The Rainaldi Quartet Read Online Free PDF Page A

his presence.
    â€˜Questions?’
    â€˜Just say if it gets too much,’ Guastafeste said. ‘Do you know why Tomaso went back to his workshop last night, after we’d played quartets?’
    Clara gazed at him in silence for such a long time that I wondered whether she had taken in the question. But then she shook her head.
    â€˜No, I don’t know,’ she said.
    â€˜He didn’t say he was meeting anyone?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Did he often work late?’
    â€˜Not that late,’ Clara said. ‘And never after he played quartets.’
    â€˜Can you think of any reason why he might have done so last night?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜He didn’t say anything when he came home for dinner?’
    â€˜He didn’t come home for dinner. He had a pupil.’
    â€˜I can confirm that,’ I said to Guastafeste. ‘He’d been teaching. He told me that when he arrived.’
    â€˜What about his state of mind?’ Guastafeste asked Clara. ‘Had anything been troubling him? Worries, other people?’
    Before Clara could reply, the door opened and Giulia came in carrying a tray of coffee with some cups and saucers. She put the tray down on a table and poured the coffee.
    â€˜Mama, you’ll have some coffee?’
    Clara shook her head.
    â€˜It will do you good.’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜What about something to eat then? A roll with jam.’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Clara, you should eat something,’ I said.
    â€˜I don’t feel like food.’
    I glanced at Giulia and she gave a helpless shrug, as if to say, ‘What do I do?’ She handed cups of coffee to Guastafeste and me, then sat down on the edge of the settee, gazing anxiously at her mother.
    â€˜Yes,’ Clara said suddenly. She was looking at Guastafeste, who seemed perplexed by the remark until Clara went on, ‘Not worried exactly. More … what’s the word? Distracted.’
    â€˜Distracted about what?’ Guastafeste asked.
    â€˜He was looking for something,’ Clara said. ‘It was on his mind all the time. Like an obsession, I suppose.’
    I thought back to the previous evening, to Rainaldi saying he’d been to England on a ‘quest’.
    â€˜Looking for what?’ Guastafeste said.
    â€˜A violin,’ Clara said. ‘The Messiah’s Sister, he called it.’
    I started so violently I spilt some of my coffee on my knee. It was one of those moments you remember for the rest of your life. A turning-point, the beginning of something that changes you for ever – like the moment you first set eyes on the woman who will be your wife, or when your first child is born. Afterwards nothing is ever the same again.
    I dabbed at my trousers with my handkerchief. When I looked up, Guastafeste was watching me with his soft, perceptive eyes. He turned to Clara.
    â€˜Looking where?’ he said.
    â€˜All over. He didn’t talk about it much. It was his secret. He went to England in search of it.’
    â€˜And did he find it?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜What sort of violin?’
    â€˜Just a violin. That’s all I know. He never found it. And now he’s dead.’
    Clara was staring across the room, her eyes bleak and empty. Then the tears came, trickling slowly down her wrinkled cheeks.
    â€˜And now he’s dead,’ she repeated. She closed her eyes, but the tears kept coming, forcing their way out under her eyelids.
    Giulia went across to her mother and sat down on the arm of the chair. She put her arm around Clara’s shoulders. I looked at Guastafeste. He gave a nod and stood up.
    â€˜We’ll go now.’
    I looked at Clara, feeling for her, feeling frustrated by my own impotence. She was my friend. I’d known her even longer than Tomaso. We’d grown up together in the same district of Cremona, we’d started primary school together on the same day. Once, a long time ago, when we were