Why did this second fact seem to embitter the sweetness of the first? No, it was not the fact, she told herself, that was bitter; the bitterness lay in the manner of its coming to her knowledge. Why had not Owen written to her? There could be no reason to conceal it! Of course, none! Owen was doing all that was right, no doubt. But to allow her to hear of this step for the first time from Theodore Bransby at a dinner-table conversation--this it was which irked her. So, at least, she had declared to herself last night. Then the tone in which her uncle and all of them had spoken of Mrs. Bransby and Owen had jarred upon her painfully. Theodore had not joined in the tasteless banter; but then Theodore's way of receiving it--with a partly stiff, partly deprecatory air, as though there could possibly be anything serious in it--was almost worse! The pathway of life which had stretched so clear and fair before her but a short while ago, seemed now to have contracted into a tangled maze, in which she lost herself. The events of the morning had made May resolve that all secrecy as to her engagement must come to an end. She must see Owen immediately on his arrival in London. But how to do so? She did not know whether he was or was not in England at that very moment! Well, at all events she knew Mrs. Bransby's address, and could write to him there. This thought gave her a pang. And the pang was intensified by the sudden and vivid perception--as one sees a whole landscape by a lightning-flash out of a black sky--that it was caused by jealousy! Jealousy! She, May Cheffington, jealous--and of Owen? Yes; it might be painful, humiliating, incredible, but it was true. The flash had been inexorably sharp and clear. To young creatures, every revelation that they--even _they_--are subject to the common woes, pains, and passions of humanity about which they may have talked glibly enough, is an amazement and a shock. Still earlier in our earthly course we doubt that Death himself can touch us. What child ever realizes that it must die? It is only after many lessons that we begin to accept our share of mortal frailties and afflictions as a matter of course. Poor May felt sick at heart. Oh, if she could but see Granny! She longed for the motherly affection which had never failed her since the day her father left her--a rather forlorn little waif, whom no one seemed ready to love or welcome--in the old house in Friar's Row. She thought that to sit quite still and silent by Granny's knee, while Granny's kind old hand softly stroked her hair, would charm away all her troubles, or at least lull them to sleep.