Lady Lavinia Loveless was an actress of the touring kind — tragic parts, provincial houses, notices she can still recite — until the profession and she released one another by mutual consent. She now practises at a quieter table: the séance, conducted with great decorum, at which the departed are consulted and, it is said, occasionally answer. The title arrived with the billing, and like much about her is best not pressed.
She resides at Hartfield House as cousin and guest of Xerxes, receiving her sitters in her own wing. Her manner is warm — warmer, the drawing-rooms observe, than strict prudence would advise; she is apt to let people rather too close, and to be surprised, afterward, at what proximity costs. The Colonel's weekly sitting for his late wife is her most faithful engagement, in every sense.