Granice rose with an exquisite sense of relief. Surely Allonby
wouldn't have said that if he hadn't believed him!

"That's all right. Then I needn't detain you. I can be found at any
time at my apartment." He gave the address.

The District Attorney smiled again, more openly. "What do you say to
leaving it for an hour or two this evening? I'm giving a little
supper at Rector's--quiet, little affair, you understand: just Miss
Melrose--I think you know her--and a friend or two; and if you'll
join us..."

Granice stumbled out of the office without knowing what reply he had
made.

He waited for four days--four days of concentrated horror. During
the first twenty-four hours the fear of Ascham's alienist dogged
him; and as that subsided, it was replaced by the exasperating sense
that his avowal had made no impression on the District Attorney.
Evidently, if he had been going to look into the case, Allonby would
have been heard from before now. ... And that mocking invitation
to supper showed clearly enough how little the story had impressed
him!

Granice was overcome by the futility of any farther attempt to
inculpate himself. He was chained to life--a "prisoner of
consciousness." Where was it he had read the phrase? Well, he was
learning what it meant. In the glaring night-hours, when his brain
seemed ablaze, he was visited by a sense of his fixed identity, of