The next weeks passed in ending all connection with Hamingburgh, which Peter now found intolerable, and in preparing for life in London commensurate with his new ideas. He took rooms for himself and his mother in Curzon Street, to be made ready for the autumn season. "We will have everything very beautiful, and we will have only what is necessary," he told his mother as they talked things over in their flat at Golder's Green. "Of course we must sell all this stuff." He waved his hands in an inclusive gesture toward the chairs and tables. Mrs. Paragon mildly looked about her. "But, Peter, I thought you liked all this pretty furniture." "It's modern," said Peter briefly. "There is no such thing as modern furniture. Ask Marbury." He came and sat on the arm of his mother's chair. "I must get Marbury to help. I want to see you talking to Lady Mary over a tea-table by the Brother's Adam." "Peter, this is the third time to-day you have mentioned Lord Marbury's sister." "Naturally, mother. This is polling day at Highbury. I've been wondering how things are going." A few days later Marbury came to town and took his seat as member for Sandhaven. Peter secured him for the following evening, and they all three dined together at the flat in Golder's Green. Marbury was called upon for advice as to Curzon Street. "Peter," he said, "this is a new phase. Don't encourage him, Mrs. Paragon. He wasn't intended for an exquisite. He's too robust." "He does not need encouraging," said Mrs. Paragon. She had calmly accepted Peter's new enthusiasm, and now only wondered how long it would endure. "Peter has already sold all our furniture," she added by way of information. "It will disappear at the end of the week." "What are you going to do in the meantime?" asked Marbury, exchanging an intelligible smile with Mrs. Paragon. Mrs. Paragon quietly answered him, unaware of the irony which lurked in her undisturbed acceptance of the inevitable. "Peter says that no one stays in London during these next months. He says we must go to the North of Scotland." "What are you going to do there?" asked Marbury. "Peter is going to fish," said Mrs. Paragon. When the time came Mrs. Paragon discovered that her part in the holiday in North Britain was to attend Peter during long happy days in lonely places where Peter mysteriously dangled in lakes and rivers. She dreamed away the time beside the basket of food and shared with Peter pleasant meals under the sky, quickened with his lively account of the morning's work.