Rope-soled shoes

Usage examples of espadrilles.

Betsy had boarded the train wearing her plain and everyday striped cotton boxer shorts, her T-shirt with the sunflowers stenciled on the front and back, her Roman espadrilles laced up to her knees, and a knapsack slung over her back, its canvas sides strained by her Dante and Beatrice bookends, her alabaster horse, and her treasure box, plus a stone she had grubbed from the foundation landscaping as her mother was hustling her out to the taxi waiting at the curb in front of their house.

It contained various toiletries, a pair of espadrilles, some soiled shirts, a dead passport (the young blond face erect with classic vanity), and a travel pouch full of loose matter: credit-card counterfoils, bills, used tickets, a slip of note-paper letterheaded the Cymbeline, Stratford-on-Avon, with a telephone number and appointment time on one side and a message from Selina on the other.

I was thinking of a pale green, button-down collar shirtdress that I could wear through the spring, a pair of matching Jacques Cohen espadrilles, a Provencal print handbag from Pierre Deux, and like whatever accessories happened to catch my eye.