The Rainaldi Quartet Read online

  ‘Where now?’ he said.

  ‘Let’s try his workshop, just in case.’

  Rainaldi’s workshop was in a scruffy side-street off the Corso Garibaldi, not one of the more fashionable areas for violin-making in the city, but then Rainaldi was not a fashionable luthier. The road outside was crammed with parked vehicles so we left our car fifty metres further on and walked back along the pavement. The workshop was on the ground floor of a three-storey building. It was set back from the street, accessed through an archway which led into a small paved courtyard. There were no lights on in either the courtyard or Rainaldi’s workshop, just an eerie yellowish sheen over the stonework from the lamps out on the street.

  ‘He doesn’t appear to be here,’ Guastafeste said.

  ‘Then where on earth is he?’

  ‘Probably home by now. We’ll call Clara again and find they’re tucked up in bed together.’

  ‘You got your mobile?’ I said. ‘Antonio?’

  Guastafeste was peering in through the window of the workshop, his hands cupped around his eyes to cut out the reflections from the glass. He’d gone very still.

  ‘Antonio?’ I said again. ‘Your phone.’

  He didn’t appear to hear me. He moved away from the window and headed for the archway.

  ‘I’ll be right back.’

  When he returned, moments later, he was carrying the torch he kept in his car. He shone the beam through the workshop window. Something about his manner alarmed me.

  ‘What is it?’ I said. I stepped towards the window, but Guastafeste shifted his position slightly to block me. He clicked off his torch.

  ‘Antonio, what’s the matter?’ I said.

  Guastafeste didn’t reply. He went to the workshop door. He took out his handkerchief, wrapped it carefully around the door handle, then depressed the lever. The door was locked. Guastafeste took a pace backwards, lifted his leg and smashed the sole of his shoe into the door. The wood around the lock splintered and the door flew open with a bang. Guastafeste stepped over the threshold. I made a move to follow him but he motioned me back.

  ‘You’d better stay outside, Gianni.’

  I stared at him, bewildered. ‘Why? What’s happened?’

  Guastafeste flicked on the light switch just inside the door. I caught a glimpse of a figure slumped over a workbench in the middle of the room before Guastafeste closed the door behind him, shutting out my view. I could have gone to the window and looked in, but I didn’t want to see. I didn’t want to know. There was a sickness in my stomach, a ghostly touch of premonition on my neck that made me shiver.

  Guastafeste came back out into the courtyard, his mobile phone in his hand.

  ‘Go and wait in the car, Gianni.’ He punched a number into the phone.

  ‘Tomaso…’ I said.

  Guastafeste touched my arm gently. ‘Go and wait in the car.’

  2

  The police were there in less than five minutes. The black and white patrol cars were first, their sirens blaring despite the time of night and lack of traffic, their rooftop lights flashing. They were followed by a couple of unmarked saloons containing plain-clothes detectives. They didn’t trouble to find anywhere to park, just stopped in a line in the middle of the street. I saw Guastafeste come out through the archway to meet them, watched him confer for a while with his colleagues before they all turned and disappeared into the courtyard. Uniformed officers were already closing off the street, putting out plastic bollards, running red and white tapes between the buildings.

  I felt numb. I knew Rainaldi was dead. Why else had Guastafeste sent me away except to spare me the trauma of seeing my friend’s body? Yet, for the police to be there, and in such force, I knew there was more to it than a simple death.

  I waited, staring down the street at the garish blue lights on top of the police cars, still illuminated but no longer flashing. One of the officers looked in my direction, saw me sitting in the car. He started to walk towards me, but at that moment Guastafeste came out from the courtyard and overtook him, saying something that made the officer turn back. Guastafeste kept on walking. He pulled open the car door and slid into the driver’s seat next to me. He gazed out through the windscreen as if he couldn’t bring himself to look at me.

  ‘How did he die?’ I asked.

  Guastafeste took hold of the steering wheel and gripped it hard, bowing his head and giving a low sigh.

  ‘I have to know,’ I said.

  Guastafeste lifted his head, still not looking at me. ‘He was stabbed in the back of the neck with a chisel.’

  ‘Dio!’ I felt my chest tighten. I was suddenly short of breath. I wound down the window to let in some air.

  ‘I’ll get a squad car to take you home,’ Guastafeste said. ‘Someone will have to tell Clara.’

  ‘I know. I’ll do it. I have to wait for the Scene of Crime team, the forensic people to arrive – it shouldn’t be long – then I’ll go over and tell her.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ I said.

  He looked at me now. ‘That’s not necessary. Not you, Gianni, you were his friend.’

  ‘So were you.’

  ‘I’m a police officer, it’s different. I won’t put you through an ordeal like that. It’s too painful.’

  ‘And Clara? What about her pain? I know her. She’ll take it better from me.’

  Guastafeste considered the suggestion for a time, then nodded. ‘If you don’t mind … yes, I think it might be better.’

  ‘She’ll ask me who, why. What do I tell her?’

  ‘That it’s too early to say. But tell her we’ll find out. I promise her that.’

  Guastafeste looked away again. He was trying hard to remain professional, but I could see the strain in his face.

  ‘Do you want a police officer with you, a woman?’ he said. ‘We have a special trauma unit. They’re trained in things like this.’

  ‘Not with me,’ I said. ‘But you could send one to Giulia’s house. To tell her what’s happened and bring her over to her mother’s.’

  ‘Of course, I should have thought.’ Guastafeste twisted sideways in his seat to face me. ‘I’m sorry, Gianni. I’m so very sorry.’ He reached over and embraced me, a friend now, not a police officer. Then he broke away and opened his door. ‘I’ll get someone to run you over.’

  The uniformed poliziotto said nothing to me on the short journey to Rainaldi’s house. I was relieved. I didn’t want to talk. Certainly not to him, a stranger I’d never met before. I didn’t even want to talk to Clara, but I knew I had to. I owed it to her, to Tomaso. The prospect filled me with dread, but it was the right thing to do.

  I could tell from the moment she opened the door that Clara knew her husband was gone. My very presence, my grave expression, the police car behind me on the street must have told her.

  ‘No, no,’ she said, so breathless she could barely get the words out. ‘It’s not … no … it’s not…’ She backed away down the hall, shaking her head, her gaze fixed on my face, eyes wide open, bleak with shock.

  ‘Come and sit down, Clara,’ I said gently. I moved towards her, tried to take her arm, but she shied away from me.

  ‘Tell me, just tell me, Gianni. He’s dead, isn’t he?’

  I nodded. ‘I’m sorry, Clara.’

  She let out an animal howl of agony, her hand going to her mouth. ‘Oh, God. How?’

  ‘Let’s sit down,’ I said.

  ‘I don’t want to sit down. How? He crashed, didn’t he? Crashed the car. Had he been drinking? He always drinks too much when he goes to your house.’

  ‘He didn’t crash. He was in his workshop.’

  ‘But I rang there. What was it, a heart attack? For God’s sake, Gianni, tell me.’

  I took hold of her arm. This time she made no move to resist. I led her through into the sitting room and lowered her on to the settee. Her arms were trembling, fragile as twigs. She suddenly seemed very old.

  ‘It wasn’t a heart attack,’ I said, wonderin
g how I was going to tell her. Accidental death, natural causes were one thing, but murder?

  ‘Someone killed him,’ I said. There was no honest way of softening the blow.

  ‘Killed him?’ she breathed. ‘What do you mean? Deliberately? You mean he was murdered?’

  ‘Yes.’

  She stared at me in disbelief. ‘Who would do that? Tomaso never harmed anyone in his life. Why? Why would they do it? What happened?’

  ‘I didn’t see him. Antonio found him. I think he was stabbed.’

  ‘Stabbed? With a knife?’

  ‘I don’t know the details,’ I lied, wanting to spare her the image of the chisel that had been haunting me since Guastafeste had first told me.

  She continued staring at me, her eyes unblinking, but I don’t think she was seeing me. She was seeing through me, beyond me to a place only she could go. I’d expected her to break down. I’d prepared myself for tears, for uncontrollable grief, but she was unnaturally calm now, almost catatonic with shock. I found that more unsettling than the wildest hysteria.

  ‘I’ll get you a drink,’ I said. ‘Have you any brandy?’

  She didn’t answer, didn’t seem to register the question. I went out into the kitchen, glad of something to do. I couldn’t just sit there and watch her shrivel up, watch a part of her die too. I rummaged through the cupboards, found a bottle of grappa and brought it back to the sitting room. Clara hadn’t moved. I sat down next to her, poured a glass of brandy and held it to her lips.

  ‘Drink, Clara. It will do you good. Come on, try.’

  She opened her mouth and I forced in a little grappa. She swallowed, then coughed as the fiery liquor went down. The spasm seemed to jolt her out of her stupor. She blinked and turned to look at me. I saw a terrible sadness in her face, an inconsolable despair. Her features crumpled and she began to weep. I put my arms around her and let her cry, let the pain flood out in great racking sobs.

  I was still holding her, quiet now, drained and exhausted, when the front doorbell rang. I eased my arms out from behind her and went into the hall. A woman police officer and Clara’s daughter, Giulia, were outside. I showed them into the sitting room.

  ‘Giulia’s here,’ I said.

  Mother and daughter embraced tearfully and I turned away to leave them alone with their grief.

  ‘I’ll stay with them now,’ the woman police officer said. ‘There’s a driver outside to take you home.’

  I nodded weakly, aware of how tired I was. I looked at Clara and Giulia holding each other on the settee. Giulia glanced up at me over her mother’s shoulder, her cheeks streaming with tears.

  ‘I’ll call back in the morning,’ I said.

  My house seemed very quiet and empty when the police driver dropped me off. I went through into the back room and slumped down into an armchair. I was worn out, but somehow couldn’t face my bed, couldn’t face the effort of trying to get to sleep when my mind was in such turmoil.

  I sat there in the darkness, shadows all around me, tears welling up, and thought about Rainaldi, my thoughts running through the half century I had known him in brief, fleeting glimpses, like clips from a dozen films. Seeing him at school with me; sitting beside me in the local youth orchestra; on the day of his marriage, Clara radiant next to him; with our children at a picnic by the river; in his workshop crafting a piece of wood. A palimpsest of memories, each one overlaying the one before, obliterating it so that in the end I was left only with my final image of him – sitting here in my back room, a glass of whisky on the table beside him, his violin tucked under his chin, face alight with joy as he played one of his beloved quartets. That was how I wanted to remember him.

  * * *

  I must have dozed off some time in the small hours. I recall feeling drowsy, seeing the clock on the mantelpiece registering 3:15, but then nothing afterwards. When I next opened my eyes it was light outside. The clock read half past eight. I shifted uncomfortably in my armchair. My eyes felt sore, my head thick. I stretched my limbs to ease the stiffness. For a fraction of a second I wondered what I was doing downstairs, then it all came flooding back with a sickening clarity. I tried to shut out the thoughts, the images, but they were too fresh in my mind, too disturbing, to be erased. I pulled myself slowly to my feet and shuffled through into the kitchen.

  I was sitting at the kitchen table, sipping coffee and eating a dried-out bread roll and jam when Guastafeste telephoned.

  ‘I didn’t wake you, did I?’ he said.

  ‘No, I’m up.’

  ‘Are you free any time today? You knew Tomaso’s workshop well. Would you come in and take a look around it for me?’

  ‘Now?’

  ‘Whenever you can make it.’

  ‘Give me half an hour,’ I said.

  I washed and changed my clothes and drove into Cremona. It was a bright sunny day, too bright for my sombre mood, not to mention the ache behind my eyes which I attributed to either lack of sleep or too much alcohol the night before.

  The street outside Rainaldi’s workshop was still closed to traffic, the surrounding area still taped off. One or two curious onlookers were clustered on the pavement, but there was nothing much to see. Guastafeste met me by the entrance to the courtyard and escorted me through into the workshop. Rainaldi’s body was gone, removed to the morgue for autopsy, Guastafeste explained, but there was a chalk outline on the workbench where it had lain. I tried not to look at it. Two men in white overalls were painstakingly collecting bits of debris from the floor and the top of the bench, and on virtually every surface was a dusting of white powder which I assumed had been used for taking fingerprint evidence. I’d never been present at a crime scene before. It was calm and quiet and unhurried, everyone going about their jobs in a methodical, clinical manner. It was difficult to believe that a few hours earlier a man had died here.

  ‘Try not to touch anything,’ Guastafeste said. He was bleary-eyed, unshaven, his clothes crumpled. I knew he’d been up all night.

  ‘What am I looking for?’ I asked.

  ‘Anything that strikes you as odd, out of place. Anything missing.’

  ‘You think something might have been stolen?’

  ‘The workshop had been searched, I’m sure of that. Not wrecked, the way you see it in films, but searched nonetheless. The locked cupboard doors had all been forced open, there was stuff spilt on the floor that I don’t think Tomaso would have done.’

  I let my gaze wander around the room. I’d been here many times before, but always with Rainaldi. Without his loud, gregarious presence it seemed like a different place, one I was seeing for the first time.

  ‘Would he have kept money here?’ Guastafeste asked.

  ‘Not large sums,’ I replied. ‘A bit of petty cash, that’s all.’

  ‘What about instruments? Do you know if he was working on any valuable violins?’

  ‘Valuable?’ I shook my head. ‘Not Tomaso, he wasn’t that kind of luthier.’ It felt disloyal to say it, but the truth was that Rainaldi had not been a very distinguished violin-maker. He’d come into the business late and had not built up much of a reputation. He’d got by, done a lot of low-grade repair work to pay the bills, but his own violins had not been greatly sought after. I could not see that there would have been any valuable instruments in his workshop, either his own or anyone else’s.

  ‘You think robbery might have been the motive?’ I said. I was studying the bench along the side of the room. There was a length of maple in a vice waiting to be sawn, some rough-cut violin backs and bellies, a rib assembly clamped together while the glue dried.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Guastafeste said. ‘It’s a puzzle. Why was Tomaso here? Did he call in for something on his way home and was surprised by his killer? The door of the workshop hadn’t been forced.’

  ‘Someone with a key?’ I said.

  ‘Or Tomaso let them in himself. It’s possible he was meeting someone here.’

  My eyes came to rest on the rack of tools above one of
the benches – the saws and planes and gouges, the row of chisels with a gap where one was missing.

  ‘Why would anyone kill him?’ I said, voicing my own inner confusion rather than because I expected a reply. ‘A man like Tomaso. Everyone liked him. Everyone.’

  The two men in white overalls were collecting up their plastic bags and screw-capped containers, recording their finds in a large black logbook. I saw Rainaldi’s pipe – the stained wooden briar pipe that he liked to smoke as he worked – in one of the bags. It was such a personal possession, so much a familiar part of the man that I couldn’t bear to look at it. I turned away and said to Guastafeste: ‘I’m sorry, I can’t see anything out of the ordinary.’

  He seemed to sense my discomfort for he didn’t press me further, just led me out into the courtyard.

  ‘It was worth a try,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry to have brought you all the way in for nothing.’

  ‘That’s all right. I was going to come in to visit Clara in any case.’

  ‘Let’s go together. I need to talk to her. She might find it easier if you’re there too.’

  I looked at him. ‘She was in a bad way last night.’

  ‘I won’t push her, Gianni. But the sooner I talk to her, the sooner we get a clearer picture of what happened. These first few hours are important in a case like this.’

  It was Giulia who answered the door. Her face was pale, taut. She seemed relieved to see us.

  ‘Come in.’

  ‘How is your mother?’ I said.

  Giulia showed us through into the kitchen at the rear of the house and only when the door was closed behind us did she answer.

  ‘Not good.’

  ‘Has she slept?’ I asked.

  ‘She dozed off for a while near dawn, but she’s awake again now. She’s exhausted, but too upset to sleep.’