Michael went up to London after dinner. He left Lily curled up before the fire presumably quite content to stay at Hardingham.
“Not more than a fortnight, mind,” were Stella’s last words.
He went to see Maurice next morning to get the benefit of his advice about possible places in which to live. Maurice was in his element.
“Of course there really are very few good places. Cheyne Walk and Grosvenor Road, the Albany, parts of Hampstead and Campden Hill, Kensington Square, one or two streets near the Regent’s Canal, Adelphi Terrace, the Inns of Court and Westminster. Otherwise, London is impossible. But you’re living in Cheyne Walk now. Why do you want to move from there?”
Michael made up his mind to take Maurice into his confidence. He supposed that of all his friends he would be as likely as any to be sympathetic. Maurice was delighted by his description of Lily, so much delighted, that he accepted her as a fact without wanting to know who she was or where Michael had met her.
“By Jove, I must hurry up and find my girl. But I don’t think I’m desperately keen to get married yet. I vote for a house near the Canal, if we can find the right one.”
That afternoon they set out.
They changed their minds and went to Hampstead first, where Maurice was very anxious to take a large Georgian house with a garden of about fifteen acres. He offered to move himself and Castleton from Grosvenor Road in order to occupy one of the floors, and he was convinced that the stable would be very useful if they wanted to start a printing press.
“Yes, but we don’t want to start a printing press,” Michael objected. “And really, Mossy, I think twenty-three bedrooms more than one servant can manage.”
It was with great reluctance that Maurice gave up the idea of this house, and he was so much depressed by the prospect of considering anything less huge that he declared Hampstead was impossible, and they went off to Regent’s Park.