His instantaneous certainty that there was no drop of Rothwell blood in her veins was confirmed by later inquiry. He learnt that she was distantly related to the squire's wife, and had recently lost her parents. Though she had not been left absolutely penniless, her little pittance was not enough to keep her in idleness, and she was staying at Mitchelhurst while the question of her future was debated. It was difficult to see what Minnie Newton was to do in a hardworking world. She could sink into helplessly graceful attitudes, she could watch you with a softly troubled gaze, anxious to learn what she ought to think or say; she was delicate, gentle, and very slightly educated. She had not a thought of her own, and she was pure with the kind of purity which cannot grasp the idea of evil, and fails to recognise it, unless indeed vice is going in rags and dirt to the police-station, and using shocking language by the way. Her simplicity was touching. She thought nothing of herself; she would cling to the first hand that happened to be held out to her. She might be saved by good luck, but nature had obviously designed her for a victim.
Miss Newton was polite to Mr. Hayes as to everybody else, but she was the last person at Mitchelhurst Place to suspect the little gentleman's passion. The very servants found it out, and wondered at her innocence. John Rothwell laughed.
"What a fool she is!" he said to his sister, as he stood by the window one day, and saw Hayes coming up the avenue.
"That's an undoubted fact," said the magnificent Kate.
"And what a fool he is!" John continued.
"Well, we won't quarrel about that either," she replied liberally. "They will be all the better matched."
"Matched?" said Rothwell. "No."
She looked up hastily.
"Eh?" she said. "Not matched? And why not?"