‘Yes, but only at the beginning. They made sure they had her there on show when people arrived. But before the action started, they packed her off to the home of some pony-club friend in Edendale, where they let her stay the night. Out of sight, out of mind, as Grandma would say.’
‘We know she was sexually experienced. Do you think she might have got involved with any of her father’s friends?’
o o J
‘One of the perks for daddy’s best clients? Maybe. It sounds about right.’
O
Helen sounded very bitter, but it was more than just distaste at the casual treatment of a teenage girl. You didn’t have to be a police officer to know that far worse exploitation was an all too familiar story these days. Cooper thought about his nieces, Josie and Amy, and clenched his fists. He dreaded to think what he would do if anyone came near those two.
‘She enjoyed every minute of the attention while she was there,’ said Helen. ‘But my feeling was that it was mostly a performance for daddy. She was daddy’s girl, all right. Though Charlotte Vernon would tell you differently, I think. Charlotte thought Laura was as good as gold, and really believed that she had no idea what went on at those parties. I’m sure that provided an extra spice for Laura. The excitement of living dangerously, enjoying a big secret.’
Cooper wondered what she based this judgement on, but had too many other questions piling up in his mind to go down a side track.
‘Daddy’s girl?’
‘You can take that how you like. Imagine the worst, if you want. As far as I’m concerned, Graham Vernon is capable of anything.’
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‘You really dislike him, don’t you?’
‘Dislike him? Hate him, you mean.’
He frowned. He thought that the word ‘hate’ didn’t sit too comfortably in Helen’s mouth.
‘And you, Helen?’ he asked cautiously. ‘How did you get involved in these parties?’
‘I was invited because 1 had met Graham Vcriion at my parents’ house a few weeks before.’
‘I suppose he took a fancy to you.’
She sighed. ‘I can’t believe how naive I was. Dad really didn’t
o >
want me to go, but he wouldn’t say why. I thought it would be exciting, you see. A bit more glamorous than the staff room of a primary school, anyway. When I arrived it all seemed good fun at first. Everybody was very friendly. Attentive, even.’ There was a strange vibration of the phone, as if she were shuddering at the recollection. ‘I had a bit too much to drink, but everybody else was the same. I sobered up pretty quickly when Graham Vernon got me in one of the bedrooms.’
Ben Cooper thought at first he must have misheard her. Helen’s last words didn’t seem to conjure up a rational picture in his mind. The picture he had was completely wrong. Completely.
‘Hold on. Are you telling me —?’
But Helen wasn’t listening. She was absorbed in her own memories. ‘He’s a big man, you know. He was far too strong
o ‘ ^ o
for me. Before I knew what was happening, he had pushed me down among the expensive coats on the bed, and his whole weight was on top of me so I could barely breathe. He was laughing all the time, as if it was some sort of joke that I was struggling. I can remember now the smell of the wine on his breath, the feel of his fingers digging into my arms, the sight of his face so close to mine that I had to shut my eyes …’
Cooper waited in silence. He wanted to ask her to stop now, to tell her that he had enough information, that there were times when you could know too much. But her words continued to spill down the phone line, cold and fast, like a stream loosened from its winter ice.
‘The worst thing was that somehow I couldn’t force myself
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to shout for help. It was because I was in his house, Ben. I was too embarrassed to cry out or scream. Too embarrassed! It sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it? Totally pathetic. I didn’t want to make a fuss.’
Finally, there was a crack in Helen’s voice, a single, painful flav that betrayed the truth behind the unemotional delivery. Cooper had never felt so helpless, never so lacking in the right things to saw.
The think about all those women who have ever been raped,’ said Helen, ‘and who have then had to explain in court why they didn’t fight back or shout for help. I never understood it before that night, Ben. I understand it now.’
Cooper remembered reading a report of a court case, the trial of a notorious American serial killer who had been convicted of the brutal rape and murder of several women. Sentencing the killer to the electric chair, the judge had made a famous comment: ‘The male sexual urge has a strength out of all proportion to any useful purpose that it serves.’ But for some people, it did serve a purpose. The purpose of domination.
‘I was saved in the end, when somebody started knocking on the bedroom door. There seemed to be a group of them out there, and something was causing them great hilarity. Of course, I was convinced that it was me they were all laughing at. Stupid, isn’t it? And when Graham Vernon finally let me go, I had to walk past them downstairs as if nothing had happened. I couldn’t bear the thought of all those people looking at me, seeing the state I was in, all messed up, with my best dress crumpled and my hair all over the place. That was all I could think about at the time. But they wouldn’t have cared what I’d been doing, would they? Because they were all the same as him. Graham Vernon. Don’t ask me why I hate him, Ben.’
Cooper wished he could reach out and touch her, to reassure her that everything was OK. But maybe it wouldn’t have been the right thing to do, even if he had actually been there with her, instead of on the end of an impersonal phone line.
