“Delighted to see you again, Mr. Stone,” she said in her rich, husky voice. She panted a little as she spoke, like a short-winded lap-dog. It was Mrs. Budge who, having read in the “Daily Mirror” that the Government needed peach stones--what they needed them for she never knew--had made the collection of peach stones her peculiar “bit” of war work. She had thirty-six peach trees in her walled garden, as well as four hot-houses in which trees could be forced, so that she was able to eat peaches practically the whole year round. In 1916 she ate 4200 peaches, and sent the stones to the Government. In 1917 the military authorities called up three of her gardeners, and what with this and the fact that it was a bad year for wall fruit, she only managed to eat 2900 peaches during that crucial period of the national destinies. In 1918 she did rather better, for between January 1st and the date of the Armistice she ate 3300 peaches. Since the Armistice she had relaxed her efforts; now she did not eat more than two or three peaches a day. Her constitution, she complained, had suffered; but it had suffered for a good cause. Denis answered her greeting by a vague and polite noise. “So nice to see the young people enjoying themselves,” Mrs. Budge went on. “And the old people too, for that matter. Look at old Lord Moleyn and dear Mr. Callamay. Isn’t it delightful to see the way they enjoy themselves?” Denis looked. He wasn’t sure whether it was so very delightful after all. Why didn’t they go and watch the sack races? The two old gentlemen were engaged at the moment in congratulating the winner of the race; it seemed an act of supererogatory graciousness; for, after all, she had only won a heat. “Pretty little thing, isn’t she?” said Mrs. Budge huskily, and panted two or three times. “Yes,” Denis nodded agreement. Sixteen, slender, but nubile, he said to himself, and laid up the phrase in his memory as a happy one. Old Mr. Callamay had put on his spectacles to congratulate the victor, and Lord Moleyn, leaning forward over his walking-stick, showed his long ivory teeth, hungrily smiling. “Capital performance, capital,” Mr. Callamay was saying in his deep voice. The victor wriggled with embarrassment. She stood with her hands behind her back, rubbing one foot nervously on the other. Her wet bathing-dress shone, a torso of black polished marble. “Very good indeed,” said Lord Moleyn. His voice seemed to come from just behind his teeth, a toothy voice. It was as though a dog should suddenly begin to speak. He smiled again, Mr. Callamay readjusted his spectacles. “When I say ‘Go,’ go. Go!” Splash! The third heat had started. “Do you know, I never could learn to swim,” said Mrs. Budge. “Really?” “But I used to be able to float.”