To confess? He dared not show the agitation that the story caused him. He rose brusquely, with a desire to escape for a moment from the torture of his present position. Its falseness stung his impatience. A little bald-headed man two rows of stalls off, who was looking with curiosity at the hero of the cause célèbre, suddenly met Hugh’s glance and curled up like a shrivelled leaf into his stall. But Hugh had been quite unconscious of the bald-headed man’s interest.
“Why don’t you go and smoke a cigarette?” said Irene.
As he turned towards her, he saw the tender truthful love in her face, and he called himself a villain for deceiving her. But it was for her happiness. Indubitatively.
Still the presence there of the other woman shed a ghastly light upon his honour rooted in dishonour. And Irene’s simple statement of Minna’s mysterious visit, whose baffled intention he could not but surmise, added a grimmer irony to the situation. Before he could reply to Irene, however, the attendant had edged her way to him with Minna’s note. His brow darkened as he read the words. He could not refuse. Besides, Irene had heard the attendant’s enquiry and explanation.
“I will go and speak to her if you don’t mind,” he said.
“Of course you must,” said Irene. “She will be glad to see you.”
Hugh looked at his watch. There were still ten minutes before the curtain rose. There would be time for a brief interview. The briefer the better.
He made his way along the line of stalls and ran up the stairs to Minna’s box. She met him outside, in the carpeted and quiet passage, and walked a step or two past the door of her box, so as to be beyond the earshot of Mrs. Delamere. She held out her hand to him with an air of contemptuous defiance.
“So you have committed bigamy?” she remarked.
“To put it bluntly, I have,” replied Hugh. “You scarcely summoned me to give yourself the pleasure of telling me that.”