It is one thing to think vaguely of civilisation being swept away, and _quite_ another to visualise some concrete, humdrum Tom, Dick, or Harry being swept horribly out of existence. Jane’s imagination suddenly showed her Formula “A”—The Process, whatever they chose to call the horrible thing—in operation; showed it annihilating fussy Mrs. Cottingham, with her overcrowded drawing-room and her overcrowded talk; showed it doing something horrible to fat, common Daphne Todhunter. The romance of adventure fell away, the glamour that sometimes surrounds catastrophe shrivelled and was gone. It was horrible, only horrible. Jane kept seeing Mrs. Cottingham’s ugly room, and Raymond Heritage standing there, as she had seen her that afternoon, like a statue that had nothing to do with its surroundings. All at once she knew what it was that Lady Heritage reminded her of—not Mercury at all, but Medusa with the lovely, tortured face, stone and yet suffering. As she looked out over that calm sea she had before her all the time the vision of Medusa, and of hundreds and hundreds of quite ordinary, vulgar, commonplace Mrs. Cottinghams and Daphne Todhunters being turned to stone. A tremor began to shake her. It kept coming again and again. Then, all at once, the tears were running down her face. It was then it came to her that she could not bear to think of Daphne as she had seen her at the last, with that hurt, angry, puzzled look. “She’s a fat lump, but Arnold is her brother, and Renata is her friend, and she thinks they’ve failed each other and been horrid to her. I can’t bear it.” At that moment Jane hated herself fiercely because Daphne’s tears had amused her. “You’ve got a brick instead of a heart, and, if you get eliminated, it’ll serve you right.” She dabbed her eyes very hard, straightened her hair, and ran downstairs to the library again. Ember was the sole occupant, and Jane addressed him with diffidence: “Mr. Ember, do you think I might ... do you think Lady Heritage would mind ... I mean, may I use the telephone?” “What for?” said Ember, looking at her over the edge of his paper. “I thought perhaps I might,” said Jane ... “I mean, I wanted to say something to my friend, the one who is staying with Mrs. Cottingham.” “Ah—yes, why not?” “Then I may?” “Oh yes, certainly. Do you want me to go?” Jane presented a picture of modest confusion. It was concern for Daphne Todhunter that had brought her downstairs, concern and the prickings of remorse, but at the sight of Ember, she experienced what she would have described as a brain-wave. “If you wouldn’t mind,” she said. “I’m so sorry to disturb you, but I did rather want to talk privately to her.” “Oh, by all means.” Ember’s tone was most amiable, his departure most courteously prompt.