As they returned into the town, a carriage with four posters passed them; Elizabeth recognised at once Gerard Neville within--a pang shot through her heart to remember that they did not share their feelings, but were separated, perhaps for ever, at this very hour. On her return, worn out with fatigue and oppressed with this reflection, she bade good-night to Falkner; and he, happy in the idea that the same roof would cover them, kissed and embraced her. On entering her room she found a letter on her toilet--and smiles again dimpled her face--it was a letter from Neville. It contained a few words, a very few, of congratulation, reminding her that he must hurry back to town for the melancholy task of his father's funeral, and imploring that neither she nor Falkner would determine on any immediate step. "I cannot penetrate the cloud in which we are enveloped," he said; "but I know that I ought not, that I cannot lose you. A little time, a little reflection may show us how to accord our various duties with the great necessity of our not being separated. Be not rash, therefore, my own Elizabeth, nor let your friend be rash. Surely the worst is over, and we may be permitted at last to hate no more, and to be happy." Elizabeth kissed the letter, and placed it beneath her pillow. That night she slept sweetly and well. Early in the morning Mrs. Raby called on them. The same prepossession which Gerard had felt in her favour as soon as he saw her, had taken place in her on seeing Falkner. There is a sort of magnetism that draws like to like, and causes minds of fine and lofty tone to recognise each other when brought in contact. Mrs. Raby saw and acknowledged at once Falkner's superiority; whatever his faults had been, they were winnowed away by adversity, and he was become at once the noblest and gentlest of human beings. Mrs. Raby had that touch of generosity in her own character that never permitted her to see merit without openly acknowledging and endeavouring to reward it. The first thought of the plan she now entertained she had cast away as impracticable, but it returned; the desire to give and to benefit, a natural growth in her heart, made her look on it with complacency--by degrees she dismissed the objections that presented themselves, and resolved to act upon it. "We complain," she thought, "of the barrenness of life, and the tediousness and faults of our fellow-creatures; and when Providence brings before us two selected from the world as endowed with every admirable quality, we allow a thousand unworthy considerations, which assume the voice of prudence, to exile us from them. Where can I find a man like Falkner, full of honour, sensibility, and talent? where a girl like Elizabeth, who has proved herself to be the very type of virtuous fidelity? Such companions will teach my children better than volumes of moral treatises, the existence and loveliness of human goodness."