from The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
 
The entrance door was a huge one made of massive, curiously shaped panels of oak studded with big iron nails and bound with great iron bars. It opened into an enormous hall, which was so dimly lighted that the faces in the portraits on the walls and the figures in the suits of armour made Mary feel that she did not want to look at them. As she stood on the stone floor she looked a very small, odd little black figure, and she felt as small and lost and odd as she looked.

A neat, thin old man stood near the manservant who opened the door for them.

'You are to take her to her room,' he said in a husky voice.' He doesn't want to see her. He's going to London in the morning.'

'Very well, Mr Pitcher,' Mrs Medlock answered. 'So long as know what's expected of me, I can manage.'

'What's expected of you, Mrs Medlock,' Mr Pitcher said, 'is that you make sure that he's not disturbed and that he doesn't see what he doesn't want to see.'

And then Mary Lennox was led up a broad staircase and down a long corridor and up a short flight of steps and through another corridor and another, until a door opened in a wall and she found herself in a room with a fire in it and a supper on a table.

Mrs Medlock said unceremoniously:
'Well, here you are! This room and the next are where you'll live - and you must keep to them. Don't you forget that!'

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Q1 AF5
Explain two ways in which paragraph one creates an atmosphere of threatening suspense. Quote a phrase and comment on its effect.

Q2 AF6
How does the writer try to make the reader empathise with Mary in this account?

Fill in the boxes:

The way Mary is described in the first paragraph.
The dialogue in paragraphs 3-5.
The long sentence in paragraph 6.

Q3 AF2
What is the significance of the word 'unceremoniously' in paragraph 7?

Q4 AF4
Identify three features which make this a good opening to a novel.

Q5 AF3
What does the writer suggest here about the household Mary is joining? Identify and explain one key idea.