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This test consists of 5 multiple choice questions, 5 short answer questions, and 10 short essay questions.

Multiple Choice Questions

1. What woke the narrator in the night at the start of the story?
(a) A rainstorm.
(b) The phone ringing.
(c) A creaking sound in her house.
(d) Her husband.

2. What instrument does the narrator cite when describing how "the misbeats of [her] heart tailed off" (24)?
(a) Trumpet.
(b) Saxophone.
(c) Xylophone.
(d) Flute.

3. According to the narrator's tale, who were being shot by the police in the city?
(a) Schoolchildren.
(b) Other police officers.
(c) Rioters.
(d) Burglars.

4. How are the people in the narrator's story said to be living at the start of her tale?
(a) Like peas in a pod.
(b) Carefree and fancy free.
(c) Happily ever after.
(d) In eternal despair.

5. What does the wife worry the people from the city might come to their home and do some day?
(a) Kidnap their maid and gardener.
(b) Throw bombs and destroy all they have.
(c) Go for a swim in their beautiful pool.
(d) Tear off the plaque and stream in.

Short Answer Questions

1. What is the narrator's house built atop?

2. What pets does the family in the narrator's story have at home?

3. What is the man's mother called in the narrator's tale?

4. How was the plaque meant to indicate that the property owner was not racist?

5. Where does the story the narrator tells herself take place?

Short Essay Questions

1. After the riots outside the city subsided, what crimes took place in the suburbs?

2. Despite having the same fears of intruders as other people, what precautions does the narrator say she does not take in her home?

3. Where does the story the narrator tells herself take palce and who is in the story?

4. How does the husband try to assuage his wife's fears when she worries people from the cities will tear off their warning sign and "open the gates and stream in" (26).

5. What does the narrator do when she is an able to fall back to sleep at the start of the story?

6. What fears did the man and woman's trusted housemaid begin to have, and what did they do in response to her fears?

7. What were the man and woman unable to insure their house against, and why did the man tell his wife they need not worry about that?

8. What recent crimes does the narrator describe at the start of the story?

9. Describe the sign the man and woman received from the Neighborhood watch. How was it supposed to "prove the property owner was no racist" (25)?

10. How is the man's mother described and what warning did she give her son and his wife as they start their life together?

(see the answer keys)

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