‘Kunitachi,’ Paul Gilbert said.
‘Someone give him a Kleenex.’
‘The Kunitachi College of Music. I made a note of it.’
Leaman took this as the cue to air more of his musical expertise. ‘Suzuki trained.’
The only Suzuki Diamond had heard of was a motorbike and he wasn’t being lured into admitting that. ‘We’ll take your word for it. The point is that Mari’s mother taught her to love music and she was keen enough to have miniature musical instruments fixed to her backpack. I’m thinking it’s possible she was here in Bath for some concert.’
‘But we don’t know when, so how can we tell?’ Halliwell said.
‘You want it on a plate. It’s a possibility, that’s all.’
‘The music festival is always at the end of May,’ Leaman said, ‘but there are concerts of one sort or another all year round.’
‘Ingeborg checked all the local music colleges for a missing Japanese student and came up with nothing,’ Halliwell said.
‘Get with it,’ Diamond said with an opportunity to score. ‘We’re not looking for a missing student now. Mari wasn’t living here. That wouldn’t stop her looking up some Japanese friend in a music college. The music may be a huge red herring, but it keeps swimming into view.’
Diamond and Ingeborg got on the road after an early lunch. The Exeter University physics department had set up a meeting with Mari’s two Japanese friends at 3.30 pm.
‘It’s a learning experience, this,’ he said after they were on the M5 and he’d asked Ingeborg to stay in the slow lane. He believed conversation made the journey go just as quickly as belting along at dangerous speeds. ‘Classical music and now physics. Quite a mental leap.’
‘Einstein managed it,’ Ingeborg said. ‘He was a keen violinist.’
‘You’re starting to sound like John Leaman now.’
‘In what way?’
‘Trotting out facts. I’m not complaining. John’s a useful guy on the team. He was right, saying we must investigate these Exeter friends. I don’t know why I didn’t think of it. Am I losing my grip?’
‘You don’t miss much, guv.’
‘I’m not sleeping all that well.’
‘Any reason?’
‘Bit of a crisis in my personal life.’ He stared at the back of his hand as if it didn’t belong to him. ‘You might as well know. I split up with Paloma.’
‘Really?’ She hesitated before saying with sympathy, ‘That’s tough.’
‘My fault. I came out with one stupid remark too many. Any woman who takes me on is asking for trouble.’
‘Would you like to make it up with her?’
‘Don’t know. We’re proud people, both. She gave me an earful.’
‘Pity if it’s only words that came between you.’
‘There’s more – my attitude. I can’t stop being the hard-nosed cop. She thinks I should lighten up when I’m off duty. I try. Obviously not enough.’
‘It goes with the job.’ Ingeborg said. ‘We’re never entirely off duty. We see something wrong and can’t ignore it.’
‘What started this? You mentioning Einstein, making me feel inferior.’
Ingeborg laughed. ‘I’m no Einstein myself. I failed physics and I can’t read music.’
‘Too bad. I was hoping you’d be discussing relativity with these undergraduates.’
‘And in Japanese?’
‘They must be reasonably fluent in English or they couldn’t study here.’
‘How do you want to deal with them – as a pair or singly?’
‘Definitely one by one. Joint interviews don’t work. There’s always one loudmouth who dominates and it’s sod’s law that the quiet one has all the information.’
‘And we’re treating them as suspects?’
‘We must. John Leaman could be right. They may have murdered her in Exeter and dumped the body in Bath as a blind.’
‘They’re supposed to be her friends.’
‘They’d need a motive, yes, like some bad blood we’ve yet to find out about.’
Even in the slow lane, they reached Exeter ahead of schedule. The university complex north-west of the city was easy to locate. Finding a place to leave the car was more of a problem. ‘There was a time when most students couldn’t afford a motor,’ Diamond said.
‘It’s now,’ Ingeborg said. ‘They just run up a bigger debt.’
At the physics department they were told that the professor was off the campus all day, so they were given his office to use as an interview room.