The Third Volume by Fergus Hume

TO a woman who rules by right of beauty it is a terrible thing to see her empire slipping from her grasp by reason of gray hairs and wrinkles. What desperate efforts does she make to protract her sway, how she dyes and paints and powders and tight laces -- all to no end, for Time is stronger than Art, and finally he writes his sign-manual too deep to be effaced by cosmetics. Mrs. Hilliston was not yet beaten in the fight with the old enemy, but she foresaw the future when she would be shamed and neglected close at hand.

Perhaps it was this premonition of defeat that made her so unamiable, sharp, and bitter on the night when Claude came to dine. She liked Claude and had stood in the place of a mother to him; but he was a man, and handsome, so when she saw his surprised look at her changed appearance all the evil that was in her came to the surface.