"Your sister's friendship is worth greater efforts," Tallente replied.

Lady Alice smiled.

"I wish that some of you could persuade her to come to town
occasionally," she said. "Jane is a perfect dear, of course, and I know
she does a great deal of good down there, but I can't help thinking
sometimes that she is a little wasted. Life must now and then be dreary
for her." Tallente seemed for a moment to be looking through the walls
of the room. "We are all made differently. Lady Jane is very
self-reliant and Devonshire is one of those counties which have a
curiously strong local hold."

"But when her moors and her farms are under snow, and Woolhanger is
wreathed in mists, and one hears nothing except the moaning of animals
in distress, what about the local attraction then?"

"You speak feelingly," Tallente observed, smiling. "I spent a fortnight
with Jane last winter," she explains. "I had some idea of hunting.
Never again! Only I miss Jane. She is such a dear and I don't see half
enough of her."

"I saw her yesterday," Tallente said reminiscently. "This morning she
told me she was going to ride out to inspect for herself the farm of the
one black sheep amongst her tenants. I looked out towards Woolhanger as
I came up in the train. It seemed like a miasma of driven snow and
mists."

"Every one to his tastes," Lady Alice observed, as she turned away with
a friendly little nod. "I have just an idea, however, that this