Explore "A Humble Enterprise" by Ada Cambridge on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
The junior Churchill partner returned home next day from a six months' trip, and the house at Toorak was much excited by the event, for he was a great man in its eyes. He lived an independent life at the club and in a suite of sumptuous chambers in East Melbourne, when on this side of the world, but was received by his father and stepmother on his first arrival, and entertained until his own establishment was ready for him.
His stepmother, before she was his stepmother, had badly wanted to be his wife, and it was a source of extreme satisfaction to her that he still remained unmarried and disengaged, though thirty-five last birthday, and one of the greatest catches in the colony. She never would have a pretty governess in the house, lest Anthony should be tempted; and she kept a sharp eye upon the girls who sought and sighed for him -- their name was legion -- when able to do so, and systematically circumvented them. He was too good, she said, to be thrown away. In other words, it would be too dreadful not to have him at dinner on Sundays, and in and out of the house all the week through, petting her (in a strictly filial manner), and escorting her about when his father was busy.