Between the acts, McCarren amused him with anecdotes about the audience: he knew every one by sight, and could lift the curtain from every physiognomy. Granice listened indulgently. He had lost all interest in his kind, but he knew that he was himself the real centre of McCarren’s attention, and that every word the latter spoke had an indirect bearing on his own problem.

“See that fellow over there—the little dried-up man in the third row, pulling his moustache? His memoirs would be worth publishing,” McCarren said suddenly in the last entr’acte.

Granice, following his glance, recognized the detective from Allonby’s office. For a moment he had the thrilling sense that he was being shadowed.

“Caesar, if he could talk—!” McCarren continued. “Know who he is, of course? Dr. John B. Stell, the biggest alienist in the country—”

Granice, with a start, bent again between the heads in front of him. “That man—the fourth from the aisle? You’re mistaken. That’s not Dr. Stell.”

McCarren laughed. “Well, I guess I’ve been in court enough to know Stell when I see him. He testifies in nearly all the big cases where they plead insanity.”

A cold shiver ran down Granice’s spine, but he repeated obstinately: “That’s not Dr. Stell.”

“Not Stell? Why, man, I know him. Look—here he comes. If it isn’t Stell, he won’t speak to me.”

The little dried-up man was moving slowly up the aisle. As he neared McCarren he made a slight gesture of recognition.

“How’do, Doctor Stell? Pretty slim show, ain’t it?” the reporter cheerfully flung out at him. And Mr. J. B. Hewson, with a nod of amicable assent, passed on.

Granice sat benumbed. He knew he had not been mistaken—the man who had just passed was the same man whom Allonby had sent to see him: a physician disguised as a detective. Allonby, then, had thought him insane, like the others—had regarded his confession as the maundering of a maniac. The discovery froze Granice with horror—he seemed to see the mad-house gaping for him.

“Isn’t there a man a good deal like him—a detective named J. B. Hewson?”

But he knew in advance what McCarren’s answer would be. “Hewson? J. B. Hewson? Never heard of him. But that was J. B. Stell fast enough—I guess he can be trusted to know himself, and you saw he answered to his name.”

VI

SOME days passed before Granice could obtain a word with the District Attorney: he began to think that Allonby avoided him.

But when they were face to face Allonby’s jovial countenance showed no sign of embarrassment. He waved his visitor to a chair, and leaned across his desk with the encouraging smile of a consulting physician.

Granice broke out at once: “That detective you sent me the other day—”

Allonby raised a deprecating hand.

“—I know: it was Stell the alienist. Why did you do that, Allonby?”

The other’s face did not lose its composure. “Because I looked up your story first—and there’s nothing in it.”