In this chap­ter of “The Catch­er in the Rye,” the nar­ra­tor describes a late-night jour­ney to the train sta­tion after an alter­ca­tion that left him with a sore lip and a bleed­ing nose. Despite the cold weath­er and the dis­com­fort caused by his Glad­stones, he finds some enjoy­ment in the fresh air. On the train, he reflects on his typ­i­cal expe­ri­ences of night travel—enjoying snacks and magazines—but tonight feels dif­fer­ent; he is in a con­tem­pla­tive mood, feel­ing some­what detached.

As he rides, a woman boards the train and sits next to him. She is well-dressed with orchids and engages him in con­ver­sa­tion about his Pencey Prep stick­er. She intro­duces her­self as the moth­er of Ernest Mor­row, a boy he dis­likes, which com­pli­cates his response. Despite his dis­dain for Ernest, he adopts a false iden­ti­ty, claim­ing his name is Rudolf Schmidt, after the dorm jan­i­tor. Their con­ver­sa­tion flows as she express­es pride in her son, describ­ing him as sen­si­tive and a good stu­dent, which the nar­ra­tor inter­nal­ly dis­putes, con­sid­er­ing him a bul­ly.

He con­tin­ues to feed her a stream of flat­ter­ing lies about Ernest, por­tray­ing him as shy and pop­u­lar to appease her mater­nal pride. The nar­ra­tor enjoys spin­ning this web of deceit, rel­ish­ing the atten­tion and the look of admi­ra­tion in the moth­er’s eyes. He even sug­gests that she encour­age Ernest to come out of his shell. When the con­duc­tor arrives, the nar­ra­tor feels a sense of sat­is­fac­tion know­ing he has manip­u­lat­ed the per­cep­tion of Ernest in his moth­er’s mind.

Their con­ver­sa­tion drifts to the top­ic of cock­tails, which the nar­ra­tor sug­gests they could have in the club car. The moth­er, how­ev­er, polite­ly declines. As they part ways, she express­es con­cern for his well-being after he fab­ri­cates a sto­ry about need­ing a minor oper­a­tion for a tumor, anoth­er lay­er of decep­tion he spins while simul­ta­ne­ous­ly feel­ing guilty for lying to her.

This encounter show­cas­es the pro­tag­o­nist’s com­plex feel­ings about con­nec­tion, iso­la­tion, and the façades peo­ple main­tain in social inter­ac­tions. The nar­ra­tor leaves the train after the woman departs, fur­ther illus­trat­ing his feel­ings of lone­li­ness and his strug­gle with authen­tic­i­ty in a world filled with pre­tense.