The Tooth Tattoo(10)
He still had no clue as to which quartet they were. He knew of many and had played in some. This wasn’t to say he was an expert. String quartets were legion, a surprising number top notch, plenty whose best hope was to get through a concert without people leaving, a humble majority who confined themselves to weddings like this and a few who were just abysmal. The high-flyers literally jetted around the world delighting audiences in distant places, so it was understandable that he’d not heard Cat in concert. He was sure he’d have noticed her.
They’d reached the end of a rendering of Moon River that she’d embellished with trills the trio hadn’t heard before, all in waltz time, and now she waved the bow for Mel to take over. ‘Melly, my dear, I haven’t had my second slice of wedding cake. I’m through playing.’
She was given a round of applause and blew kisses to the audience. While changing places with Mel she said with a wink, ‘See more of you soon, eh?’
‘So I may be in with a chance?’
‘Don’t push it, ducky. We only met an hour ago.’
‘I meant the quartet.’
‘Oh, that. Better wait and see. Is this your best instrument?’
‘I do have another I keep for concert work.’
‘That’s a relief. This one isn’t fit to use as a doorstop. Promise me you won’t show it to any of the others.’
He wasn’t going to miss an opening like that. ‘I only show mine to girls, really lucky girls.’
‘Well, it didn’t get my juices going, honey. Keep it hidden.’
‘Does anyone else need to vet me?’
‘You bet.’ She blew a kiss. ‘Thanks for today. Wild.’
He didn’t see her again that afternoon. At the end of the river trip, when they were packing up, one of the ushers asked him who the woman in yellow had been.
‘That was Cat,’ Mel said.
‘Your girlfriend?’
‘D’you mind? We only met today.’
‘The reason I asked,’ the usher said, ‘is that no one seems to know who invited her. The bride’s people thought she was one of the groom’s family and the groom thought she was on the bride’s side. We decided in the end she must have come with you.’
4
BATH, 2012
‘It was a suicide,’ Diamond told Paloma. ‘Want to hear more, or would you rather not know?’
Back in Bath, on an overcast evening with soft rain in the air, they were taking one of their walks along the industrial stretch of the river west of the city, crammed on the south side with warehouses and factories, a far cry from the elegant part of Vienna they’d stayed in, but there was a compensation: they were only five minutes, he judged, from the Dolphin in Lower Weston. Walking wasn’t a pleasurable activity for Diamond unless there was a pint and a pie when it finished.
‘Every suicide is a tragedy,’ Paloma said.
‘Of course.’
‘It’s been on my mind ever since I saw all those flowers people had left. I want to know the details – and yet in a way I don’t.’
‘Best forget it, then.’
On the opposite side of the river an InterCity train bound for Bristol enforced a timely pause, long enough for Paloma to come to a decision.
‘I’m sorry. I know I shan’t stop thinking about it. You’d better tell me what you found out.’
‘Then we leave it and move on?’
‘Agreed.’
‘Okay,’ he said. ‘I asked Ingeborg. She’s a wiz at winkling out information. Even so, it took her a while on the internet. Four years ago the body of a tourist was found in the Danube canal close to those steps. A Japanese woman in her twenties.’
Paloma’s sympathy now had more to latch onto. ‘A tourist? Poor soul. Was she travelling alone?’
‘Apparently.’
‘I wonder what drove her to do such a thing. Did they identify her?’
‘Months later, through her DNA. She’d been in the water too long to be recognised.’
‘How do they do that?’
‘DNA is unique to each individual, as you know. They take a sample from the remains and once they know of a missing person they can compare the profiles.’
‘What with?’
‘Traces found in the home – hair follicles, skin cells, blood, saliva. A comb or a toothbrush will often have DNA attached.’
‘I suppose the family reported her missing.’
‘Not immediately. She’d been away some time. Her travel arrangements were open-ended.’
Paloma took a sharp, pitying breath. ‘So easy to get depressed when you’re alone in a strange city.’
‘She must have known what to expect.’