Peter Robinson: When the Music's Over

McLaughlin cleared his throat again. ‘Though the Met is technically in charge of Operation Yewtree, Mr Burgess here from the NCA will be bringing his expertise of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection command to bear on the case.’

Burgess tipped his hand in a mock salute. ‘At your service,’ he said.

‘What will your role be?’ Banks asked.

‘Co-coordinating between you and the Met, mostly,’ said Burgess. ‘I’ll be trying to make sure that the left hand knows what the right hand is doing. The case is unwieldy enough already. Linda Palmer was living with her parents in Leeds in 1967, but the assault took place in Blackpool. She now lives near Eastvale, a village called Minton-on-Swain, and Danny Caxton lives out on the coast, as you probably know already, though he lived in West Yorkshire for some years. In Otley. If we involved all the local forces — not to mention the rest that will soon come into play as the complaints add up — you can imagine what a mess we’d have on our hands. That’s why we decided on one SIO for Linda Palmer, one team manager, and that’s you. It’s your job to keep a firm hand on the rudder. I’m available to provide updates and background intelligence from other sources wherever possible. Believe me, in this investigation, the different county forces involved will be talking to one another, and complete records will be kept of every interview, every allegation, every scrap of evidence. We have several complaints about Caxton from around the country already. The one thing you can be certain of is that there will be more complainants coming forward once the news gets out, and there’s strength in numbers as far as we’re concerned. How many depends very much on the access and opportunity Caxton had to satisfy his needs. It’s my feeling, given his long and wide-ranging career, that he had plenty. They’ll all have to be traced and investigated. Possible witnesses tracked down. Locations probed. I’ll be searching for similarities in the complainant accounts.’

‘Just how wide is this investigation?’ asked Gervaise.

Burgess looked at Chief Constable Sampson, who put on a suitably grim expression and said, ‘So far, according to the NCA, we have seven independent complaints about Danny Caxton spanning the years between 1961 and 1989. All from females between the ages of fourteen and sixteen at the time. The county forces involved have done as much background checking and taken as many preliminary statements as necessary so far, but we, and the CPS, feel it’s time to move quickly now. The CPS also happen to feel that ours is one of the crucial cases, that it has a good chance of netting a positive result.’

‘Why is that?’ asked Banks. ‘As far as I’ve heard so far it’s no different from any other such case. One person’s word against another’s. What gives us a better chance of making a charge that sticks?’

‘Simply this,’ said Chief Constable Sampson. ‘Linda Palmer has informed us that, in her case, there was someone else present. There was a witness.’

When DI Annie Cabbot and DC Geraldine Masterson arrived on the scene around half past nine that Wednesday morning, the whole eight miles of Bradham Lane were already sealed off from where it began at a T-junction two miles west of Eastvale to where it ended beside a bridge over the River Ure.

‘It would be in the middle of bloody nowhere,’ said Annie. ‘We’ll have to get a mobile unit out here and find the bodies to man it. And we’ll have to run the Major Incident Room from HQ. There’s not enough facilities out here.’

The uniformed constable standing by the police tape bent to talk to them. ‘There’s an officer and a patrol car down by the bridge at the far end, and two officers at the scene,’ she said, then pointed. ‘The crime scene is three miles down there.’

‘Thanks,’ said Annie. ‘As long as we don’t have to walk.’

‘It’s a hard road surface, ma’am,’ said the officer. ‘And a rough one at that. Not much chance of tyre tracks, but you never know what the CSIs might find. I’d go carefully.’

‘We will. I know those CSIs.’

The patrol officer untied the tape at one end, and Gerry drove slowly along the narrow road.

Annie was intrigued by the shapes of the trees. Some seemed dead and stunted, standing there like men doing handstands, or the twisted and darkened shapes of burned bodies in a pugilistic stance. Others made a dazzling symphony of green in the breeze after last week’s rains, leaves glistening and dancing in the morning sun. The road meandered, and on a couple of occasions, there were narrow unsurfaced lanes leading off, signposted to villages or farms Annie had never heard of. It would be easy to get lost here if you took a wrong turn, she thought. Here and there were passing places in case you met someone coming the other way.

The first sign that they were close to their destination was a patrol car blocking the road ahead and a cyclist in bright purple Lycra leaning against the bonnet, head in his hands. A female PC stood next to him, notebook in her hand. A male officer, also making notes, sat in the car. The sleek bicycle leaned against the drystone wall. Annie bet it weighed about two ounces, cost a fortune and went like the clappers. So many cyclists had been inspired by the Tour de France’s Grand Départ in Yorkshire that you could hardly move for them on the roads these days. Some of them looked quite fit in their Lycra, too, Annie thought, though not this one. He needed a few more thousand miles on his speedometer to get up to snuff.

‘This is Mr Roger Stanford,’ said the PC. Then she gestured towards the misshapen bundle lying in a cordoned-off area several yards further along the road. ‘He found the... er... her.’

‘Thanks,’ said Annie. ‘And you are?’

‘PC Mellors, ma’am. Stephanie Mellors. Most people just call me Steph.’

Annie gestured for PC Mellors to follow her a short distance from Roger Stanford. ‘Tell me, Steph,’ she said, ‘what do you think? First impressions?’

‘You mean did he do it?’

‘Well, if that’s where you want to start.’

Steph shook her head. ‘He’s gutted, ma’am. A blubbering wreck. You can tell. I don’t think he’s faking it.’

‘You look a bit peaky, yourself.’

‘You haven’t seen her yet, ma’am. It’s never easy, something like this.’

‘Too true. What do you think happened?’

‘From my limited experience, I’d say she was either hit by a car or beaten to death.’

‘Have you any idea who she is?’

‘No. There’s no ID, and as far as I can tell from... you know... I’ve never seen her before in my life. It’s such a strange thing. She’s not wearing a stitch of clothing.’

‘OK. Let’s have a word with Mr Stanford.’

Roger Stanford was still leaning on the bonnet of the patrol car with his head in his hands. He wasn’t crying, Annie noticed, just propping his head up as if it were too heavy with images of violent death to hold itself up. He would need to be investigated, being the person who had found the body, but he didn’t need to be treated like a suspect. ‘Mr Stanford,’ she said, touching his arm. He raised his head, a blank expression on his face, as if he had been startled out of a deep sleep. Annie introduced herself. Gerry stood beside her, notebook at the ready. ‘What time did you find the body?’ Annie asked.

‘It would have been about a quarter to nine.’

‘Is this journey part of a routine, or are you on holiday?’

‘Daily routine. I live in Bradham and I work in Eastvale. Clinton Estate Agents. I usually pass here about a quarter to nine. That’s how I know. I keep track of my times.’

‘There are quicker ways.’