"I shall introduce you to the princ.i.p.al leaders of society; know them and study them: I do not advise you to attempt to do more,--that is, to attempt to become the fashion. It is a very expensive ambition: some men it helps, most men it ruins. On the whole, you have better cards in your hands. Dance or not as it pleases you; don"t flirt. If you flirt people will inquire into your fortune,--an inquiry that will do you little good; and flirting entangles a young man into marrying. That would never do. Here we are."
In two minutes more they were in the great ballroom, and Randal"s eyes were dazzled with the lights, the diamonds, the blaze of beauty.
Audley presented him in quick succession to some dozen ladies, and then disappeared amidst the crowd. Randal was not at a loss: he was without shyness; or if he had that disabling infirmity, he concealed it. He answered the languid questions put to him with a certain spirit that kept up talk, and left a favourable impression of his agreeable qualities. But the lady with whom he got on the best was one who had no daughters out, a handsome and witty woman of the world,--Lady Frederick Coniers.
"It is your first ball at Almack"s then, Mr. Leslie?"
"My first."
"And you have not secured a partner? Shall I find you one? What do you think of that pretty girl in pink?"
"I see her--but I cannot think of her."
"You are rather, perhaps, like a diplomatist in a new court, and your first object is to know who is who."
"I confess that on beginning to study the history of my own day I should like to distinguish the portraits that ill.u.s.trate the memoir."
"Give me your arm, then, and we will come into the next room. We shall see the different notabilites enter one by one, and observe without being observed. This is the least I can do for a friend of Mr.
Egerton"s."
"Mr. Egerton, then," said Randal,--as they threaded their way through the s.p.a.ce without the rope that protected the dancers,--"Mr. Egerton has had the good fortune to win your esteem even for his friends, however obscure?"
"Why, to say truth, I think no one whom Mr. Egerton calls his friend need long remain obscure, if he has the ambition to be otherwise; for Mr. Egerton holds it a maxim never to forget a friend nor a service."
"Ah, indeed!" said Randal, surprised.
"And therefore," continued Lady Frederick, "as he pa.s.ses through life, friends gather round him. He will rise even higher yet. Grat.i.tude, Mr.
Leslie, is a very good policy."
"Hem," muttered Mr. Leslie.
They had now gained the room where tea and bread and b.u.t.ter were the homely refreshments to the habitues of what at that day was the most exclusive a.s.sembly in London. They ensconced themselves in a corner by a window, and Lady Frederick performed her task of cicerone with lively ease, accompanying each notice of the various persons who pa.s.sed panoramically before them with sketch and anecdote, sometimes good-natured, generally satirical, always graphic and amusing.
By and by Frank Hazeldean, having on his arm a young lady of haughty air and with high though delicate features, came to the tea-table.
"The last new Guardsman," said Lady Frederick; "very handsome, and not yet quite spoiled. But he has got into a dangerous set."
RANDAL.--"The young lady with him is handsome enough to be dangerous."
LADY FREDERICK (laughing).--"No danger for him there,--as yet at least.
Lady Mary (the Duke of Knaresborough"s daughter) is only in her second year. The first year, nothing under an earl; the second, nothing under a baron. It will be full four years before she comes down to a commoner.
Mr. Hazeldean"s danger is of another kind. He lives much with men who are not exactly mauvais ton, but certainly not of the best taste. Yet he is very young; he may extricate himself,--leaving half his fortune behind him. What, he nods to you! You know him?"
"Very well; he is nephew to Mr. Egerton."
"Indeed! I did not know that. Hazeldean is a new name in London. I heard his father was a plain country gentleman, of good fortune, but not that he was related to Mr. Egerton."
"Half-brother."
"Will Mr. Egerton pay the young gentleman"s debts? He has no sons himself."
RANDAL.--"Mr. Egerton"s fortune comes from his wife, from my family,--from a Leslie, not from a Hazeldean." Lady Frederick turned sharply, looked at Randal"s countenance with more attention than she had yet vouchsafed to it, and tried to talk of the Leslies. Randal was very short there.
An hour afterwards, Randal, who had not danced, was still in the refreshment-room, but Lady Frederick had long quitted him. He was talking with some old Etonians who had recognized him, when there entered a lady of very remarkable appearance, and a murmur pa.s.sed through the room as she appeared.
She might be three or four and twenty. She was dressed in black velvet, which contrasted with the alabaster whiteness of her throat and the clear paleness of her complexion, while it set off the diamonds with which she was profusely covered. Her hair was of the deepest jet, and worn simply braided. Her eyes, too, were dark and brilliant, her features regular and striking; but their expression, when in repose, was not prepossessing to such as love modesty and softness in the looks of woman. But when she spoke and smiled, there was so much spirit and vivacity in the countenance, so much fascination in the smile, that all which might before have marred the effect of her beauty strangely and suddenly disappeared.
"Who is that very handsome woman?" asked Randal. "An Italian,--a Marchesa something," said one of the Etonians.
"Di Negra," suggested another, who had been abroad: "she is a widow; her husband was of the great Genoese family of Negra,--a younger branch of it."
Several men now gathered thickly around the fair Italian. A few ladies of the highest rank spoke to her, but with a more distant courtesy than ladies of high rank usually show to foreigners of such quality as Madame di Negra. Ladies of rank less elevated seemed rather shy of her,--that might be from jealousy. As Randal gazed at the marchesa with more admiration than any woman, perhaps, had before excited in him, he heard a voice near him say,
"Oh, Madame di Negra is resolved to settle amongst us, and marry an Englishman."
"If she can find one sufficiently courageous," returned a female voice.
"Well, she"s trying hard for Egerton, and he has courage enough for anything."
The female voice replied, with a laugh, "Mr Egerton knows the world too well, and has resisted too many temptations to be--"
"Hush! there he is."
Egerton came into the room with his usual firm step and erect mien.
Randal observed that a quick glance was exchanged between him and the marchesa; but the minister pa.s.sed her by with a bow.
Still Randal watched, and, ten minutes afterwards, Egerton and the marchesa were seated apart in the very same convenient nook that Randal and Lady Frederick had occupied an hour or so before.
"Is this the reason why Mr. Egerton so insultingly warns me against counting on his fortune?" muttered Randal. "Does he mean to marry again?"
Unjust suspicion!--for, at that moment, these were the words that Audley Egerton was dropping forth from his lips of bronze,
"Nay, dear madam, do not ascribe to my frank admiration more gallantry than it merits. Your conversation charms me, your beauty delights me; your society is as a holiday that I look forward to in the fatigues of my life. But I have done with love, and I shall never marry again."
"You almost pique me into trying to win, in order to reject you," said the Italian, with a flash from her bright eyes.
"I defy even you," answered Audley, with his cold hard smile. "But to return to the point. You have more influence, at least, over this subtle amba.s.sador; and the secret we speak of I rely on you to obtain me.
Ah, Madam, let us rest friends. You see I have conquered the unjust prejudices against you; you are received and feted everywhere, as becomes your birth and your attractions. Rely on me ever, as I on you.
But I shall excite too much envy if I stay here longer, and am vain enough to think that I may injure you if I provoke the gossip of the ill-natured. As the avowed friend, I can serve you; as the supposed lover, No--" Audley rose as he said this, and, standing by the chair, added carelessly, "--propos, the sum you do me the honour to borrow will be paid to your bankers to-morrow."
"A thousand thanks! my brother will hasten to repay you."
Audley bowed. "Your brother, I hope, will repay me in person, not before. When does he come?"
"Oh, he has again postponed his visit to London; he is so much needed in Vienna. But while we are talking of him, allow me to ask if your friend, Lord L"Estrange, is indeed still so bitter against that poor brother of mine?"
"Still the same."
"It is shameful!" cried the Italian, with warmth; "what has my brother ever done to him that he should actually intrigue against the count in his own court?"