Then, in a low voice, as if he were afraid his mother could still hear him, he exclaimed, "Come in." The first room, Madame Goujet's, was piously preserved in the state she had left it.

On a chair near the window lay the tambour by the side of the large arm-chair, which seemed to be waiting for the old lace-worker.
The bed was made, and she could have stretched herself beneath the sheets if she had left the cemetery to come and spend the evening with her child.

There was something solemn, a perfume of honesty and goodness about the room.
"Come in," repeated the blacksmith in a louder tone.
She went in, half frightened, like a disreputable woman gliding into a respectable place.

He was quite pale, and trembled at the thought of ushering a woman like this into his dead mother's home.

They crossed the room on tip-toe, as if they were ashamed to be heard.