Peter Robinson - When the Music's Over

When they finally arrived at the ex Mrs Caxton’s flat in a converted convent not far from York city centre, they found that her day had hardly been anywhere near as abstemious as theirs.

The woman who answered the doorbell was short and plump, with a fuzz of pinkish-white hair over chipmunk cheeks and a small, pinched mouth. The tight T-shirt and tartan slacks she wore didn’t do her any favours. But she probably didn’t care about that. She had a glass in her hand, and Banks could smell the gin from where he stood.

‘Mrs Caxton?’ he asked, identifying himself.

‘As was,’ she said. ‘Then Mrs Braithwaite, but the second one was no better than the first, so I’ve gone back to my maiden name — Canning. But you can call me Carol. Don’t stand out there in the hall, or you’ll have the neighbours talking. Nosey lot, they are. Come in, make yourselves at home. Is this about Danny?’

‘Why do you ask?’ said Banks, as he and Winsome followed Carol Canning into her living room. The large picture window framed a view of the main road, where traffic slowed for a large roundabout. The flat was cleaner and neater than Banks would have expected from the state of Carol Canning so early in the day. Maybe she had someone to come in and ‘do’ for her, or perhaps she was just a fastidious, house-proud drunk. Maybe the drink was her way of celebrating a day’s housework. Whatever the reason, the mantelpiece was dust free, and the wood surfaces shone with recent polish.

‘Well, nobody’s interested in little old me any more, my second husband wouldn’t say boo to a goose, but Danny always was a bit of a lad, to say the least. He sailed a bit close to the wind, if you catch my drift. Besides, you called me Mrs Caxton. It’s been a long time since anyone called me that. What is it? Tax evasion? Not that I care. I don’t get a penny from him. Not any more.’

‘It’s not tax evasion,’ said Banks.

‘Sit down. Tea? Something stronger? Gin?’

‘Tea would be really nice.’

Carol Canning headed for the kitchen. Winsome looked at Banks and widened her eyes. Banks smiled at her. Carol seemed to him the sort of drunk who could hold her liquor; at least, she didn’t wobble when she walked, and her speech wasn’t slurred. A steady drip throughout the day, Banks guessed, causing and maintaining a gentle buzz. She returned several minutes later with a tray bearing a rose-patterned china teapot with gilded edges and two matching cups and saucers. There were also similar bowls of sugar and milk. Banks, who preferred his tea in a mug, accepted milk and sugar and took the proffered saucer. Not a trace of a tremor in Carol Canning’s hand. Banks could hardly get his finger through the handle of the cup. He noticed that the level of gin in Carol’s glass was considerably higher than it had been before she went into the kitchen.

When everyone had been served, she sat on the sofa, lit a cigarette, which she attached to a long ivory holder, put her legs up and stretched her smoking arm along the back, holding the gin close to her breast. It might have been the nineteenth century, and she might have been reposing on a chaise longue. ‘Now do tell,’ she said. ‘Don’t tease. You haven’t come all this way just for the view.’

‘No,’ said Banks, trying to hold his teacup delicately, without snapping off the fragile handle. ‘It is about your ex-husband. The first one.’

‘So what has Danny boy been up to now?’

‘Now?’

‘A figure of speech.’ She wagged her finger and spilled a little gin. ‘You policemen! I can see I’m going to have to watch what I say.’

‘Sorry. Just habit. Well, you’ll hear about it soon enough, so I might as well tell you that your ex-husband has been accused of a rape in 1967, and that other similar incidents are being investigated.’

‘1967?’

‘Yes.’

‘We were divorced in 1965.’

‘Yes. But were you ever aware of anything like that while you were married to him?’

‘I wouldn’t have put it past him. Danny was always rather forceful, shall we say. I mean, his idea of foreplay was, “You awake?” ’ She laughed. ‘He liked it rough — but that’s not to say he ever hit me or anything — and he liked it often and anywhere. I always assumed he had other women, but I’d never have imagined that he had to rape them. He was very attractive, was Danny. Lots of women fancied him and I’m sure plenty of them were only too willing to spread their legs.’

‘These were young girls.’

She chewed her lip. ‘How young?’

‘Underage. Fourteen. The one we talked to.’

She put her cigarette hand to her mouth. A half inch of ash dropped on to the front of her T-shirt. She ignored it. ‘Oh my God.’

‘That surprises you?’

‘No, no. Not particularly. But it does shock me.’ She took a hefty slug of gin. ‘As much as I’m capable of being shocked these days.’

‘But it doesn’t surprise you?’

Carol Canning thought for a moment, a little pale, took a gulp of gin, then whispered, ‘Nothing about Danny surprises me. He was a law unto himself, that man. What he wanted, he took.’

‘He wanted young girls?’

‘Christ, I was only sixteen when he took me. And there was no hesitation on his part. I didn’t even have time to say no.’

‘He raped you?’

‘He took me. I wasn’t unwilling and I wasn’t a virgin. I was a little bit tipsy. I don’t think I wanted to say no. It was flattering, getting attention from a star like Danny Caxton. See how naive I was? There was a time when I was flattered by the attention of celebrities. It took me long enough to learn better. You wouldn’t find a bigger pack of deviants outside an institution.’

‘Well, this fourteen-year-old girl wasn’t flattered, and she says he raped her.’

‘Is this for certain? Are you sure she’s telling the truth, and not just out for what she can get?’

‘Sure as we can be. At least, we’re investigating the allegation. Why should she lie?’

Carol snorted. ‘ Men . Why wouldn’t she lie? If she was ashamed of what she did, or regretted it too late? Got a bit pissed, and things went too far. Women do that all the time.’

‘Do what?’

‘Cry rape.’

‘We don’t think that’s what happened,’ Winsome said.

‘But you’re not sure, are you, love? And you have no evidence. Besides, they’re all coming out of the woodwork now, after Jimmy and Rolf. They can smell the money in it, you ask me.’ She turned back to Banks.

‘Did you know any of Mr Caxton’s friends?’ he asked.

‘Danny didn’t have any friends. Just hangers-on. They came and went.’

‘Do you know any who hung around longer than others? Or any from 1967?’

‘I told you, we were divorced by then. I have no idea who his cronies were.’

‘You must have been very young.’

She smiled flirtatiously. ‘Flattery will get you anywhere. We were all young once.’ She looked at Winsome. ‘Some of us still are. I was nineteen. We’d been married two years. I suppose it was ’62 when we first met. My fifteen minutes.’

‘You must have heard things about him, though?’

‘I can’t say I paid a lot of attention. I had an exciting enough life to live. You know about his background, don’t you?’

‘Some things,’ Banks said cautiously. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Well, it wasn’t all public knowledge. He had a hard time of it when he was young, did Danny.’

‘You mean being taken away from his parents?’

‘Partly that,’ said Carol Canning. ‘But it wasn’t until much later that he found out what really happened, around the time we were married, in fact.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘What happened to his parents.’