SECTION B: PROSE CHARLOTTE BRONTË: Jane Eyre Remember to support your ideas with details from the writing. Either 7 Read this passage, and then answer the question that follows it: I now stood in the empty hall; before me was the breakfast-room door, and I stopped, intimidated and trembling. What a miserable little poltroon had fear, engendered of unjust punishment, made of me in those days! I feared to return to the nursery, and feared to go forward to the parlour; ten minutes I stood in agitated hesitation; the vehement ringing of the breakfast-room bell decided me; I must enter. 5 'Who could want me?' I asked inwardly, as with both hands I turned the stiff door-handle which, for a second or two, resisted my efforts. 'What should I see besides Aunt Reed in the apartment? a man or a woman?' The handle turned, the door unclosed, and passing through, and curtseying low, I looked up at – a black pillar! – such, at least, appeared to 10 me, at first sight, the straight, narrow, sable-clad shape standing erect on the rug; the grim face at the top was like a carved mask, placed above the shaft by way of capital. Mrs Reed occupied her usual seat by the fireside; she made a signal to me to approach; I did so, and she introduced me to the stony stranger 15 with the words 'This is the little girl respecting whom I applied to you.' He - for it was a man turned his head slowly towards where I stood, and having examined me with the two inquisitive-looking gray eyes which twinkled under a pair of bushy brows, said solemnly, and in a bass voice – 20 'Her size is small; what is her age?' 'Ten years.' 'So much?' was the doubtful answer; and he prolonged his scrutiny for some minutes. Presently he addressed me – 'Your name, little girl?' 25 'Jane Eyre, sir.' In uttering these words I looked up: he seemed to me a tall gentleman, but then I was very little; his features were large, and they and all the lines of his frame were equally harsh and prim. 'Well, Jane Eyre, and are you a good child?' 30 Impossible to reply to this in the affirmative: my little world held a contrary opinion: I was silent. Mrs Reed answered for me by an expressive shake of the head, adding soon, 'Perhaps the less said on that subject the better, Mr Brocklehurst.' 'Sorry indeed to hear it! She and I must have some talk;' and bending 35 from the perpendicular, he installed his person in the arm-chair, opposite Mrs Reed's. 'Come here,' he said. I stepped across the rug: he placed me square and straight before him. What a face he had, now that it was almost on a level with mine! what a great nose! and what a mouth! and what large prominent teeth! 40 'No sight so sad as that of a naughty child,' he began, 'especially a naughty little girl. Do you know where the wicked go after death?' 'They go to hell,' was my ready and orthodox answer. 'And what is hell? Can you tell me that?' 'A pit full of fire.' 45 'And should you like to fall into that pit, and to be burning there for ever?' 'No, sir.' (from Chapter 4)

1. How does Brontë make this moment in the novel so disturbing?[25]