MY BONDHAM, though far stronger than most horses, was beginning to feel ill with anxiety, for it was now within three days of the date fixed for Mrs. Foxinglove's fancy-dress Elizabethan Fair, and still no invitation had arrived for her from the infamous Theodosia. It could not be that a temporary lapse of memory had caused Theodosia to forget her existence, as she had received plenty of reminders. For the last week Amy had been deluging her with hospitalities: she had asked her to lunch, tea, dinner and supper, all of which Mrs, Foxinglove had refused with regrets. Amy had even so far humbled herself as to get a mutual friend to ask Mrs. Foxinglove whether she, Amy, was coming to the Elizabethan Fair, and she had replied, firmly and perhaps ironically, that it was no use trying to get hold of Amy, as she was always solidly engaged for weeks ahead. But as the Foxinglove had asked the people she wanted to secure months ahead, this was a very paltry excuse.
To the ordinary mind, such a speech must have seemed final, but then Amy had not an ordinary mind. She meant to go to the Elizabethan Fair, and what to others spelled "Defeat" spelled to her "Try again and harder." In fact, at this melancholy moment she had just tried again. She had written a sweet little note to dearest Theodosia, asking her to come and dine quite quietly with her and her husband on June 18th, which was the night of the Fair, and the answer had come back that dearest Theodosia was out of town that night. Amy read into that mendacious message contempt and an iron determination not to yield. But then Amy was determined too.
For the moment she had winced when these words came pattering into the telephone in the voice of Mrs. Foxinglove's butler, and she had an impulse to give up, to leave town for a day or two till the party was over, and perhaps put in the social columns of the leading journals that she had been unavoidably prevented from going to it. That would be quite true, the unavoidable impediment being the absence of an invitation. But her indomitable spirit revolted from the thought of retreat: to quit London would be equivalent to leaving the enemy in possession of the field, and the thought of that steeled her again.
Certainly Theodosia Foxinglove had behaved atrociously, and Amy resolved never to call her Theodosia again. She and Amy were, so to speak, twin dewdrops, for they both devoted their whole pellucid energies to the aspiring art of social climbing; and when, only a year ago, Mrs. Foxinglove had left Chicago, where she found it very difficult to rise, and appeared in London, Amy had done a great deal for her, for she had had two years' start, and was chirping away quite high up, while the Foxinglove was still nowhere. She had constantly invited her to her house, she had introduced her to five members of Parliament, two Earls, a prize-fighter, four distinguished literary people, a film-star, a Bolshevist, and a Marquis. There were many others, too, whom she did not trouble to enumerate to herself, but all these she remembered without an effort. At first Mrs. Foxinglove had shown no signs of the cloven-hoof; she had indeed behaved very fairly, and several of the brightest butterflies that to-day refreshed themselves at Amy's hospitable board, had been netted by her at Mrs. Foxinglove's house. That was as it should be; that was part of the code of honour that ought to prevail among climbers, and in fact up to the beginning of this season the two had hunted in couples with most gratifying success. But then, it must be supposed, success had gone to Mrs. Foxinglove's head; she began kicking down the ladders which had enabled her to attain eminence, and among these ladders (not, it is true, a very lofty one, but one that had most emphatically given her a foothold on the lower branches of the great tree of Social Success) was Amy. Indeed, that telephone message she had just received was more than a mere ignoring of her: it was a definite act of hostility and insult. Mrs. Foxinglove had "made a face" at her when she had replied that she would not be in London on the night which everyone knew was the night of the Elizabethan Fair. Of course, Amy, when she asked her to dinner then, had known also that she could not come, but that was not the same thing as telling a lie....