to reflect them. Every day she fell a little lower in that weakness,
and however slight the likeness had once been, she knew that now it
must be patent to every observer. She copied her aunt, mimicked,
duplicated her. It was easier to do that than fight the resemblance,
against her aunt's determination; and so, by unnoticed degrees, she had
permitted herself to become a lay figure upon which was dressed the
image of Miss Deane's youth. She had even come to desire the look of
almost sensual gratification on her aunt's face when she saw her niece
so perfectly reflecting her own well-remembered airs.

And Rachel, too, had come to avoid the looking-glass, dreading to see
there the poses and gesticulations of the old, repulsive woman whose
every feature and expression had become so sickeningly familiar.

And, in all that time, Adrian had not once been to the house in
Tavistock Square. Rachel had kept him away by what she felt had become
all too transparent excuses. That terror, at least, she felt must be
kept at bay. For she could not conceive it possible that, once he had
seen her and her aunt together, he could retain one spark of his
admiration. He would, he must, see her then as she was, see that her
contemptible vanity was the essential enduring thing, all that would
remain when time had stripped her of youth's allurement.

Nevertheless, the day came when Rachel could no longer endure to
deceive him. He had challenged her, at last, with hiding something from
him. Inevitably, he had become increasingly curious about her strange
reticences concerning the Miss Deane whom he, in turn, had grown to
regard as almost mythical; and all his suppressed suspicions had
suddenly found expression in a question.