Less than honest ....

I have recently remembered an incident where I sold a 3/4 size violin to someone in Lincoln.  It was a good Chinese one ("Marlborough" from The Soundpost) which isn't sold in the UK any more; this was more than ten years ago.  It was £350 then, but because it was the end of the line we got it cheaper than usual and so did the customer, still it cost her about £250.  She mailed me in a state of panic saying that the violin had collapsed.  All that had happened was that the tailpiece had come off and so of course the bridge came down, it always looks a lot worse than it really is.  She took it into the local music shop where they said it could not be repaired but they would let her trade it in for a new one they sold (why would they say it could be traded in, if it couldn't be repaired?).  It was clear to me that it was a very minor thing that was wrong so I drove down to Lincoln to fix it.  All it needed was a new tailgut which costs about £2 and it takes about ten minutes to put it on and retune the violin.  I had fixed it before she brought in the coffee.