Chapter 3Rather than waiting until dinnertime, Anthony had barely settled in at The Lamb Inn the next morning before calling on them. When Charlotte’s mama ushered him through the front door, his tall frame filled the low-ceilinged hallway. The youngsters gathered around him as he absent-mindedly bestowed sweets from his pockets while he asked their mother, over the uproar, if the landlord had carried out the repairs to the roof.
For a while, the parlour was a chaos of noise and happy confusion until the smaller Grenvilles spilt out into the lane clutching their booty of sweetmeats.
This left their mother, Charlotte, and two sisters, Mary and Frances, who at fifteen and nearly seventeen grandly did not consider themselves as mere children. Anthony, even though he had taken off his hat an
