“Did you hear what that catering woman said?” I asked.
“Something about the Komarovs being vegetarians,” she said. “So what’s exciting about that?”
It means that even if they were at the gala dinner at the racetrack, they couldn’t have been food-poisoned, because I’m pretty certain the poison was in the sauce that was on the chicken.”
“So?” she said.
“They didn’t turn up at the Delafield box on the Saturday when they were expected to,” I said. “And they couldn’t have missed that lunch because they had been ill the night before, at least not like everyone else, because they hadn’t eaten the right stuff. So why didn’t they turn up? Was it because they knew there would be a bomb going off?”
“Hold on a minute,” she said. “That’s a hell of a conclusion to suddenly jump to, especially when you’ve claimed in the past that the poisoning was to stop someone being at the lunch and now you’re saying that maybe the bomber wasn’t poisoned at all but still didn’t turn up.”
She was right, of course. It was confusing.
“But suppose there was someone else the bomber didn’t want to be at the lunch,” I said. “Then both could be true.”
“You need more than ‘suppose,’” she said. “Suppose the bomb was aimed at the Arab prince after all. You can make anything you like sound sensible with ‘suppose.’”
Our train arrived, and we sat in a carriage surrounded by a party of children on their way home from a theme park. It had been a birthday outing, and they were all so high on the experience, describing with screams and laughter how frightening the rides were and how much fun it had been to survive them.
Caroline leaned on my shoulder. “I want lots of kids,” she said.
“That’s a bit sudden,” I said. “We’re not even living together yet and you want kids?”
For an answer, she just snuggled down closer to me and hummed. I don’t think it was “Nimrod,” by Edward Elgar.
I COOKED dinner in Caroline’s white-and-chrome kitchen, and she played her viola for me as I did. We had stopped at the supermarket in Waterloo station and bought some ingredients and a bottle of wine. I prepared a beef stroganoff while Caroline played the first movement of Bach’s Violin Concerto in E Major, her favorite piece. She was right. It sounded great on the viola.
“Is that the piece you’re playing at Cadogan Hall?” I asked.
“No, sadly not,” she said. “I would have to play the violin to ever play this at a concert.”
“But surely you could play a violin too?” I said.
“Oh yes, I could,” she said. “But I don’t want to. I’m a violist, not a violinist, and it’s out of choice. Violins are so tinny compared to the mellow tones of a viola. Most of the orchestra think that we violists are failed violinists, but it’s not true. That’s like saying trombonists are failed trumpeters or flautists are failed oboists. It’s ridiculous.”
“Like saying waiters are failed chefs,” I said, although I knew quite a few waiters who were just that.
“Exactly,” she said. It was clear to me that this wasn’t the first time she had built up a head of steam over the issue.
“Caroline,” I said seriously, “you don’t have to prove your worth, certainly not to me. Be confident in your role as a violist. You don’t have to apologize for not being something else.”
She stood next to me and leaned back against the worktop.
“You are so right,” she said in a determined tone. “I’m a violist and pleased to be so.”
We laughed and drank a toast to Miss Caroline Aston, violist and proud of it.
“So what are you playing at the Cadogan Hall?” I asked.
“Concerto for Violin and Viola by Benjamin Britten,” she said.
“Can you play it for me?” I asked.
“No,” she said. “It would sound silly.”
“Why?”
“Because it needs to be played by two people, one with a violin and one with a viola. It would be like listening to only one person while they were having a conversation with someone else that you couldn’t hear, like they were on the telephone. You wouldn’t get the full meaning.”
“Does music always have a meaning?” I asked.
“Definitely,” she said. “Playing a musical score is like telling a story, using notes and harmonies instead of letters and words. Music can invoke huge passion, and a symphony should carry the listener through the full range of emotions, from anticipation and sadness and melancholy in the early movements to delight and joy at the climax.”
I couldn’t claim that my dinner would tell a story, but I hoped that it might provide a share of delight and joy, albeit briefly, on the taste buds.
I trimmed the beef and cut it into strips before seasoning and then searing it in a hot frying pan. Then I fried a sliced onion and some mushrooms until they were tender and added them to the beef with some plain flour. I poured a generous measure of cognac over the mixture and, much to Caroline’s horror, flamed off the alcohol.
“You’ll set the whole bloody building on fire,” Caroline shouted as the flames leaped towards her ceiling, and I laughed.
Next, I carefully poured in some sour cream and a small amount of lemon juice, and sprinkled some paprika over the top. I had previously taken a large potato and, since Caroline didn’t have a kitchen mandolin, I had grated it on the large-hole side of her box cheese grater to produce long thin strips of potato that I now fried briefly in a deep fryer to produce crisp brown potato straws, while my beef mixture warmed on a low heat.
“I thought beef stroganoff was served with rice,” she said, watching me. “And I didn’t expect a chef to use my deep-fat fryer.”
“I use one all the time,” I said. “I know that fried food is not considered very healthy, but it tastes so good, and it’s fine if you eat it only in moderation and use the right oil for the frying. I certainly wouldn’t use lard like they used to.” I lifted the basket of potato straws out of the oil. “It’s traditional in Russia to serve beef stroganoff with potato straws, although lots of people like serving it with rice.”
We sat together on the sofa in her sitting room and ate off trays on our laps.
“Not bad,” she said. “Why is it called stroganoff?”
“After the Russian who invented it, I think.”
“Another Russian,” she said. “Is that why you chose it for tonight?”
“Not consciously,” I said.
“It’s nice.” She took another forkful. “What gives it such a distinctive flavor?” she asked with her mouth full.
“The sour cream and the paprika,” I said, laughing. “This dish used to be on lots of restaurant menus, but, unfortunately, these days it tends to be made without the beef, is called mushroom stroganoff and is served up for vegetarians.”
“Like the Komarovs,” she said.
“Indeed,” I said. “Just like the Komarovs.”
MONDAY MORNING was full of contradictions and wildly different from the evening before.
Caroline was eager to leave for the airport and could hardly contain her excitement at the prospect of jetting to Chicago to join the orchestra. She kept complaining at how slowly the time was passing as we waited for the taxi she had ordered to take us to Heathrow.
I, meanwhile, was dismayed at how quickly the hours were rushing by. I was sickened by the thought of her being so far away from me, while, at the same time, I was trying to share her pleasure in going.
We arrived at the terminal more than two hours before her plane was due to leave, and she checked in with no problems.
“I’ve been upgraded to business,” she exclaimed with a squeal, clutching her viola case to her chest.
“The check-in man must have fancied you,” I said.
“It was a woman,” she said, poking me in the ribs with her finger.
We sat on high stools and had coffee. There was an uneasiness between us. I wanted to spend every last moment with her, while she was desperate to get through to departures, as if in doing so her plane would leave more quickly. Neither of us wanted to express our eagerness to the other, as we both understood the situation.