The perception of this lurking enmity between them made May anxious to smoothe asperities and prevent a rupture. In her heart, although she admitted he had done nothing to startle or offend her of late, she intensely disliked Theodore Bransby; yet she found herself in a position of taking his part against Owen. Owen was too absolute, too inflexible, too implacable, she said. After all, Theodore had always conducted himself irreproachably. He might not be agreeable to _them_ (May had innocently come to join herself with Owen in this kind of partnership in sentiment), but probably _they_ were not always agreeable to other people; they ought to be tolerant if they wished to be tolerated--and the like sage reflections. All which pretty lectures, though they made Owen no whit less obdurate towards Theodore, melted his heart into ever softer tenderness for May. She had not gone to Glengowrie. The reprieve he had allowed himself, after which she was to depart, and he must steel himself to endure her absence for, probably, the remainder of his life, had expired. But May was still there. And there, too, was he. He was free to go away at any moment. But he lingered. He began to suffer sharp pangs of regret when he thought of the lost opportunities which lay behind him; for now sometimes it seemed to him as if this sweet, pure girl might come to love him. And what had he to offer her? How could he ask her to share such a life as his? Owen had held certain uncompromising theories: such as that a woman who hesitated to partake poverty with the man she professed to love was not worth winning; and that a man must be but a poor creature who should weigh a woman's fortune against himself, and fear to woo a well-dowered girl lest he might be thought to love her money bags and not her. And he had long ago decided that with _his_ marriage, at least (supposing that unlikely event ever took place), considerations of money should have nothing to do on either side. But theories--even true theories--are apt to find themselves a little out of breath when suddenly confronted with the fact. The advice so vigorously given by Mrs. Dobbs to do some honest work, if it were but breaking stones upon the road, took a new significance when he thought of May. That on this point May agreed with her grandmother's view he had ascertained, although a shy consciousness restrained her from urging him to change his course of life. He began to cast about in his mind for some possible employment; but he found, as so many others had found before him, how difficult it is to turn "general acquirements" into a definite channel. A chance word of Mr. Bragg's at length suddenly suggested a hope to him. Mr. Bragg mentioned one evening at Garnet Lodge that he purposed making a journey into Spain, partly on matters connected with his son's business; and said that he should like to find some trustworthy person to accompany him as secretary and interpreter.