shoes; and in her hand she carried a straw bag and a blue umbrella.
This woman, who had once been beautiful, seemed to be about forty
years of age; but her blue eyes, deprived of the fire which happiness
puts there, told plainly that she had long renounced the world. Her
dress, as well as her whole air and demeanor, indicated a mother
wholly devoted to her household and her son. If the strings of her
bonnet were faded, the shape betrayed that it was several years old.
The shawl was fastened by a broken needle converted into a pin by a
bead of sealing-wax. She was waiting impatiently for Pierrotin,
wishing to recommend to his special care her son, who was doubtless
travelling for the first time, and with whom she had come to the
coach-office as much from doubt of his ability as from maternal
affection.

This mother was in every way completed by the son, so that the son
would not be understood without the mother. If the mother condemned
herself to mended gloves, the son wore an olive-green coat with
sleeves too short for him, proving that he had grown, and might grow
still more, like other adults of eighteen or nineteen years of age.
The blue trousers, mended by his mother, presented to the eye a
brighter patch of color when the coat-tails maliciously parted behind
him.

"Don't rub your gloves that way, you'll spoil them," she was saying as
Pierrotin appeared. "Is this the conductor? Ah! Pierrotin, is it you?"
she exclaimed, leaving her son and taking the coachman apart a few
steps.

"I hope you're well, Madame Clapart," he replied, with an air that
expressed both respect and familiarity.