The Tooth Tattoo

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.’

‘Yes, but things can easily go wrong. You find you’re running through your cash, or you lose your credit cards, or you just get ill and there’s no one with you to share your troubles and laugh them off. The world can seem a hostile place.’

‘It would take more than that to make me jump into a canal.’

She didn’t take the remark as lightly as he intended. ‘We’re not all men of steel.’

‘Just trying to keep a sense of proportion.’

‘Not always so simple. You said she was Japanese. They think differently about suicide. It’s rooted in their culture.’

‘What — harry-karry?’

‘Hara-kiri, actually. No, that’s part of the samurai tradition and too gory to go into. I’m talking about the mass of the people, and the way they think. I’m trying to think of the name of the most famous Japanese dramatist. Anyway, he specialised in plays about lovers who commit suicide, and he was writing over three hundred years ago.’

Paloma’s knowledge of international drama had to be respected. She had her own company advising on historical costume for theatre, film and television.

Diamond said, ‘I heard somewhere that the Japanese are in the premier league for suicide. If you fail in your job, topping yourself is the honourable thing to do. Politicians, bankers, business managers. It wouldn’t happen here. You write a book about your failings and make another fortune.’

His efforts to raise a smile weren’t working.

‘Did this poor girl leave a note?’

‘No.’

‘Then how do they know she killed herself?’

‘They found something with the body that was almost the same as a suicide note. What are those little carved ivory things people collect? They have some sort of practical function.’

‘Netsuke?’

‘Right.’

‘They go with traditional Japanese costume, fixed to the sash of a kimono so that personal items can be suspended from them.’

‘Well, this one was found inside her T-shirt. She may have been holding it to her chest when she jumped. Two embracing figures in snow up to their waists.’

‘Chubei and Umegawa.’

His high opinion of Paloma’s expertise went up several more notches. ‘You know their names?’

‘They’re well known, almost universal characters. And now I’ve remembered the name of the playwright: Chikamatsu. He used them in one of his plays. It ends with the lovers going out into the snow to die.’

‘You’re way ahead of me. The point of this is that the police took the netsuke to be a suicide emblem.’

‘Symbolically, it does make sense,’ she said. ‘I’ve seen the story represented in woodcuts, paintings and netsuke. This poor woman may have been in love.’

‘Not just missing her credit cards, then?’

She finally produced a smile, more in charity than humour. ‘Probably not. Had she met someone?’

‘Couldn’t tell you. I don’t suppose the Vienna police could, either.’

‘Aren’t you interested in why she died?’

‘The “how” matters more than the “why”. If it happened here and it became obvious she’d killed herself, with no possibility of anyone else being involved, we wouldn’t go into all the possible reasons. The inquest will do that. It’s not up to the police to find out her state of mind.’

‘Peter, you probably don’t mean it, but that sounds so uncaring.’

Smarting from that, he justified his statement. ‘We’re not social workers or psychologists. We’d be wrong to try.’

‘But you’d try if she’d been murdered. That’s where your argument breaks down.’

He shrugged. ‘I didn’t think we were arguing. Besides, it’s not my case. The Vienna police dealt with it.’

‘And decided it was suicide because of nothing more substantial than the netsuke? Didn’t they go into it any more deeply than that? Someone could have stuffed the netsuke into her clothes and pushed her in.’

‘Murder, you mean?’

‘Or manslaughter, horseplay that went wrong.’

‘Unlikely.’

‘Why?’

‘If they used the netsuke to delude the police the killing would be premeditated. But it wouldn’t be a very reliable way of going about it. You couldn’t guarantee the police would find the thing. It was not much bigger than a walnut.’

‘So you agree with the official line — it was suicide?’

‘I’ve no doubt they looked at all the evidence.’

‘And this was how long ago? Four years? People still care enough to leave flowers.’

‘It’s a modern custom.’

‘And a nice one. Her family must be devastated. For this to have happened thousands of miles from home — that’s heartbreaking.’

He couldn’t prevent Paloma identifying strongly with the people involved. He’d hoped she would be satisfied knowing the main facts. She’d spoken of the temporary shrine of flowers several times since returning from Vienna.

He tried one more time to draw a line under the incident. ‘Nothing we can do about it. Bad things are happening every day in this world. It’s no good letting them get to you.’

She rounded on him with more passion than he expected. ‘That’s bloody typical of a policeman, if I may say so. Cut yourself off from reality. Develop the hide of a rhinoceros. This was a tragic suicide, a young life sacrificed and probably for love, if the netsuke means anything.’

‘Paloma, we didn’t know her. I haven’t even told you her name.’

‘It’s the offhand way you said it: “Nothing we can do” — as if she’s just a statistic. I know there’s nothing we can do. It’s up to the Austrian police. But I can’t forget we were there and I picked up the flowers. Someone obviously cares about her enough to place a bunch of lilies there four years after the event, even if you want to turn your back.’

He ignored the last remark. ‘Japanese friends, I should think, or local people with more sympathy than most of us, like you.’

‘There you go again, analysing, looking for explanations. I’m saying it’s a personal tragedy. It’s real.’

No question: the very thing he’d wanted to avoid was happening. Paloma was reliving the incident and more upset than ever. Worse, it was becoming an issue between them.

She continued, ‘We spent most of our time in Vienna tracking that bloody film as if the events actually happened. It was only a story, but you seemed more affected by it than the real human tragedy we stumbled over. I tell you, that scene has been on my mind a lot since we got back.’

‘That much is obvious,’ he said. ‘You don’t have to keep telling me. That’s why I asked Ingeborg to find out more. Maybe I shouldn’t have done.’

She turned her head, as if talking to the river. ‘It’s better knowing, even if we can’t do anything about it.’

They walked as far as Weston footbridge before Diamond spoke again, trying to make peace.

‘You had a basinful of The Third Man. Selfish of me. I should have given you more choice in what we did.’

‘I’m not complaining about that. What I find hard to stomach is that you can get emotionally involved in a film, yet cut off from a real death.’

‘My job. Simple as that.’

‘Being detached, you mean?’

‘Any professional will tell you the same — doctor, paramedic, fireman.’

‘Yet you’re a softie underneath. I’ve seen you in tears at the end of the film when the woman walks straight past Joseph Cotten and into the distance.’

‘You weren’t supposed to notice. I’m just the same in Casablanca. She was Anna, by the way.’

‘Who was?’

‘The woman in the film, played by Alida Valli.’

‘For pity’s sake, Peter, I despair of you. Yet you won’t name the Japanese suicide victim.’

‘If it mattered, I would.’

At Twerton, the river divides to accommodate a weir. They followed the towpath along the Western Cut as far as the small humpback bridge that takes its name from the Dolphin.

‘This is almost three hundred years old, did you know?’ Diamond said with a too-obvious shift in the conversation.

‘It can’t be.’

‘Most of it is. One side was bombed in the Bath Blitz and had to be rebuilt. The pub copped it, too. It’s said to be equally old.’

‘How do you know this?’

‘I live just down the road, don’t I? This is one of my locals.’

‘One of them. I like that.’

It was too damp to sit in the garden, so they found a table in one of the eating areas inside. He brought a pint from the bar and a glass of Chablis for Paloma.

She was still tetchy with him, as if more needed to be said. He wittered on for a while, explaining that the Dolphin hadn’t got its name from a small whale that had strayed up the Avon, but an old word for a mooring post.

Only when their meal arrived did Paloma say, ‘When I called you a softie just now, it wasn’t meant as an insult. I don’t think it’s bad if you shed a few tears over a film. It shows you have emotions that are bottled up mostly. You keep them hidden in your working life and I understand why. What I can’t work out is why you don’t relax enough to let your feelings show when you’re off work, such as now.’

‘What do you expect? I’m a bloke.’

‘There you go again, putting up the shutters.’

At a loss, he stared across the room. He could think of nothing to say. He’d never been comfortable talking about what he thought of as personal. Even with his beloved wife, Steph, he’d rarely opened up and after her sudden and violent death he’d confided in nobody, preferring to endure the unimaginable grief in isolation. The wound would never heal and he was certain that no one, however well-meaning, could assist. He’d put the shutters up — as Paloma had expressed it — for a reason. He couldn’t predict how he would react if she were to probe his hidden emotions. Paloma was a valued friend and an occasional lover. Up to now she’d been willing to conduct their relationship on those terms. Unless he was mistaken she seemed this evening to be demanding a change in him that he didn’t think he could make.

When it became obvious Diamond wasn’t going to speak, Paloma said, ‘I know what you’re thinking. Let me remind you that we’ve both got painful areas in our lives — totally different, but hard to bear. My ex-husband, my son. I’ll never come to terms with what happened, just as I wouldn’t expect you to get over your personal tragedy. We’re scarred for life, both of us. But we still have a life. Surely it helps to share joys and sadnesses?’

‘I prefer to keep my sadnesses to myself,’ he said.

She looked surprised. ‘But a trouble shared is a trouble halved — or so they say.’

‘Claptrap.’

She didn’t speak for a moment, but her face drained of colour. ‘I beg your pardon.’

‘What you just said — it’s only a saying and it’s rubbish. I’m not discussing my private life with anyone.’

She caught her breath. ‘I thought I was a part of your private life.’

‘It doesn’t mean you’re on the inside with a licence to go where you want.’

‘You don’t know how hurtful you’re being.’

‘I’ll shut up, then.’

He finished the pie and chips in silence. Although rows with work colleagues were his stock-in-trade, this was his first serious difference with Paloma and he knew he was handling it badly. He offered to get another drink.

She was tight-lipped.

‘Shall we go, then?’ he suggested.

Still silent, she got up from the table and walked to the door. The barman shouted, ‘Cheers, folks. Have a great evening.’ Neither Diamond nor Paloma answered.

Out on the towpath, something definitely needed to be said. In ordinary circumstances they would head towards his house and she would spend the night with him. But it wasn’t as if they were married. These intimacies were occasional and by arrangement — a subtle, consensual understanding.

He said, ‘Perhaps it’s a sign that we’ve moved on, having a few strong words with each other.’ He meant to say they’d grown closer and could speak their differences without the relationship breaking down.

That wasn’t how Paloma took it. ‘Moved on? Are you saying you want to end it?’ She stopped walking and swung round to face him. ‘Are you?’

‘Paloma, it’s not me making an issue out of nothing.’

‘So I’m to blame, am I?’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘Not in as many words, but that’s obviously what you meant. It may sound like nothing to you but I’m not used to being told my opinions are claptrap, especially when I was reaching out to you, doing my best to understand you.’

‘I don’t want to be understood — not like that, anyway.’

Her face reddened and her eyes filled with tears. ‘In that case you don’t need me around. Find some other woman to shag, someone who doesn’t give a damn about you. You and I are through.’

She turned and stepped briskly away without looking back.