Tarleton was delighted with the scenery. What pleased him still more was the absence of all traffic. We did not meet one vehicle in the road, except a farmer’s cart.
“This is the least-known beauty spot in England,” he cried with enthusiasm. “Those hills yonder must be in Radnorshire, a county whose existence I have always doubted. This is the old Welsh March, where the Britons stayed the Saxon advance at last, and kept their freedom in Wild Wales. What a contrast between this and Tarifa Road, Chelsea!”
The reminder came just in time. I had been on the point of telling him that King Arthur’s tomb stood on the crest of one of the hills that overlooked the Golden Valley. I bit my lip, thankful that I hadn’t betrayed myself.
We went through the sleepy village, bringing out one or two women with babies in their arms to their garden gates. Then we turned into the park and saw the rabbits scampering to the right and left as we crossed the fern-covered slopes.
“This is a true ‘haunt of ancient peace,’” murmured the consultant wistfully. “This is the sort of place I want to end my days in. And we have come to disturb it, perhaps to bring disaster and disgrace. I should be glad if we could turn back now and go away again.”
I turned to him expectantly. His words had echoed my own thoughts so closely that I half hoped to find him ready to act upon them. But the frown on his brow and the stern set of his mouth told me that I was deluding myself.
The car drew up at the main entrance to the Castle. The ivy-clad ruins to which the building owed its name were almost screened from view by the huge red-brick front of a dull edifice dating from the reign of George the Second. The mansion had been put up out of ostentation at a cost from which the estate had never recovered, and every Earl of Ledbury since had cursed his ancestor’s extravagance. I know that the present Earl found it hard to pay the interest on his mortgages, and that he lived in one corner of the vast house, leaving long corridors and whole suites of rooms to the spiders and rats.
We got out, and Sir Frank Tarleton gave his card and mine to the man who came down the steps to receive us. His suit of black was threadbare, and his coat looked as if it had been thrust on hastily at the sound of our approach.
“Please take our cards to Lady Violet Bredwardine, and ask her ladyship if we can see her in private, on urgent business.”
The servant stared at the message. His eyes wandered from Tarleton to me, and I thought there was a vague recognition in them when they met mine. But his manner was respectful and demure.