In the foggy world of the reflection, a boy wavers in the depths of the mirror. Ignoring the voices in the hall below, Charles steps up to it and stretches out his right hand towards the boy he sees there. In the mirror the reflected boy mimics his action.
Charles's right hand almost touches the boy's left hand. The mirror glass is all that divides them, that and the layer of candle grease and dust that has settled along the bottom rail of the frame and spread slowly higher over the years.
...
Charles wonders whether he has lost his reflection as well as his voice. He doesn't recognize the boy's face, his ragged clothes or untidy hair - he is a stranger. Yet it is he, Charles. But he looks like someone else, not the boy who used to examine himself in Maman's looking glass.