was not yet four years old. Frank's Night Companion looked much fiercer than mine its club-head was more knotted and it was stained a darker shade than the stem. My Night Companion looked mild and clean-shaven beside it. When Nanny bought the sticks I was stupid enough to show my preference for the fiercer-looking one, and that of course ruined my chances of being given it as my protector.
Now please click on the correct answer A, B, C or D.
As he went past Hope-Pinker's house he liked to try to look at.... .
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