In two minutes more they were in the great ball-room, 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 favorable 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 can not _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 illustrate the memoir." "Give me your arm then, and we will come into the next room. We shall see the different _notabilités_ 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 space 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 passes through life, friends gather round him. He will rise even higher yet. Gratitude, Mr. Leslie, is a very good policy." "Hem," muttered Mr. Leslie. They had now gained the room where tea and bread-and-butter were the homely refreshments to the _habitués_ of what at that day was the most exclusive assembly 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 passed 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."