Some time ago I discovered that one of my chairs had a broken leg. I didn’t think there would be any difficulty in getting it mended, as there are a whole lot of antique (古董) shops near my home. So I left home one morning carrying the chair with me. I went into the first shop expecting a friendly reception (接待). I was quite wrong. The man wouldn’t even look at my chair.
The second shop, though slightly more polite, was just the same, and the third and the fourth ----- so I decided that my approach must be wrong.
I entered the fifth shop with a plan in my mind. I placed the chair on the floor and said to the shopkeeper, “Would you like to buy a chair?” He looked it over carefully and said, “Yes, not a bad chair. How much do you want for it, sir?” “Twenty pounds,” I said. “OK,” he said, “I’ll give you twenty pounds.” “It’s got a slightly broken leg,” I said. “Yes, I saw that, it’s nothing.”
Everything was going according to plan and I was getting excited. “What will you do with it?” I asked. “Oh, it will be easy to sell once the repair is done.” “I’ll buy it,” I said. “What do you mean? You’ve just sold it to me,” he said. “Yes, I know but I’ve changed my mind. I am sorry. I’ll give you twenty-seven pounds for it.” “You must be crazy,” he said. Then, suddenly the penny dropped. “I know what you want. You want me to repair your chair.” “You’re right,” I said. “And what would you have done if you had walked in and said, ‘Would you mend this chair for me?’” “I wouldn’t have agreed to do it,” he said. “We don’t do repairs, not enough money in it and too much trouble. But I’ll mend this for you, shall we say for a fiver?” He was a very nice man and was greatly amused (感到有趣) by the whole thing.
36．We can learn from the text that in the first shop the writer _______.
A. was rather impolite B. was warmly received
C. asked the shopkeeper to buy his chair D. asked the shopkeeper to repair his chair
37．The underlined word “approach” in the second paragraph means _______.
A. plan for dealing with things B. decision to sell things
C. idea of repairing things D. way of doing things
38．The expression “the penny dropped” in the last paragraph means the shopkeeper ______.
A. changed his mind B. accepted the offer
C. saw the writer’ s purpose D. decided to help the writer
39．How much did the writer pay at last?
A. ￡5. B. ￡7. C.￡20. D. ￡27.
40．From the text, we can learn that the writer was _________.
A. honest B. careful C. smart D. funny