As I crick my neck at the window, a pinstriped young man enters the first-class compartment, asking if this is Carriage D. He is carrying a violin case. All senses flare alert. What has Dovidl done with the three-million-dollar Guadagnini? If he has absconded, as I am starting to suspect, he will not have left it behind. It would show up in the estate, be sold at auction to pay living costs or death duties, and be claimed by me with a police warrant, exposing the missing man as a thief and liar, to his children’s disgrace. He would not want that.

The violin is on an Interpol watch-list. It cannot be legally sold. If he has taken it with him, it will have no value. If not, it must soon come to light.

‘Is that an old instrument?’ I ask the loose-limbed young fellow, pointing to the violin case that he has laid carefully on the seat.

‘Oh, I should say so,’ he drawls, in fluent Eton-and-Oxford. ‘Italian eighteenth century. I’m taking it to Sotheby’s for a bit of spit and polish before we sell it.’

‘Mind if I take a look? I’m a bit of a connoisseur. Got a Testini at home. Used to be my grandfather’s,’ I blabber.

‘I can’t let you touch it,’ says the agreeable chap. ‘They’d murder me at Bond Street. But I’ll open the case and give you a peek, if you like.’

My heart starts pounding, the way it mortally used to until this week’s renewal. Have I uncovered a flaw in his posthumous plan? I pat my pills pocket, find it empty and manage to survive unaided.

‘There,’ says the auctioneer’s runner. ‘What do you think of that?’

Not a lot, is the truthful answer. To my jaded eye it looks like a nineteenth-century French copy of a Cremona original, common as muck and worth no more than a hundred grand. Phew.

‘It’s gorgeous,’ I tell the clerk. ‘Have you tried playing it?’

‘Oh, no, I can’t play the things, just sell them.’

‘Where does it come from?’

‘Usual story. Country estate, been there for yonks. Old man used to play a bit, dead now. Kids just want the money.’

‘No respect for tradition . . .’

‘Shame, really, but I suppose they need the cash.’

Inside, I am effervescent with delight. It would have been far too sloppy, too unlike the Dovidl I knew, to try to slip a key piece of traceable evidence out of town while the heat is on. He will have made more sophisticated arrangements for the tainted instrument. Patience, I tell myself contentedly. Be patient and all will become clear, all in your own good time.

Chapter 12

12

In My Own Good Time