Annales gratuites Bac L : Compréhension

   How I started working for Mrs Dibble: I was nineteen years old, fresh out of high school, looking for a summer job before I entered college. Only nobody wanted to hire me because, let's be honest, the high school I had attended was sort of more of a reform school. Not to mention that a lot of folks in the immediate area were mad at me for breaking into their houses and reading their mail. So my father asked around among his Planning Council members. (By then my father was head of the Foundation.) Eventually he persuaded this one guy, Brandon Pearson, to put me to work in his hardware(1) chain.
   But I could tell Mr. Pearson had warned his staff about my evil nature. They watched my every move and they wouldn't let me near any money, even though money had never been my weakness. They gave me the most noncrucial assignments, and the manager nearly had a stroke once when he found me duplicating a house key for a customer, I guess he thought I might cut an extra copy for myself.
   My second week on the job, a lady in a flowered dress came in to buy a board. Mrs Dibble, she was, although of course I didn't know it at the time. She said she wanted this board to be two feet, two and a half inches long. So I told her I would cut it for her. I wasn't aware that a customer had to buy the whole plank. (Besides, she had these nice smile wrinkles at the corners of her eyes.) I grabbed a saw from a wall display and set to work. Made kind of a racket. Manager came running, "What's this ? What's going on here ?"
   "Oh, he's just cutting me a teeny piece of shelving !" Mrs. Dibble sang out.
   "What on earth! You weren't hired to do that," Mr. Vickers told me. "What do you think you're up to ?"
   That's when I should have stopped, I know. But I didn't like the tone he was using. I pretended not to hear him. Kept on sawing. When I finished, there was this enormous, ringing silence, and then Mr. Vickers said, clearly, "You are fired, boy."
   "Oh !" Mrs. Dibble said. "Oh, no, don't fire him ! It was all because I asked him to ! I begged him and implored him ; I pleaded on bended knee !"
   But Mr. Vickers had his mind made up, I could tell .No doubt he was glad of the excuse.
   I wasn't too devastated. I couldn't have stood the place much longer, anyhow. So I told Mrs. Dibble, "It's all right."
   But Mrs. Dibble started burrowing in her purse. She came up with a cream-colored business card, and, "Here," she said, and she handed it to me.
RENT-A-BACK, INC., the card read. "WHEN YOUR OWN MUSCLES AREN'T QUITE ENOUGH." VIRGINIA DIBBLE, PRES.
   "Your new place of employment," she told me.
   "Aw," I said. "Mrs.-um-"
   "All our clients are aged, or infirm, or just somehow or other in need, and what they're in need of is precisely your kind of good-heartedness."
   "Ma'am-" Mr. Vickers said.

   And I said, "Mrs. Dibble-"
   I guess Mr. Vickers was going to say, "Ma'am", I think you should know that this boy is a convicted felon, or would have been convicted(2) if his folks hadn't bought his way out of it."
   And I was going to say, "Mrs Dibble, I don't have a muscle to my name, if you're talking about heavy lifting."

   But she didn't give either one of us the chance. "Nine a.m. tomorrow," she said, tapping the card with her index finger. "Come to this address."

A Patchwork Planet, Anne Tyler (Vintage, 1999)

(1) hardware chain = quincaillerie
(2) convicted = pronounced guilty

b) What do we learn about his situation:

- before the incident ?
- at the time of the incident ?
- after the incident ?

c) "My evil nature" :

- What past events can justify such a judgement ? Quote from the text.

*(line(s))...

*(line(s))...

- How far did his reputation influence the way people considered him ? Quote from the text to justify your answer ( 40 words).

What does it reveal about the boy's social background ? (20 words)

a) What did Mr. Vickers blame the narrator for ?

b) What in the narrator's behaviour made things worse ?

c) "You're fired boy" :
What shows that this is not bad news for the narrator ?
Justify your answer with 3 elements from the text (40 words).

4 - "Rent a back" : Imagine what the job consists in (50 words)

b) What do we learn about his situation :

c) "My evil nature":

d) He "would have been convicted if his folks hadn't bought his way out of it". What does it mean ? Tick the correct answer.

o He was sent to prison

o He was not sent to prison

ý His father bought his freedom

o His father refused to pay for his freedom

o His parents were convinced that prison would be good for him.

c) "You're fired boy".