“There were potatoes and carrots and a lot of things which I may have eaten, but completely failed to recognise in a raw state. And then suddenly, through a gap in the asparagus, I saw a vast yellowy-green object. It seemed about four times the size of an ordinary Rugby football, and a steady stream of people circled slowly round it and an ancient man, who periodically groomed it with a vast coloured handkerchief. So I steered a zigzag course between a watery-eyed duck on my right and a hand-holding couple on my left, and joined the stream. At close quarters it seemed even vaster than when viewed from the other side of the tent, and after I’d made the grand tour twice, I thought I’d engage the ancient man in conversation. Unfortunately, he was stone deaf, and his speech was a little indistinct owing to a regrettable absence of teeth, so we managed between us to rivet the fascinated attention of every human being in the tent. In return for the information that it was the largest pumpkin ever produced in Kent, I volunteered that I had come from London specially to write about it. He seemed a bit hazy about London, but when I told him it was larger than Appledore he appeared fairly satisfied that his pumpkin would obtain justice. “He also launched into a voluble discourse, which was robbed of much of its usefulness by his habit of holding his false teeth in position with his thumb as he spoke. Luckily a local interpreter was at hand, and from him I gathered that the old man was eighty-five, and had never been farther afield than Ashford, forty-eight years ago. Also that he was still gardener at Cedarlime, a house which I must have passed on my way from the station. Standing well back it was: fine flower gardens—‘but not what they was. Not since the new gentleman come—a year ago. Didn’t take the same interest—not him. A scholard, they said ’e was; crates and crates of books had come to the house—things that ’eavy that they took three and four men to lift them.’ “He rambled on did that interpreter, while the ancient man polished the pumpkin in the time-honoured manner, and wheezed spasmodically. But I wasn’t paying much attention, because it had suddenly come back to me that Cedarlime was the name of the house where I had spoken to the inscrutable stranger. Subconsciously I had noticed it as I crossed the road; now it was brought back to my memory. “‘Is the owner of Cedarlime a youngish, man?’ I asked my informant. ‘Dark hair; rather sallow face?’ “He shook his head. The owner of Cedarlime was a middle-aged man with grey hair, but he often had friends stopping with him who came from London, so he’d heard tell—friends who didn’t stop long—just for the week-end, maybe, or four or five days. Probably the man I meant was one of these friends.