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This test consists of 15 multiple choice questions and 5 short answer questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What happens after Byron approaches Brown near the railroad tracks?
(a) Brown agrees to return to town and marry Lena.
(b) The two men struggle and Brown leaps onto a passing train.
(c) Byron pays Brown to leave town.
(d) The two men struggle and Byron falls onto the train tracks.

2. Of what does Hightower accuse Byron of doing?
(a) Selling out Christmas to help his pregnant girlfriend's lover get the thousand-dollar reward
(b) Initiating an inappropriate relationship with the pregnant Lena
(c) Running bootleg whiskey with Christmas
(d) Hiding the whereabouts of Lena's former lover

3. Of what does Hightower think his mother died?
(a) Malnutrition
(b) Diabetes
(c) Cancer
(d) Heart trouble

4. What does Christmas trade a black woman for when he is on the run?
(a) food
(b) a Bible
(c) shoes
(d) money

5. What does the old woman instinctively know about Christmas without even seeing him?
(a) That he is not capable of murder
(b) That he is their grandson
(c) That he is a murderer
(d) That he will be hanged for his crime

6. The sheriff has his men beat a Negro so that he will them what?
(a) That Miss Burden had a lot of enemies
(b) That no one would ever hurt Miss Burden
(c) That Miss Burden was crazy
(d) That Christmas and Brown lived in the cabin

7. Why does Lena move into the cabin?
(a) She is tired and needs a place to rest.
(b) She does not want to return home.
(c) Her baby is due soon and she wants to give her child a home.
(d) She thinks it is Lucas Burch's house.

8. How does the fading afternoon light seem to Hightower?
(a) audible
(b) sad
(c) rosy
(d) sentimental

9. What does the old man holler out while waiting on the train to Jefferson?
(a) Hell won't have this mess!
(b) Hellfire and brimstone!
(c) Bitchery and abomination!
(d) Saints be praised!

10. What favor does Byron ask of Hightower?
(a) To consider practicing as a minister once again
(b) To bring his medical book to the cabin and deliver Lena's baby
(c) To talk to Christmas about the murder of Miss Burden
(d) To lend him enough money to leave town

11. The baby's first cry also has a strong emotional release for Byron. Why?
(a) Byron's former wife had died during childbirth.
(b) He realizes that he has been in denial that Lena has borne another man's child.
(c) He knows that he has no way of repaying Hightower for his kindness.
(d) The child will be another bastard born in a difficult time in the South.

12. What do the townspeople want to do with Christmas?
(a) Free him
(b) Lynch him
(c) Give him a fair trial
(d) Increase his bail

13. What does Joe Brown do after the murder?
(a) He shows up in town, idenitifies Christmas as the murderer and claims the reward.
(b) He admits to killing Miss Burden.
(c) He tries to get word to Christmas that the sheriff is looking for him.
(d) He runs away from town as fast as he can.

14. How old is Miss Burden when she discovers him stealing food from her house?
(a) Forty-one years old
(b) Thirty-years old
(c) Fifty-three years old
(d) Twenty-five years old

15. How has Hightower always perceived his parents?
(a) As two people very much in love
(b) As the best parents a child could ever have
(c) As good business partners
(d) As two ghosts inhabiting the same house

Short Answer Questions

1. What does Christmas do on the side without telling Miss Burden?

2. Where does Christmas go when he escapes from jail and where he is eventually killed?

3. Why do the townspeople leave the old couple alone?

4. What does Christmas eat while on the run?

5. Who does Byron bring to Hightower's house?

(see the answer keys)

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