When the Music's Over

9

The Bay Horse was a sprawling modern chain pub on the estate, sitting beside a cluster of local shops — greengrocer, butcher, newsagent and hairdresser. When Annie and Gerry walked in that Tuesday afternoon, the place was almost deserted except for a lone figure in jeans and a black T-shirt sitting hunched over his pint in the far corner. Some music Banks would probably recognise was playing softly in the background — maybe Dire Straits, Annie thought — but other than that the pub was quiet.

When they got a little closer, he looked up at them, and Annie could see that his eyes were red-rimmed, as if he’d been crying. He had a skinhead haircut and was stockier than Annie had expected, with elaborate tattoos on the muscles of his arms. She could see some similarity in features to the images of Mimosa she had seen, the cat-like slant of the eyes, the full, slightly pouting lips. On Mimosa it would all have been sexy as hell in life, whatever her age, but it made Albert’s features seem a little too feminine. If he had more hair, Annie thought, he might even be quite handsome.

Lenny had told them he had just given the news to Albert about Mimosa and left him in the pub, that he had wanted to sit alone for a while and digest what he’d heard. Annie leaned over and said, ‘Albert? Lenny told us you were here. We’re the police. We need to ask you a few questions. Is it OK if we sit down?’

Albert looked from one to the other. ‘Might as well,’ he said.

Annie nodded towards the almost empty glass. ‘Another?’

‘Thanks.’

Gerry went to the bar and came back with a pint of lager for Albert and two diet bitter lemons for herself and Annie.

‘We’ll try and make it brief and painless,’ Annie said. ‘We’re really sorry about your sister. I understand you’ve only just heard about what happened?’

‘Yes.’

‘Where were you?’

‘Manchester, clubbing with some mates. I went there on Thursday and came back this morning.’

‘Drive?’

‘Nah. Train.’

‘When did you last see Mimosa?’

‘The weekend before. Sunday, I think. Maybe Monday.’

‘And you weren’t worried about her? I mean, she’d already been missing two days before you left for Manchester.’

‘That wasn’t unusual. Not for our Mimsy. Besides, I’m not always at home myself.’

‘What did you do last Tuesday night?’ Annie asked.

‘I stopped over at Paul’s. We’d had a bit to drink, like, watched some DVDs and crashed out.’

‘What time was this?’

‘Dunno. We met up in the pub earlier. Not this one. The Hope and Anchor, near his place. We left there about tennish, I suppose.’

‘And went to Paul’s?’

‘Yeah. That’s Paul Warner. He’s my best mate.’

‘You stay there often?’

‘Paul says I can crash whenever I want. He’s got one of those let-down couches. It’s pretty comfortable. And a power shower. Cool.’

‘What about work, Albert? Don’t you have to go to work in a morning?’

‘I’m unemployed. Paul lets me work with him sometimes. Odd jobs, like, you know, fetching and lifting.’

‘What does this Paul do?’

‘He’s got his own business. Painting and decorating. Odd jobs on the side. He’s good at fixing things. Tellies and computers and sinks and stuff.’

Annie heard the barman greet a regular. Albert sipped his lager and stared into the cold pale liquid.

‘What was your relationship with your sister like?’ she asked.

‘Relationship?’

‘Yes. How did you get along?’

‘Do you have a big brother?’ Albert asked.

‘Me? No,’ said Annie.

‘I do,’ said Gerry. ‘He’s five years older than me. He used to tease me like hell, but once when I was about ten he rescued me from a gang on my way home from school. They were shoving me around and getting rough with me.’

Albert glanced at her and nodded. ‘You understand, then,’ he said. ‘The problem with Mimsy was that she never knew when to keep her gob shut.’

‘Bit of a mouth on her, had she?’ said Annie.

‘You can say that again. Not always, mind. She could be sweet and gentle as anything. Quiet, even. But when the mood took her. She was no fool, wasn’t Mimsy, and she didn’t suffer fools gladly.’

‘That can make for a hard life,’ Annie said.

Albert looked at Gerry again. ‘So you’ll know what it was like,’ he said. ‘Having a big brother and all. I love our Mimsy, and I’d have done anything for her, but she was a kid and she wasn’t part of my life in that way, so I probably treated her like crap some of the time. I mean, we didn’t have much in common, we didn’t hang out or anything.’

‘You didn’t share any parts of your life?’ Gerry asked.

‘I used to let her come and help sometimes, when I was working with Paul.’ He turned away. ‘Maybe we’d even let her have a lager and lime when we’d done, like, if it was thirsty work. There’s no harm in it, is there?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Annie. ‘We hear Mimosa liked a drink.’

‘She did and all.’

‘But you don’t know where she went in her spare time,’ Annie went on, ‘what she got up to?’

‘No. Some people would probably think she was too young to be let loose like that, but you see it a lot these days. Kids as young as twelve, thirteen, fourteen, getting up to whatever they want with no questions asked.’

‘Did Mimsy stop out all night?’

‘Sometimes, sure.’

‘Do you know where?’

‘I never asked and she never said.’

‘Is there anything you can tell us that might help us find her killer, Albert?’

Albert looked Annie in the eye, then leaned forward and spoke with a ferocity that made her flinch. ‘Do you think those Pakis did it?’

‘Which ones would that be?’ Annie asked.

‘That lot down on the Strip.’

‘What do you know about them?’

‘Nothing. ’Cept they’re old, and she shouldn’t have been hanging out with them. You can’t trust them, can you? They’re not like us. They do things different.’

‘What did you see?’

‘Our Mimsy getting in a taxi outside that minicab place next door to that takeaway. She was with a fat Paki, an older bloke in a suit. All tarted up, she was, too.’

‘Did you recognise the man?’

‘No. He wasn’t anyone I’d seen in the takeaway or the other shops. I mean, I’ve got nothing against them, really, but what was our Mimsy doing getting in a minicab with one of them?’

‘Did you ask her?’

‘Last time I saw her. When we were walking down the street.’

‘What did she say?’

‘Told me it was none of my fucking business what she did, and they were a lot more fun to hang out with than the sad bastards at school.’

‘Did you tell your parents, your mother?’

‘I didn’t tell anyone, did I? Why should I get her in trouble. I’m no snitch. But I told her she should stay away from them, that they were up to no good.’

‘What did she say to that?’

‘She just laughed and said what did I know.’ He paused. ‘I’m not a racist, really, but it’s not right, is it? Blokes like that hanging about with young girls like Mimsy. It surprised me, really, when I saw her, like, because I thought she... well, I thought we agreed on certain things.’

‘On Pakistanis?’

‘Yeah. Immigration. Them coming and taking over. That sort of thing.’

‘Have you seen any Pakistanis with other young girls?’

‘No. I mean, not really. You know, you’ll see one or two of them down the Strip, in the takeaway or waiting for a minicab, but I never took much notice. I mean, anything you need around the Strip you have to get from them. They’ve got it all sewn up. Except the chippie, and that’s run by the Chinks. But they don’t live around here.’

Not a racist but... Annie thought. The number of times she’d heard that. ‘I understand you got probation for throwing a brick through a halal butcher’s window,’ she said.

‘I was pissed, wasn’t I?’

‘But why that particular window?’

‘Dunno. It was just there.’

‘When did this incident with Mimosa and the taxi occur?’

‘Week before last. Wednesday or Thursday.’

About a week before she disappeared, Annie calculated. ‘And next time you saw Mimsy was on the Sunday or Monday after that?’

‘That’s right.’

‘How did she seem? Was she upset, worried or anything? Was there anything different about her?’

‘No. Same as usual.’

‘Any marks on her? Anything like that?’

‘No. She just got pissed off when I mentioned I’d seen her with the Paki, that’s all. And, yeah, she was wearing some new trainers, fancy Nikes. I asked her where she’d got the money for them, and she told me she’d saved up.’

‘Did you believe her?’

‘No reason not to.’

‘Did she have a part-time job? A summer job?’

‘No.’

‘Did Lenny or Sinead give her any pocket money?’

‘Shouldn’t think so.’

‘Where do you think she got the money for new trainers?’

Albert shrugged. ‘Dunno. She’d saved it out of the bits and pieces she earned helping out me and Paul? But it must have taken her a long time. He doesn’t pay either of us much. Bit of a skinflint, is Paul. Maybe some bloke gave it to her. You haven’t told me. Did they do it? Do you think it was the Pakis?’

‘We don’t know who it was yet, Albert, so don’t take it into your head to do anything stupid.’

‘Are you calling me stupid?’

‘No, I’m not. I’m just telling you not to do anything foolish. Leave it to us to find out what happened.’

‘Right. As if you lot would ever do anything if it was Pakis. You’d be too scared of being called racists.’

‘Albert, no matter what you think, we’re out to catch a murderer here, and we’ll use whatever it takes to do that, whoever the murderer turns out to be. You have my word on that.’

Albert stared at her, then picked up his pint. The new customer started playing one of the machines near the door. Sirens and bells filled the air. ‘There’s something else,’ Albert went on. ‘Not specifically to do with Mimsy, but a Paki mate of mine — he’s OK, by the way, none of that religious mumbo-jumbo, and he’s a loyal Boro fan — he says he heard that some of the older blokes had been messing with white girls. You know, like that Rotherham thing.’

‘Did he say anything more?’

‘No. Just that.’

‘When was this?’

‘A few weeks before I saw Mimsy getting in the taxi.’

‘Did you make any connection between what he told you and what you saw?’

‘Connection?’

‘Never mind. What’s his name?’

‘Ali.’

‘Do you know where he lives?’

‘Somewhere south of the Strip. But we have a drink in the Wytherton Arms now and then. You could probably find him in there most nights. Like I said, none of that religious non-drinking mumbo jumbo for Ali.’

‘If you happen to bump into him before we have time to find him, would you give him this and ask him to call me?’ Annie said, handing Albert her card.

‘I don’t want him to think I’ve been talking to the polis.’

‘Albert. It’s for Mimosa.’

Albert took the card reluctantly. ‘I’ll think about it.’

‘How did it end, this last talk with Mimosa? Did you stay friends?’

‘I suppose so. It’s her life. I just told her if she needed anything, like, all she had to do was ask. She gave me one of her friendly pecks on the cheek, said something about her knight in shining armour, and that was that.’

‘That was you? Her knight in shining armour.’

Albert managed a thin smile. ‘Yeah. That’s what she called me sometimes.’ He looked at Gerry. ‘I saved her from bullies too, once or twice, when she was about ten. It sort of stuck.’

‘Mimsy was bullied?’ Annie asked.

‘For a while, yeah, at school.’

‘Why?’

‘Who knows. She was just different, that’s all. And, like I said, she was mouthy.’

‘But it stopped?’

‘Far as I know.’

Annie paused, as much to let Gerry catch up with her notes as anything else. Albert drank some more lager and Annie sipped the tart bitter lemon. A pint would have been so much better. ‘Do you remember that incident with the psychological counsellor?’ she asked.

‘Do I ever. Mum really laid into Mimsy that time. Him, too. I think she knew she’d fucked up a lot in her own life, and she saw Mimsy making the same mistakes, same bad choices. It just set her off.’

‘Was Mimsy doing drugs then?’

‘Some, maybe. Pills and dope and stuff.’

‘Ketamine?’

‘K? That’s crazy stuff, isn’t it? I don’t know. I wouldn’t think so. Mimsy liked a good time, she didn’t want to go apeshit barking bonkers.’

‘Have you seen or heard of this counsellor since?’

‘No. They fired him. I heard he’d buggered off to Spain or somewhere. Too good for him. Ought to send him to the fucking North Pole stark bollock naked. Good riddance.’

‘Is there anything else you can tell us, Albert?’ Annie asked. ‘Anything at all. Was there anyone you know who’d want to do Mimosa harm?’

‘Not that I know of. Except maybe the Pakis, if she pissed them off.’

‘OK.’ Annie glanced towards Gerry, who put her notebook away. ‘If you think of anything, and I mean anything, that may help us catch your sister’s killer, no matter how unimportant it seems, give us a call. Right?’

‘Right,’ said Albert.

‘And try to get in touch with Ali. Want a lift home?’

‘Nah. Thanks. I think I’ll just stay and have another. Let it all sink in.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘I just feel like numb, like.’

They met in Banks’s office shortly after his return from Leeds: Banks, AC Gervaise and Adrian Moss. Banks could have done without the latter, but he seemed to be all over the place like a dirty shirt these days. The station was still under siege, cameras clicking and questions shouted every time anyone came in or went out. The clamour seemed as much to do with Mimosa Moffat as it did Danny Caxton. Now that Mimosa had been identified, a phalanx of media had headed up to the Wytherton Heights estate to get the story from the horse’s mouth, so to speak. No doubt viewers of the evening news and readers of tomorrow’s newspapers would be treated to Lenny Thornton’s or Albert Moffat’s opinion on the local Muslim community and Sinead’s feelings about her murdered daughter. Only Johnny Kerrigan would remain silent.

Winsome, Banks knew, had been hard at work since he had phoned her from Leeds with the identification of Linda Palmer’s mystery man. She had been on the phone and the Internet to amass as much information as she could about Tony Monaghan’s life and death and had gathered it together in a small file, which Banks had just finished reading. At the moment, Winsome was in the squad room trying to squeeze out more information and was due to join them shortly.

For his part, Banks had stayed on in Leeds for a while after Linda had found the photographs. He had offered to arrange transport back to Minton-on-Swain for her, but she said she’d like to do a bit of shopping and visit some friends, then she’d take the train back in the evening. Banks first visited Ken Blackstone at Elland Road, where they had trawled through various archives and records, mostly in vain, coming up with an interesting titbit about the long-dead Chief Constable Crammond, but not much else.

The problem, as Blackstone pointed out, was that it seemed the records had been systematically expunged at some point over the last fifty years. There were no surviving witness transcripts, though supposedly every homosexual with a passing acquaintance with the Hyde Park public convenience would have been questioned, along with a number of undercover police officers and officers placed on surveillance at various periods in the roof of the structure, where they had been able to spy on whatever was going on below. Another quick visit to the Wakefield archive had produced only the stark entry in the occurrence book: ‘No further action.’ What it all added up to, Banks still didn’t know, and he was hoping a bit of a brainstorming session back in Eastvale would go some way towards correcting that situation.

The basic facts, culled from newspapers, were that the man Linda Palmer identified as her second rapist had lived in Hampstead. Only twenty-six years old when he was murdered, Tony Monaghan worked for a London advertising agency, Philby, Leyland and Associates, based in the West End, and he was up in Leeds on company business during the time the incident occurred. At the time of the murder, Monaghan had been wearing a bespoke suit from a Savile Row tailor and a lilac shirt. That had, no doubt, sealed his dismissal as a ‘queer’.

Monaghan’s body had been found in the public conveniences at Hyde Park in the student area of Leeds. He had been stabbed to death, and his wallet was missing. The prevailing theory was that he had been on the prowl, looking for rough trade, and had found it. The public conveniences were a notorious spot for homosexual encounters, and though homosexual acts between two consenting adults in the privacy of their own homes had been legalised in the Sexual Offences Act that summer, the legality did not apply to public toilets or public acts of lewdness.

According to the date in the occurrence book, the investigation had been dropped after less than two weeks, and Monaghan’s body would have been released for burial. Nothing more of interest appeared, and the photo that had caught Linda Palmer’s attention was the only visual record still existing.

‘It’s as thin as the Caxton investigation as far as evidence goes,’ Banks said, after pushing the file aside. ‘There’s hardly any forensics, nothing to say whether he had been sexually active, sexually assaulted or what. Nothing to indicate that he was even gay. One of the papers speculated that it might have been a mugging, with Monaghan a stranger to the city and all, maybe not knowing the reputation of those toilets. But muggers rarely kill. There’s also some speculation that whoever he picked up was psychologically confused about his sexuality and became violent when Monaghan made a pass. It’s also possible he was a “queer” hater or someone who saw himself on a crusade against indecency. Don’t forget the law had just been passed. It was controversial and it must have set off any number of nutters.’

‘What’s the link with Caxton?’ asked AC Gervaise.

‘We don’t have one yet,’ Banks said. ‘Apart from Linda Palmer. Winsome’s still digging.’

‘Was nothing else mentioned in the press or the police investigation?’

‘No. Nobody dug deeply enough.’

‘Is Ms Palmer sure this is our man?’

‘Certain,’ Banks said. ‘She was shaken up by the whole thing. She got no impression that he was gay, of course, but she admitted she wouldn’t have known much about such things back then.’

‘But he did rape her?’

‘Yes. She said she remembered he hesitated, seemed nervous. But there could be many reasons for that. And just because a man rapes a woman, it doesn’t mean he’s not gay.’

‘Point taken.’

‘Where do you want to go with this?’ Adrian Moss interjected.

Banks glanced at Gervaise. ‘Nowhere yet,’ he said. ‘Not until we’ve actually got somewhere to go.’

‘You want to keep it under wraps?’

‘For now, yes. As much as we can.’

Moss made a note. ‘OK. Good.’

‘We don’t know what we’ve got,’ Banks went on. ‘We don’t know if it’s a lead or a red herring. If Linda Palmer says she’s sure it’s the man who raped her with Caxton, I, for one, believe her, but even so, it gets us no further. I mean, it’s not as if he’s still alive to identify Caxton, and we’re not here to investigate his murder. It’s bad enough having to investigate a fifty-year-old rape, but add a murder in the mix and it’d be damn nigh impossible.’

‘You might be surprised, Alan,’ said Gervaise. ‘The one might actually illuminate the other.’

‘There’s that, I suppose.’ Banks scratched his cheek. ‘I must admit, I was hoping it would turn out to be someone who might still be alive, but that was probably reaching a bit.’

‘Don’t you think it’s too much of a coincidence that this Monaghan was murdered such a short time after assaulting Ms Palmer?’ asked Gervaise.

‘I do,’ said Banks. ‘And I also think it’s fishy that Caxton was photographed handing a cheque over to Crammond just over two weeks after Monaghan’s murder, only days after the investigation stopped. But just at the moment I can’t come up with a good reason as to how all these are linked. Was Monaghan simply in the wrong place at the wrong time? Did he pick up someone who, for whatever reason, stabbed him to death? What was he doing in Leeds, for a start? If we knew even that it would be something.’

‘He was on business, wasn’t he?’ Gervaise said.

‘That’s what it said in the paper. He was in advertising.’

‘What about his old firm?’

‘Philby, Leyland and Associates? No longer in business,’ Banks said. ‘Winsome checked. She’s still trying to track down other ex-employees.’

‘Advertising must have been an exciting occupation back then,’ Gervaise said, ‘if it was anything like Mad Men.’

‘I think it attracted its fair share of hip young creative types, that’s for sure,’ Banks agreed.

‘A lilac shirt,’ said Moss.

Banks looked at him. He was wearing a dazzling white shirt, old school tie and pinstripe suit. ‘Indeed,’ he said. ‘Your point, Adrian?’

‘Oh, nothing really. I mean, maybe back then, in the dark ages, so to speak, a police detective might well have taken such an article of clothing as a sign of... well...’

‘Gayness?’

‘Yes. And when you add the fact that Monaghan worked in advertising, a flamboyant and creative business, and the place his body was found, then... well, it’s hardly surprising, is it?’

‘No force would put a great deal of its resources into an investigation of that sort back then,’ said Banks. ‘No more than they would into the murder of a prostitute, as we discovered from the Yorkshire Ripper case. But even so, there should have been something, if only for form’s sake.’

‘Was there any information as to whether he was actually murdered in the toilet itself, or whether his body was brought from elsewhere?’ AC Gervaise asked.

‘No,’ said Banks. ‘So far it seems everyone assumed that he was killed where he was found, but any forensic information and exhibits, if there were any, have disappeared.’

‘No forensics?’

‘Nothing. I should imagine there was a lot of blood, though, given that he was stabbed.’

‘So he goes in the cubicle with whoever he picked up,’ Gervaise said. ‘The other bloke’s standing behind him. They get ready to do whatever they’re about to do, and the other bloke takes out a knife and stabs him, then slips his hand in his inside pocket for his wallet.’

At that moment there came a light tap on the door and Winsome entered, carrying a folder with her.

‘I hope you’ve got something for us,’ Banks said, ‘because we’re getting so desperate for leads here AC Gervaise has taken to crime fiction.’

Winsome sat down and poured herself the remaining splash of coffee. ‘I think you’ll like this, guv,’ she said. ‘Tony Monaghan was first employed as a PR consultant and publicist by Danny Caxton in 1966.’

‘I thought he worked for an advertising agency in London?’

‘He did, but they contracted him out. Apparently he did such a good job on his first assignment that Caxton asked for him by name.’

‘How on earth did you discover this?’ asked Gervaise. ‘The agency’s been defunct for years, Alan says.’

‘I have my methods, ma’am,’ said Winsome.

‘Come on, DS Jackman, give.’

Winsome managed a brief smile. ‘Yes, ma’am. Well, first off, I pushed Danny Caxton’s management company for that list of employees we’ve been after. I’d asked them before, but they were dragging their feet, going on about how many there were and how long ago it all was. I don’t think they were stalling particularly, just that it was another job on their table and there was nothing in it for them, I suppose, so why hurry? The secretary I spoke with this time was quite chatty. Must be a slow day. She seemed to find no reason to keep it from us, and when I expressed a sense of urgency, she faxed it to me. Monaghan’s name appeared, along with Philby, Leyland and Associates. I rang her back and asked her for more details about him, and she told me she didn’t know much, but it wasn’t unusual to hire freelancers or subcontract publicists from specialist firms. It happened a few times in Danny Caxton’s career. Monaghan was with him on and off from May 1966 until his death in October 1967. Monaghan took a break at home in London after the Blackpool summer season, and he headed back up north again to work with Caxton on the panto he was appearing in at the Bradford Alhambra that Christmas. Monaghan was married, by the way. I’ll see if I can find anything out about the widow. Anyway, the secretary I talked to knew nothing about Monaghan’s death — she wasn’t even born then — though she did say that most of the office knew they once had an employee who’d been murdered way back in the mists of time.’

‘I suppose you would remember something like that,’ Banks said. ‘Excellent work, Winsome. Now we have a concrete link between Monaghan and Caxton.’

‘Yes, but it hasn’t exactly taken us anywhere, has it, guv?’ said Winsome.

‘I don’t know about that. An employee of Caxton’s, someone who led Linda to the car and back to the hotel, who raped her in the hotel room, along with Caxton, and two months or so later he’s murdered in a mysterious and gruesome way. Don’t tell me that’s just coincidence.’

‘And the murder was never solved,’ Winsome added.

‘The murder was never even investigated,’ Banks said. ‘Just like Linda Palmer’s original complaint. Sounds like orders from on high to me. We have the photo of Caxton with then chief constable, Edward Crammond, and old gossip has it they were close, dinners together, golf club, even a cruise. Was Danny Caxton golden, or what?’

Banks could hear Adrian Moss’s sudden intake of breath. Phrases such as ‘orders from on high’ were anathema to him. ‘Never mind, Adrian,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you’ll find the right direction to spin it.’

Moss glowered at him.

‘And nothing showed up in any of the documents we’ve seen,’ Banks went on, ‘or any of the press reports. Nothing else to link Monaghan to Caxton. It was all kept quiet, if indeed anyone knew at all.’

‘That’s some cover-up,’ said AC Gervaise. ‘But surely your DI Chadwick must have known?’

‘Possibly,’ Banks agreed. ‘At least, I assume he would have been the one to get the order to cease and desist. But seeing as he’s long dead, we can hardly ask him, can we?’ He paused for a moment. ‘But we can do the next best thing — talk to his oppo DC Bradley. He’s alive, at least he was when I talked to him ten years ago about that pop festival murder. I was going to talk to him and Chadwick’s daughter about the lack of investigation on Linda’s case, anyway. Now I’ve got a bit more to ask them about.’

AC Gervaise sniffed. ‘Seems this DI Chadwick has left quite a legacy.’

‘Yes,’ said Banks. ‘I could probably make a career out of just working over his cold cases.’

Yvonne Reeves still lived in a bay-window semi on the outskirts of Durham. A light breeze ruffled the thick foliage of the trees that shaded the street and gave some shade from the sun. Yvonne ushered Banks and Winsome into the living room, which had been redecorated since Banks’s last visit. It seemed brighter and airier than he remembered. Yvonne didn’t offer tea but sat down opposite the two visitors and folded her hands in her lap. She wore black trousers and a cotton print top and seemed to have lost bit of weight since his last visit. Banks remembered her being more full-figured. She wore her grey hair cut short, and its thinness, along with that of her body, made Banks wonder whether she was suffering from a serious illness. She seemed on the ball, though, and didn’t appear to be lacking in energy. There were a few more lines on her face than last time, though that was only to be expected. She would have been fourteen in 1967, Banks had calculated, the same age as Linda Palmer, though she looked older. They might have even known one another, as they had both grown up in West Leeds.

‘I seem to remember you were here about one of my dad’s old cases a while ago, weren’t you?’ she said.

‘Going on for ten years back,’ said Banks.

‘Is it that long?’

‘Just about.’

She looked at Winsome. ‘I don’t remember you, love.’

‘I was just a wet-behind-the-ears DC back then,’ Winsome said, with a sideways glance at Banks.

Yvonne smiled and turned back to Banks. ‘So what is it this time?’

‘Another of your father’s old cases.’

‘I’m sure I told you last time that he didn’t bring his work home — except for what we talked about last time, when I was involved with those hippies and the Brimleigh Festival murder. But that was only because of me.’

‘I know,’ said Banks. ‘It’s an even older crime than that.’

‘When?’

‘Summer of 1967.’

Yvonne stared out of the window as if lost in memories. ‘My goodness. I must have just turned fourteen then.’

‘That was my estimate.’

She shot him a sharp glance. ‘And what do you expect me to remember?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe nothing. A local girl about your age was sexually assaulted. The incident happened in Blackpool, but she lived near you in West Leeds. She went to Brotherton House with her mother, and your father heard her complaint. It was entered in the occurrence book. Then there’s nothing more.’

‘It can’t have gone anywhere, then, I suppose.’

‘No. But it’s resurfaced recently, and I was wondering why it was never investigated when it was first reported.’

‘Is that the Danny Caxton business I’ve seen on the news?’

‘That’ll be it. Yes.’

‘Bloody hell!’

‘Do you remember? Did your father ever mention Caxton?’

‘He was a popular name in our house.’

‘Your father knew him?’

‘He’d met him. But my mother was the fan. I thought he was a bit naff, myself, but I was just a precocious fourteen-year-old.’

‘So was his victim.’

‘Do you really think he did it?’

‘Did you have any idea of the things Jimmy Savile was doing?’

‘I’ve read about some of them,’ said Yvonne. ‘You’re right. I always thought he was a creep, but I’d no idea what kind, the depths... Rolf Harris, too. I quite liked “Tie My Kangaroo Down, Sport”. And Bill Cosby in the States. Who would have thought it?’

‘So why not Danny Caxton?’

‘That’s poor reasoning, Mr Banks.’

‘Alan. I didn’t mean it that way. I just meant, why should it be so unbelievable? We’re gathering evidence. The case is getting stronger. But with something like this you’ve got to build a strong solid structure, as you can imagine.’

‘I don’t know what you hope for from me. Danny Caxton never touched me.’

‘Did you ever meet him?’

‘Me? No.’

‘We’re interested in anything you can remember, really,’ said Winsome. ‘A word, a gesture, anything. We know it was a long time ago, but something important might have stuck in your memory about that period.’

Yvonne looked at her. ‘You know, love, it’s a funny thing about memory, especially as I get older. I can sometimes remember specific days, maybe even arguments Dad and I had about — oh, some boy, or some skirt I was wearing being too short, or music I was listening to being too loud. Sometimes he seemed remote and distracted — a lot of the time he was like that. I don’t ever remember him being much of a talker. Now I look back, I sometimes think it must have been his job getting him down. What a funny thing memory is.’

Banks remembered lines from another of Linda Palmer’s poems: ‘In no time at all, we alter what we / see — not nature, but nature exposed / to our vision.’ She was right about the constant dance of memory and imagination, perception and creation, history and fiction. How easily the one was transformed into the other, or by it, sometimes to such an extent that we actually believed a thing had happened the way we remembered it, when it hadn’t happened that way at all. He gave up pursuing the thought. It wasn’t a fruitful line of inquiry for a detective.

‘How did Caxton and your father meet?’

‘I don’t really know the details, but apparently there was a big do at work, something to do with a donation to a police charity by Danny Caxton. He was always doing things like that, collecting for charity and stuff. They had a special gala ball or something, a dress-up job, and even though Dad was only an inspector, he got invited and he got to take Mum, too. Well, she was made up. Had to buy a new dress and everything. Our place was a madhouse for a week before.’

‘Do you remember when this was?’

‘It might have been around the time you’re talking about, 1967. There were pictures in the papers and everything. The chief constable, Crammond, was well in with Mr Caxton, or so my dad said. And come to think of it, he did say something about a case, some colleague of Mr Caxton’s being found dead.’

‘Did he say anything more?’

‘No. Just that it was bad timing, you know, for the charity ball and everything.’

‘Do you remember anything else about the summer or autumn of 1967, especially anything to do with Danny Caxton?’ Banks asked.

‘Not about Mr Caxton, no. Except Mum was thrilled to meet him, of course. She said they shook hands — he even kissed the back of her hand like a real gentleman — and he had such a lovely smile. No wonder they called him “The Man with the Big Smile”. He even said, “Do your own thing!” You remember, that was his catchphrase.’

‘I remember,’ said Banks.

‘We seemed to argue a lot that summer, Dad and me. I was just starting to get excited about all the new music and the gatherings and stuff. Hendrix, Cream and so on. I wanted to wear flowers in my hair and go to San Francisco. My dad thought it was all stupid, of course. But there was something in the air, something different, something magical. Maybe it was just me. I suppose fourteen-year-old girls can be impressionable. But I was right in a way, wasn’t I? I mean things did happen — well, I told you about some of that last time you were here, I remember 1969 better. I was sixteen then and far more up for it.’

‘Was there anything in particular about your father’s state of mind in the period we’re talking about?’

‘He was grumpy a lot. I thought it might have been because of all the hippies starting up and all those demonstrations and marches. And the drugs. It made his job harder. Though I think most of that came later. But I suppose it wasn’t an easy time for the police, having lots of freedom-loving people taking mind-expanding drugs, and anarchists and communists on the streets ripping up cobblestones and whatever.’

Banks suppressed a smile. It was rare that anyone gave a thought to the policeman’s point of view, in his experience, but trust it to be a policeman’s daughter, whether she embraced hippiedom or not.

‘I do remember one argument we had around that time,’ Yvonne went on. ‘He said it was all very well for me to go on about miniskirts and mascara and listen to the Rolling Stones, but if I had to deal with some of the things he did, I’d never want to go outside again.’

‘Did he say what?’

‘No. I can’t remember, but I just assumed he meant his job. You know, junkies, dead bodies and stuff. He was always going on about what a dangerous world it was out there. I mean, the thing with Linda Lofthouse was later, so it wasn’t anything to do with that. But he seemed frustrated. More than usual. He even fought with Mum once or twice, which was rare. He almost never lost his temper with her.’

‘Do you remember the circumstances of this particular argument?’

‘No. It was years ago. I was doing my homework, but they were quite loud and I couldn’t help overhearing. I suppose the fact that they were having a row made me want to listen. Mum said something about it being a good thing because it meant he wouldn’t have to go and mix with all those queers, and I just remember that he got angry and said that he was hamstrung and couldn’t do anything. He said something about his effing boss, too. Funny, I only remember that because he swore, which he rarely did at home, and I had no idea what “hamstrung” meant. It was the first time I ever heard the word. I had to look it up in the dictionary.’

‘Do you remember when that was?’

‘No. I mean, not specifically. Around the time you’re talking about. It was probably September or October, as I was back at school, but I don’t know for sure.’

‘Before the ball?’

‘Around then.’

It sounded to Banks as if Chadwick had been complaining to his wife about not being allowed to investigate something to do with gays, perhaps because his boss had intervened, and if the timing was right, it could well be the Tony Monaghan case. But which boss? There had been many officers above Chadwick at the time. Edward Crammond? It would be useful to find out who Chadwick’s other senior officers were and see if any came up in the names of ‘friends and acquaintances’ Winsome had gathered so far from Caxton’s past. ‘Did your father ever say anything about homosexuals?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘That summer, the Sexual Offences Act had just made homosexuality legal for adults over twenty-one in the privacy of their own homes. It was a transitional time. It caused a few problems for the police.’

‘What? You mean you could no longer beat the shit out of people for being gay?’

‘Something like that.’

‘Sorry. I didn’t mean you specifically, but you’ve got to admit your lot didn’t exactly have a spotless record when it came to respecting minority rights — whether sexual orientation or race.’

‘Yvonne, you’re right. But I don’t want to argue about that today. Mostly we do our best. Your father did his best. You know that. But sometimes there’s a rotten apple. Maybe the police force attracts prejudiced bullies to a certain extent. I’ve met a few in my time. But not everyone’s like that.’

‘Oh, I know that,’ said Yvonne, with a pout that made her look thirty years younger for a moment. ‘Sorry, I’m just being provocative. Dad certainly wasn’t like that. I don’t think he was a rotten apple at all. A bit strict, yes. Conservative, square. He didn’t like the hippies and all that, but I never once heard him say a bad word about coloured people or gays. And he wouldn’t hit them or harass them just because he didn’t approve of them. He liked to pretend to be a crusty right-wing curmudgeon when I was defending the workers and the students and so on, but I believe at heart he was a liberal. He believed in a fair deal for everyone. He hated privilege. He didn’t really want to go to Caxton’s ball, you know. He only did it for Mum.’

‘Did he ever say anything about gays?’

‘If he did, I don’t remember. Only that argument I told you about, when Mum mentioned queers.’

‘Did he ever mention the name Tony Monaghan?’

‘Not that I heard.’

‘Do you remember anything at all about a body found in the public toilets at Hyde Park up by the university?’

‘I remember it vaguely, but I don’t remember when, or any details. I mean, when you’re a copper’s daughter you probably do pay a bit more attention to such things than someone else would. But I wasn’t really interested in crime stories. True or fictional. I do know those toilets were supposed to be a hotbed of gay activity. Everybody knew that. There was a rumour going round at school that the police used to hide up in the ceiling there and watch through peepholes to catch the gays at it.’

‘Maybe it’s true,’ said Banks, smiling. Many public conveniences did serve as meeting places for homosexuals, he remembered. His father had always warned him to stay away from certain public loos, even in Peterborough.

Yvonne laughed. ‘I couldn’t see my dad up there spying on people through a peephole. He was tolerant on the whole. Except with me, of course.’

Banks stood up, and Winsome followed suit. ‘Well, maybe he had that in common with a lot of fathers. Thanks, Yvonne. You’ve been very helpful.’

‘I have?’

‘Well, we know more now than we did before we came, so I’d call that a successful visit, wouldn’t you?’

‘I suppose so.’

Banks handed her his card. ‘In case you remember anything else. Call me any time.’

‘I’m afraid I didn’t follow your advice very well, did I?’ said Annie glumly swirling the last of her Shiraz in the large wine glass. ‘A little tact. Softly, softly.’

‘No. You did the bull in a china shop with all-guns-blazing approach.’

‘I didn’t think so, but since that bastard from Wytherton had his say, you probably do.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Banks. ‘You were playing silly buggers with two oafs. Fair enough. You’ve had your fun, now just put it behind you and get back to work.’

‘Christ, what a day,’ said Annie. ‘Now Sinead Moffat hates me, too. She blames me for the search. And I’m pissed into the bargain. And I’m going to have another one.’

‘My pleasure.’ Banks poured the wine.

‘Ta,’ said Annie. ‘What’s that we’re listening to? It sounds a bit like Jeff Buckley.’

‘It’s Tim Buckley,’ said Banks. ‘His dad. Blue Afternoon.’

‘His dad? Get away with you.’

‘It is. He died young, too. Drug overdose.’

‘All your lot did,’ said Annie.

‘I saw him once,’ Banks said. ‘Knebworth Festival, 1974. It was one of the last gigs he did. Fantastic.’

They were sitting in the wicker chairs in Banks’s conservatory after a dinner of Marks & Spencer lasagne and Caesar salad, with dressing that came in a sachet, a bottle of Shiraz almost empty on the table between them and the lightest of breezes blowing though the open windows. The sun had gone down, but there was still a bluish glow in the sky behind Tetchley Fell. Banks had caught up with Annie in the corridor outside an interview room after he had got back from talking to Yvonne Reeves. It had been a long day, and Annie had looked drawn and haggard, so he had invited her to dinner, stopping off at M&S on the way.

Maybe Annie deserved the opportunity to let off a little steam, Banks thought. It was a complex case she was on, and the death of a child — which Mimosa Moffat was, when you came right down to it — got to even the most hardened officers. The fact that Annie had, herself, been raped some years ago, and was still recovering from a recent shooting incident, made her even more vulnerable. But Banks was still convinced that she was more than up to the task. Not only that, but that she was the best person for it.

‘What’s wrong with me, Alan?’ she said when he had emptied the last of the bottle into her glass ‘Am I a racist? Is that it? Do you think I’m a racist?’

‘I don’t think you’re a racist, Annie. It’s just complicated, that’s all. What do you think those mothers in Nigeria are thinking about, the ones whose daughters were kidnapped by Boko Haram?’

Annie squinted at him. ‘What? I can’t even begin to imagine what hell they’re going through, worrying if they’re ever going to see their daughters again, scared about what’s been done to them.’ She gave a shudder. ‘It doesn’t bear thinking about.’

‘Exactly. It doesn’t matter what colour they are, does it? They’re mothers going through hell, like any mother here would whose child goes missing, and children suffering. I know it sounds like a cliché, but we’re all just people. Good ’uns, bad ’uns and in-between ’uns, most of us.’

‘ “If you prick me, do I not bleed?” ’

‘You’ve got it.’

‘But why is this race business all so complicated?’ Annie went on, waving her glass at him. ‘It drives me round the bend. I don’t know what I’m supposed to think or say. Is grooming girls for underage sex supposed to be OK in their culture, like female genital mutilation or honour killing? Are we supposed to respect it all, no matter what, just because it’s their culture, like the Scots with their bagpipes and haggis? I mean, I don’t even like bagpipes and haggis. It’s not my bloody culture, I can tell you that. So does that make me a racist? And who do we blame? Society or the kids? Whatever happened to morality? Good and evil? Right and wrong?’

‘Outdated concepts, I’m afraid,’ said Banks. ‘But I think you’re getting way too many things mixed up here. What’s acceptable to one group isn’t necessarily acceptable to another. And there’s a big difference between haggis and bagpipes and female genital mutilation.’

Annie tipped her glass at a dangerous angle and narrowed her eyes. ‘I know that. I know that. I’m just trying to make a point, that’s all. Am I supposed to think all these things are OK because they’re sacred to some culture or ethnic group or medieval religion? Am I supposed to be inclusive? Is it all part and parcel of our diversity? Would I be divisive if I disagreed?’

‘Probably,’ said Banks. ‘But calm down. You’re letting this get to you way too much.’

Annie sniffed. ‘I think anyone who performs female genital mutilation should be hung, drawn and quartered, bagpipes should be exiled to one of the inner circles of hell, and as for haggis, well, the jury’s still out on that one.’

Banks laughed. ‘That’s because you’re a vegetarian.’

‘They have vegetarian haggis, you know. Boil in a bag.’

‘What’s it made of?’

‘I don’t know. The inner organs of turnips and cabbages or something. But am I wrong about all this?’

‘We both know,’ said Banks,’ that for every Asian who does something like this, you could find thousands who are decent, hard-working, law-abiding members of the community.’

‘But it’s not those people we’re dealing with, is it? It never is. We deal with the worst, like whoever raped Mimosa. The dregs. We take the decency of the majority for granted.’

‘True enough,’ said Banks. ‘But what else can we do except try to protect the good guys and catch the bad guys? Look on the bright side. Danny Caxton, for example. For years he got away with abusing underage girls, but now we’re coming down on him and people like him.’

‘Thanks to Operation Yewtree. But don’t you think even that’s gone a bit over the top? I mean, famous people are getting arrested just for touching someone’s arm or giving them a hug forty years ago, for crying out loud. Teachers are scared to touch children. I know I’m one to speak, given what happened to me and all, but I’ve never usually had much trouble removing an uninvited hand from my knee and telling its owner to bog off.’

‘Maybe there’s always some sort of overcompensation for letting things slide for so long,’ said Banks. ‘Like positive discrimination. Some people complain that jobs are given to women or to blacks just because they’re women, or black, for example. It’s our nature to try to make amends. And the Jimmy Savile business encouraged a lot of women to come forward and speak out. Don’t forget, either, that many of the victims had come forward before, at the time of the incident, and been ignored. Women like Linda Palmer. That’s down to us. Not you and me specifically, but the force. We’ve made mistakes. That’s why Adrian Moss seems to be wringing his hands most of the time these days. But the point is, it’s happening. Same with grooming gangs. Sure, they got away with it for far too long in Rochdale, Rotherham, Manchester, Oxford, Aylesbury. Now it’s Wytherton. Fair enough, too many people are still ignoring it, including us and the social, but you’re coming down on them.’

‘With my hands tied behind my back, it seems.’

Banks smiled at her. ‘Annie, I have every faith that you can do it, even with your hands tied behind your back.’

‘You know,’ Annie said, ‘the more I think about it, the more I’m sure that bastard Carver is bent.’

‘He’s probably just trying to do a really difficult job. It can’t be easy, policing a divided community like Wytherton.’

‘No, it’s not that. Those two coppers, Bill and Reg. I know I goaded them a bit, but they were ready to beat the shit out of us, Alan. Now, who runs a station where it’s OK for patrol officers to do that for no reason than someone being mouthy?’

‘Zero tolerance,’ said Banks.

‘Bloody hell, you’ve got an excuse for everything, don’t you?’

‘Not an excuse, but maybe a reason. And I’m not saying I agree. I’m just saying that’s probably their philosophy.’

‘Yeah, well, you can keep your zero tolerance if it means bashing me on the head with a baton.’ She took a hearty swig of wine.

Banks thought for a moment. ‘I suppose they’d say they were defending their patch. It can’t be an easy beat, Wytherton. And we come in like some invading army. No wonder Carver defends them.’

‘Me and Gerry? An invading army?’

‘You know what I mean.’

‘That man Carver’s a stuffed uniform,’ said Annie.

‘But why was he so unhelpful?’ said Banks. ‘That’s the point. You’d think he’d have a bit more about him. Have some idea what’s going on in his manor.’

‘He turned a blind eye.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Banks. ‘But I can’t help finding myself wondering if there isn’t something he’s trying to keep under wraps.’

‘Like what?’

‘Those two coppers who gave you a rough time—...’

‘Reg and Bill. Pair of pillocks.’

‘Right. They weren’t on duty the night Mimosa Moffat took her last ride, were they?’

‘They said not.’

‘What if Mimsy was a problem? Their problem.’

‘Problem? Mimsy? What are you talking about?’

‘But what if she was?’ Banks said. ‘I’m just thinking out loud. What if they were involved somehow?’

‘You mean Reg and Bill were having sex with underage girls?’

‘Exactly. It’s not beyond the bounds of possibility, is it? Maybe they found out what was going on, and that was their price for turning a blind eye? Maybe Mimosa threatened to blow the whistle. I know there’s still a lot of loose ends, like nobody knowing she was going to be walking up the lane and so on. But as a working theory, does it hold water? Maybe they were planning on killing her at the other end of her journey, later, away from their own patch.’

‘Reg and Bill? But they said they didn’t know what was going on down the Strip. Even Carver didn’t.’

‘Why couldn’t they be lying? I doubt that it would have been hard for them to get hold of a car we couldn’t trace. One of the cars on the CCTV was stolen, wasn’t it?’

‘True,’ said Annie. ‘But Reg and Bill?’

‘It wouldn’t be the first time police officers have lied to protect themselves. I’m merely suggesting that maybe you should have another chat with them. Find out exactly where they were last Tuesday between one and three in the morning.’

‘Carver will love that,’ Annie said.

‘Fuck Carver. It’s our case. Work around him.’

‘You know, you might have a point. And the more I think of it, the more I’m convinced those two blokes in the takeaway were lying. You should’ve seen their faces when I said we’d be able to match the food we’d bought with the victim’s stomach contents.’

‘You told them that?’

‘Yeah. So?’

‘Well, we can’t, can we?’

‘Maybe not exactly, unless we matched the DNA with a goat or a lamb they’d been serving. But it put the wind up them, I can tell you that.’ Annie clinked glasses with Banks and slopped a little wine over the rim of hers on to the carpet. ‘Oops,’ she said. ‘It’s red, too. Sorry.’

‘Forget it. How does Gerry feel about all this?’

‘The poor kid’s terrified she’s going to be sent back on probation or something. You know, I like Gerry a lot, but she can be a bit of a mouse. She’s a bit too “golly gosh” and “jolly hockey sticks” for me sometimes.’

‘It’s a matter of background,’ said Banks. ‘She went to a posh school, didn’t she?’

‘Think so.’

‘There you are, then. Give her a chance. She’ll probably be chief constable one day. Playing fields of Eton and all that.’

‘I don’t think it was Eton. It was Merchant Taylor, or some such place.’

‘It’s just a saying. “The Battle of Waterloo was won on the playing fields of Eton.” ’

‘What’s it mean? Who said that? David Cameron?’

‘It’s supposed to have been the Duke of Wellington, but it may well be a misquote. People who go to public school are destined for great things. Leadership. That’s the point.’

‘If you say so. The old boys network? And the old girls?’ Annie drained her glass and waved it. ‘Can we have another?’

Banks got to his feet. ‘I’ll open another bottle if you want.’

‘Can I stop here for the night? I’m too pissed to drive and I can’t afford a taxi all the way to Harkside. I’d probably be sick, if I had to go in a car.’

‘I’ve got an early start in the morning, but the spare room’s made up.’

Annie hesitated for a moment, then she said, ‘I don’t need the spare room.’

Banks went to get another bottle of red from the rack in the kitchen, then he went into the entertainment room to put another CD on. What had she meant by that remark? He wondered. Was it some sort of come-on? Any romance they had shared had fizzled out long ago, and he had thought neither of them was foolish enough to want to rekindle it, to mix work and sex again. Now this? But Annie had had way too much to drink. She was upset, confused, and he wasn’t going to take advantage of her.

Tim Buckley had put him in a late sixties mellow mood, so he flipped through the classics: the Grateful Dead’s American Beauty, Joni Mitchell’s Blue, CSNY’s Déjà Vu and the rest. Or should it be Astral Weeks? Harvest? Songs for Beginners? David Crosby’s If Only I Could Remember My Name? In the end he went for Love’s Forever Changes.

When he got back to conservatory with the wine, Annie lay sprawled in her chair, fast asleep, glass clutched to her chest, mouth open, snoring gently. Banks refilled his glass, then put his feet up and settled down to enjoy the breeze and listen to ‘Alone Again Or.’