The Tooth Tattoo

22

The hooded man was less fit than his pursuer. And unfortunately for him, he’d picked the wrong direction.

‘He doesn’t know he’s heading straight for the canal,’ Mel said. ‘You can’t tell from where he is.’

Diamond just folded his arms and watched.

At the end of the eighteenth century when the canal had been dug through Sydney Gardens the main demand of the committee was that it should be invisible to the promenaders, so it was sited at a depth of twelve feet. From where Diamond and Mel stood, its sinuous route was obvious, but you had to be really close.

‘Does she know it’s there?’ Mel asked.

‘Ingeborg? She was on the bridge with us.’

Gasping and flailing like a marathon runner in sight of the finish, the hoodie was no more than thirty yards ahead of Ingeborg. He covered the last uneven stretch and reached the stone parapet that was there for safety purposes. Now he would see the sheer drop.

Instead of giving up, or turning to fight, he didn’t hesitate. He bent low, gripped the top of the wall, heaved himself over, swung his body down and held on with his fingertips. For a moment he hung there. Then he dropped the remaining six feet or so to the towpath. He could have broken both ankles, but he didn’t. He bent his knees as he hit the ground, staggered a few steps and straightened up. Then he was up and running again, jogging along the towpath towards the north end.

Diamond put his hands to his mouth and yelled to Ingeborg. ‘Don’t try it. Let him go.’

She would have followed, but had the sense to obey instructions. Hands on the wall, she leaned over to see where her quarry had gone.

He was about to disappear into the long tunnel beneath Beckford Road.

‘It’s not worth it,’ Diamond called out. He’d walked that tunnel more than once with Paloma and he knew it wasn’t far short of a hundred yards.

He grabbed the mobile from his pocket and called Bath Central. He couldn’t really expect a patrol team to be close enough to arrest the stalker as he emerged at the other end, but it had to be tried. And even as Diamond was doing his limited best to describe the suspect, part of his brain was asking what crime the guy had committed. Threatening behaviour? Resisting arrest?

Not too convincing.

‘Who was he?’ Mel asked when Diamond finished the call.

‘If you don’t know, I’m sure I don’t. It’s you he was following.’

‘How do you know?’

‘It can’t be us. We only came into the gardens because Tippi told us you were here.’

‘D’you think he’s the Megane driver?’

‘I can’t think of anyone else.’

Ingeborg crossed the bridge and joined them, in a foul mood. ‘He was slowing up, for God’s sake. I could have caught him.’

‘You did okay,’ Diamond told her.

‘I’m not feeble.’

‘Whatever gave you that idea?’

‘Yes, but—’

He knew better than to get into an argument about her physical ability. ‘It’s taken care of. I told control, asked for assistance.’

And she had the good sense not to persist. ‘What can we do him for?’

‘I want to know what he’s up to, that’s all.’

‘Me, too,’ Mel added. He appeared genuinely mystified by all the attention he had been getting.

They made their way back through the gardens to Forester Road, where Ingeborg’s car was parked. Diamond questioned Mel closely about the company he kept and whether he’d made any enemies recently.

‘I don’t have time to go out,’ he said. ‘It’s all rehearsals and tutoring.’

‘Who do you tutor?’

‘Music students. It’s part of our deal.’

‘Female?’

‘Some are.’

‘Could anyone be jealous?’

‘I can’t think why.’

‘Come on, Mel,’ Diamond said. ‘Even I know students get crushes on lecturers. It wouldn’t be unheard of for a man of the world like you to get his leg over.’

Mel shook his head. ‘No chance.’

‘Oh, yeah?’

‘Look, if I want sex it’s on tap at my lodgings.’

There was a pause for thought.

‘It crossed my mind, I have to say,’ Diamond said, ‘but her mother seems to think she’s Snow White.’

‘Have you met her mother?’

‘No, I got that second-hand, but I’ve met Tippi.’

A nod from Mel was enough. No elaboration was needed.

‘Just a thought here,’ Diamond added. ‘Does Tippi have a boyfriend who might suspect you have home advantage, so to speak?’

‘She’s never mentioned one.’

‘She wouldn’t, would she?’

‘A jealous lover?’ Mel said, as if surprised by the idea.

‘It’s you he’s following now, not Tippi.’

Mel scraped the hair back from his forehead. ‘I hadn’t really thought about that.’

‘Better be on your guard. Up to now he seems content to watch you, but that could change.’

They were approaching the house and Diamond hadn’t finished with Mel. ‘What time are you leaving for the rehearsal?’

He looked at his watch. ‘In just under an hour.’

‘Because I’d love to see this valuable instrument of yours.’

‘All right.’

Mel had his own key. There was no need to bring Tippi to the door again. She wasn’t about when they went in. Probably getting dressed, Diamond decided. But he was mistaken. After they’d gone upstairs and Mel opened the door of his room, they found Tippi sitting on the bed with her feet up.

‘Wrong room,’ Mel said.

‘You don’t mind?’ she said coolly. ‘I was checking my nails.

The light’s so much better in here.’

‘I’ve got visitors,’ Mel told her.

‘See you later.’ In the act of wriggling off the bed to leave the room, she treated them to a view that was more page three than Snow White. Diamond thought she winked at him as well.

Mel wasn’t embarrassed. He’d explained the situation already. He reached under the bed and withdrew the instrument case.

‘I still can hardly believe this,’ he said as he unzipped it and opened up. ‘Four hundred years old, near enough.’

The Amati was a beautiful object regardless of its antiquity, the glazed wood almost orange in colour, the finger board and pegs darker.

Mel lifted it one-handed from the case. ‘Isn’t the graining superb? Would you like to hold it? Mozart himself could have played this. He was a viola player, you know.’

Diamond, congenitally clumsy and fearful of doing damage, put both arms underneath and cradled the precious thing Mozart may have handled.

‘Compare it with my own, and see the difference.’ Mel fished under the bed and came out with another case and opened it. This second viola was in a darker wood, but to an inexpert eye looked similar. ‘Mine is a William Hill, and pretty well regarded.’

Diamond occasionally placed a bet with William Hill, but doubted if there could be any connection.

‘It can’t live with this, can it?’ Mel said.

‘Well it has to, under the bed. Is that the best place?’

‘As good as any if it isn’t locked in a bank vault, and that’s not what the owner wants.’

Diamond handed the Amati back to Mel with the same sense of relief as the vicar at a christening. ‘What about the bow? Is that special?’

‘Oh, yes. It came with the instrument. The very best bows sell for about a hundred grand. I can’t tell you the maker of this one. I was so staggered to be presented with the viola that I forgot to ask. To be honest I’m not using it. Tough enough getting used to a new viola, so I still play with my old Tourte. If it’s comfortable and gives the sound you want, why switch?’

‘And the case?’

‘That isn’t special.’

‘I’ll take a look, if you don’t mind.’

Diamond picked the case up and turned it over. He was checking for clues to the true owner’s identity. He found none. Maybe ultra violet would have picked up some security marking you couldn’t see with the naked eye.

‘I thought Stradivari was the great violin man,’ Ingeborg said.

‘He made only about ten violas that survive, compared to five hundred violins and fifty cellos,’ Mel said. ‘He was said to be a pupil of the guy who made this. Nicolò Amati was the third generation of instrument makers in their family, and the greatest. Sadly most early violas have been mutilated.’

‘In what way?’

‘Cut down in size to something not worthy of the name viola. This one escaped, fortunately. I was told it dates from 1625 and that’s of interest because for some reason every almost other Amati you hear about is said to have been made in 1620 and some are fakes, so the date itself has to be regarded with some suspicion. To find one from 1625 gives it a touch more credibility.’

‘But there’s no question that this is the real thing, is there?’ Ingeborg asked.

‘Not to my mind. Listen.’ He picked up his bow and played a snatch of something neither of them recognised, but with a golden tone, warm and soul-stirring. ‘Can that be a fake sound? I don’t think so.’

‘Beautiful,’ Ingeborg said. ‘Will you ever go back to your other one?’

‘Not while I have the use of this. I don’t really feel it’s mine. But in a sense you never truly own a fiddle. It’s passed down over the centuries from one musician to the next, so you’re a caretaker.’ He replaced the Amati in its case.

‘Forgive me,’ Diamond said. ‘I know nothing about musical instruments. It’s hollow, of course?’

‘For the sound,’ Mel said with a tentative smile, uncertain if he was being sent up.

‘But it has these S-shaped holes.’

‘Known as f-holes,’ Mel corrected him. ‘The old-fashioned f looked like an S. The Amati family perfected the shape. It’s remained the same ever since.’

‘What if some small object was dropped inside — a cigarette, say, or a coin, or a ring. Would it affect the sound?’

Mel looked surprised by the question. ‘A hard object like a ring would rattle. I’d know as soon as I picked the instrument up. In fact I think I’d know if something as light as a cigarette was in there.’

‘My distorted way of thinking,’ Diamond said, continuing to play even more clueless than he was. ‘If someone wanted to ship drugs through customs, the inside of a violin or viola might be a good place to stow it. Mind you, a cello would be better still.’

Mel gave a prim response. ‘Drugs? That’s too far out for me.’

‘The holes are too small,’ Ingeborg said.

‘Just a thought, that’s all,’ Diamond said.

Like Mel, she didn’t think much of Diamond’s theory. ‘It wouldn’t fool a sniffer dog.’

‘Probably not.’

‘I can tell you something for sure,’ Mel said. ‘I wouldn’t let anyone interfere with this instrument.’

‘Good for you,’ Diamond said.

‘I’m not in the business of drug-running, anyway.’

‘And I don’t suppose you’ve ever indulged.’

‘No chance.’

‘Not while you’re stuck in Bath,’ Diamond said. ’But the South American tour might be a different story. Put that in your fiddle and smoke it. Are any of your fellow musicians drug users, would you say?

Mel grinned. ‘Can you picture it?’

‘They get their highs from Beethoven and Brahms, do they?’

‘And why not?’

‘Well said,’ Ingeborg murmured, confirming her high regard for Mel.

‘Is Colombia on the itinerary?’ Diamond asked. He wasn’t leaving this.

‘Not that I’ve heard.’

‘If a fellow in a sombrero called Speedy Gonzales offers to carry your case, don’t let him.’

‘I get the message,’ Mel said with a forced smile.

‘But in the meantime — and this is serious — if you get another sight of the stalker, let us know at once. No heroics.’

In the car on the way back to Manvers Street, Ingeborg said, ‘What was all that about drugs, guv? You don’t seriously think they’re a factor, do you?’

‘Testing the ground,’ he said. ‘There’s an extra element in this case that I doubt is music.’ He fished in his pocket. ‘I’m going to call control, see if they picked up our hooded man.’ He wasn’t yet managing one-handed, but he used the mobile more often these days.

After exchanging a few words with the communications room he told Ingeborg, ‘No joy. Not even a sighting.’

‘What description did you give them?’ she asked.

‘Average height and build, wearing a hoodie, dark blue or black. Dark trousers and shoes.’

‘It’s not a lot, especially if he has the sense to take off the hood or tuck it out of sight.’

‘I suppose. What do you think his game is? Have we covered all the angles?’

‘All the obvious ones. Anything else would be stretching it.’

‘And you still think Mel is on the level?’

‘Don’t you?’ She gripped the wheel so hard that the steering shuddered.

In the CID room a surprise awaited them in the shape of a young blonde woman with plaited hair coiled on top of her head. In a houndstooth suit and white blouse, she was sitting on the edge of Keith Halliwell’s desk drinking coffee from the machine.

‘Guv, this is Dagmar,’ Halliwell said, as if Diamond should know all about Dagmar.

‘Right,’ Diamond said, with an enquiring glance towards Ingeborg, who amazed him by saying, ‘Dagmar? How did you manage this?’ She turned to Diamond and said, ‘Dagmar is my contact in the Vienna Police. I never expected to meet her in person.’

Dagmar eased herself off the desk, which involved a small jump. She was not much taller than the three-drawer filing cabinet. She formally extended a hand and addressed Diamond in a voice so deep that it more than compensated. ‘Pleased to meet you, Detective Superintendent. I am Detective Inspector Aschenberger of the Bundespolizei, Vienna District.’

‘We didn’t know they were sending anyone,’ Diamond said, impressed by the strength of her grip.

‘I flew in this morning.’

‘That was quick.’

‘But you are not my reason for coming.’

‘No?’ He scratched his chin, uncertain where this was leading.

‘I am here for a course in forensics at Bristol University, but I volunteered to make a special visit to Bath after we heard from you yesterday.’

Ingeborg said, ‘You’re a star,’

Diamond said, ‘So why are you here — apart from meeting Ingeborg?’

Dagmar stooped and picked her backpack off the floor and made a startling noise ripping open the Velcro flap. ‘As you know, most of the material you requested was sent electronically, but there is a piece of evidence that by law we must keep in the possession of our police service.’

‘The netsuke?’ He felt like picking Dagmar up and kissing her on both cheeks. He had become increasingly curious about the strange little ornament found with Emi Kojima’s body. ‘You brought it with you?’

‘I can allow you to examine it as long as I am present. This way, we observe the letter of the law.’

‘Understood.’

Dagmar produced from the backpack a transparent evidence bag and handed it across. It contained an object not much bigger than a table tennis ball, but less white. It was intricately carved.

‘May I take it out?’ Diamond asked.

‘No problem. Many people have handled it since it was found.’

‘Not many as clumsy as me, I bet.’ With care, he tipped the netsuke into his palm. It weighed very little. ‘Nice carving!’ He held it up with his left hand. Two figures, male and female in traditional costume, formed the upper portion, with hands joined around the rim, exquisitely detailed. The doomed lovers were finely worked by the sculptor, but only to waist level. The lower half of the piece had been left as a mainly flat surface representing fallen snow, giving the impression they were half submerged in a drift.

‘Do you know the story?’ Dagmar said.

‘The lovers who commit suicide by going into deep snow?’

‘Chubei and Umegawa. We learned about this when we consulted Japanese experts to find out whether the netsuke had some significance.’

‘As an emblem of suicide?’

‘Exactly.’ She brought her small hands together in a gesture of finality. ‘With their advice we reached the conclusion that the victim meant it to symbolise her choice of death.’

‘So we heard. And did the evidence back this up?’

She shrugged. ‘There were no obvious signs of... what do you say?’

‘Foul play?’

‘Yes. No foul play.’

Diamond didn’t relish challenging the Bundespolizei, Vienna District, interpretation, but it had to be done. ‘The body had been in the water for some time, right?’

‘Correct.’ Dagmar looked at him with all the respect she would show to a man who had arrived at her door to sell double-glazing.

‘So it was difficult to be certain?’

‘We don’t claim it is certain. These questions had to be decided by a jury and they could have been mistaken.’

‘They wouldn’t be the first. And who carried out the autopsy?’

‘A hospital doctor.’

‘Not a forensic pathologist?’

‘She was a qualified pathologist.’

‘Not a forensics expert. We had two autopsies done on our victim. The second revealed that she was strangled. A small bone in her throat fractured. Unless your pathologist was looking for it...’

Dagmar said, ‘Nothing like this was in the report of our autopsy. But even if there was damage to the throat and it wasn’t discovered, it is too late now. The body was returned to Japan for disposal.’

He didn’t press the point any more. He wanted to stay on speaking terms. ‘Did you discover where this netsuke came from? They’re collectors’ pieces, aren’t they?’

‘Usually they are, particularly if they are antique. They can be extremely valuable. We had this one valued by an expert and he said the workmanship was of high quality.’

‘Even I can see that,’ Diamond said holding the ivory piece up to the light. ‘It’s obviously handmade, not cast.’

‘That is true,’ Dagmar said, ‘but the value is not especially high. It’s not antique. There are craftsmen working with modern precision tools who make these as copies of ancient designs.’

‘Forgeries?’

‘If they are traded as antiques, yes. But if they are sold as what they are, modern artefacts, you can’t call them forgeries. They have some intrinsic value for the workmanship.’

Ingeborg came in on the conversation. ‘But if they’re ivory, they’re illegal. Ivory products have been banned since 1989, and rightly so, in my opinion.’

‘That is true and no right-minded person would argue with you,’ Dagmar said in a tone suggesting she was about to do exactly that. ‘True of elephant ivory. But this netsuke is not elephant ivory.’

‘What is it, then?’

‘Mammoth.’

‘Get away,’ Diamond said.

Dagmar continued in her solemn voice, ‘Don’t you know about this? The melting of the ice-cap has revealed large quantities of mammoth remains in the Russian tundra. The tusks are workable as ivory and can be traded within the law. They are not particularly valuable.’

‘Yet this thing I have in my hand is actually thousands of years more ancient than the netsuke that are so prized. That’s weird.’

‘Weird, but true. Mammoth ivory netsuke are increasingly being worked and traded, and not just by Japanese.’

An awed silence had descended. Visions of mammoths roaming the Siberian wastes half a million years ago were pretty remote from the CID room in Bath.

It took Paul Gilbert to bring everyone back to the twenty-first century. ‘So how does this affect the case?’

‘It doesn’t,’ Dagmar said. ‘The symbolism would still be just as valid if it was made from plastic.’

‘Where would she have got it from?’ Diamond asked for the second time.

‘In Vienna? From some private source. You don’t find these in good antique shops.’

Diamond said, ‘We may sound ungrateful, Dagmar, but we’re not. We’re looking at it from the perspective of another case.’

‘I know about this. Your Japanese woman.’ Even so, her lip curled slightly as she added, ‘But if I understand correctly there was no netsuke found with her.’

‘Yet there are other things in common.’

‘But your woman was strangled, you said.’

‘And we must decide if we agree with that jury of yours that Emi Kojima committed suicide.’ Back to confrontation, but it had to be said.

Dagmar shot him a withering look.

He refused to blink. ‘Just now you said there were no obvious signs of foul play. I noted your words. Might there have been something you wouldn’t classify as obvious?’

‘Have you read the autopsy report?’ Dagmar asked.

‘It only landed on my desk this morning.’

‘We provided a translation.’

‘Thank you. I haven’t got to it yet. Is there anything we should know about?’

Keith Halliwell said, ‘I’ve been through it. Some of the fingernails on both hands were broken. She had quite long nails.’

Dagmar said, ‘It all depends on your interpretation. This may have happened when the body was underwater, or being recovered.’

‘Or when she was fighting an attacker,’ Halliwell said.

Dagmar shrugged in a dismissive way.

‘You went to some trouble finding out about her background in Tokyo,’ Diamond said. ‘The drugs and the prostitution.’

‘That was all provided by the Japanese authorities.’

‘Before, or after, the autopsy?’

‘After. But we had it in time for the inquest.’

‘Did you discover why she came to Vienna? Was she selling herself there?’

‘We had no reports that she was.’

‘It’s hard to understand how a woman who used drugs and traded in sex managed to get herself to Europe.’

‘Maybe,’ Dagmar said, ‘but it happened.’

‘Perhaps there was trafficking going on.’

‘Quite possibly, giving her a reason to kill herself.’

‘Or be killed. Is there much of a Far East influence on organised crime in your city?’

‘There is some for sure, just like the mafia, into all kinds of illegal money-making. They are the yakuza, a network of Japanese gangs with international connections, increasingly in Europe.’

‘I know a little about them,’ Ingeborg said. ‘They’re rooted in tradition and go back a long way, but it comes down to the usual rackets like drugs, loan-sharking, gambling, protection and prostitution. They had a stake in a large swathe of Japanese industry, but the authorities have cracked down hard in recent years and they’re starting to make inroads elsewhere. This poor young woman could have been part of the process.’

Diamond sensed the discussion slipping away from the investigation. ‘There’s a point you may not be aware of,’ he said to Dagmar. ‘Both of these victims had a grounding in classical music. Emi was trained to a high level in a Tokyo violin school. And Mari’s mother was also a product of one of those schools and Mari inherited the passion for it. I don’t think she performed, but she spent all her pocket money on concerts. We believe she came to Bath specially to hear a string quartet called the Staccati. She had them as a screensaver on her phone.’

‘Three of them,’ Ingeborg was quick to correct him. ‘The fourth is a late addition.’

‘True,’ he said, ‘but all four were in Vienna in 2008 when Emi ended up in the canal.’

‘Not Mel,’ Ingeborg insisted, her face flushing.

‘He happened to be there with the London Symphony Orchestra,’ Diamond informed her. ‘I don’t think you heard him telling me in Sydney Gardens. You were keeping tabs on the stalker at the time.’

Now Ingeborg went white. ‘I didn’t know this. You didn’t tell me.’

‘Probably just coincidence,’ he said to pacify her. There was a bigger issue here than Ingeborg’s cosying up to Mel.

Dagmar asked, ‘Have you interrogated these people?’

‘ “Interrogated” is putting it too strongly. We’re talking to them. We have it confirmed by one of them that Mari Hitomi attended the first concert they gave. She wasn’t seen alive after that.’ He let that sink in before saying, ‘Now do you understand our interest in what happened in Vienna?’

She said tersely, ‘We are not aware of any link between this quartet and the death of Emi Kojima.’

Diamond lifted the netsuke high. ‘I’m thinking this could be it.’