Hard Frost (2 page)

   The man was glaring at him. "I am still waiting, sergeant."

   "Please take a seat, sir. I'll deal with you as quickly as I can." He looked up hopefully as PC Lambert came in from Control.

   "Still no answer from that Inspector Allen number, Sarge."

   "Keep trying. Any luck with Wonder Woman?"

   "Not a dicky bird!"

   "Bloody cow's useless." Wells ripped the sheet from his pad. "Someone else who's useless . . .see if you can get Mr. Mullett on this number."

   Lambert glanced at it and frowned. "This is the same number I'm trying for Mr. Allen, Sarge."

   Wells looked at it again. Lambert was right. "Mullett and Allen, both out together at eleven o'clock at night. I wonder where?"

   "A cut-price knocking shop?" suggested a familiar voice, helpfully.

   Frost! Jack Frost in his crumpled mac and maroon scarf beaming at them.

   "Jack!" cried a delighted Wells. "I thought you were on holiday."

   "I am. I've just nipped in for some fags. Did you get my comic postcard?" He struck a pose and declaimed:

   "I cannot get my winkle out. Now there's a funny thing. The more I try to pull it out. The more I push it in!"

   Wells grinned. "I stuck it on the notice-board, but Mullett made me take it down. He said it was near pornographic'

   "There's nothing pornographic about a man eating winkles," said Frost. "So what's all the panic?"

   "Patriot Street. Body in a dustbin sack."

   Frost grimaced. "Where did people hide bodies before dustbin sacks were invented? We find more bloody bodies than rubbish in them these days."

   "This one's a kid," said Wells, 'a boy, seven years old. We've got a murder investigation, a detective constable in sole charge, the pathologist on his way and Mullett and Allen conveniently unobtainable. A proper sod-up!"

   "Not as good as some of my sod-ups," said Frost, 'but I'm glad I'm on holiday. I'll just nick some of Mullett's fags and go." He disappeared up the corridor.

   Seeing Wells with nothing to do, the man in the camel-hair coat sprang across to the desk.

   "Perhaps you can now spare me some time. I've lost my car - a metallic grey Rover, registration number - '

   "Stolen car, right," said Wells, pulling the forms towards him. The quickest way to get shot of him was to take the details.

   "I didn't say it was stolen. I just don't know where it is. I drove down from Bristol for the firm's function. I parked it down a side street somewhere. I must have got confused - I can't find it. My wallet, credit cards, everything, are inside it."

   "It's probably been pinched by now," said Wells cheerfully.

   "I'm sure it hasn't, sergeant. It's fitted with anti-thief devices."

   "And you've no idea where you left it?"

   "If I did, I wouldn't be here, would I?"

   Wells put his pen down. "So what do you want us to do about it?"

   The man sighed as if explaining to an idiot. "I would have thought that was obvious, sergeant. If one of your men could drive me around the side streets, we could look for it."

   "I've got a better idea." Frost had returned with one of Mullett's best cigarettes dangling from his lips. "Why don't you piss off and go and look for it yourself? We've got more important things to do."

   The little man spun round angrily, jabbing a finger at Frost. "I'll have you," he spluttered. "I've got friends in high places. I want your name."

   "Mullett," said Frost. "Superintendent Mullett."

   "Right," said the man, scribbling this down. "You haven't heard the last of this." He stamped out of the station.

   "You bloody fool, Jack," said Wells.

   "He won't take it any further," said Frost, but now beginning to have doubts himself. "Anyway," he brightened up, "I'm on holiday so Mullett won't suspect me."

   "If you were dead he'd still suspect you," said Wells grimly.

   Lambert slid up the dividing hatch to the Control Room. "Still nothing from that number, Sarge. I got the exchange to trace it for us. It's the Clarendon Arms, that big pub and restaurant over at Felstead."

   Wells's eyes narrowed. "What the hell are they doing there? Those two are up to something, you mark my words. Why isn't anyone answering the phone?"

   Lambert shrugged. "There could be a fault on the line. We'll have to send someone over there to pick Allen up."

   "We can't spare a bleeding car," said Wells. He groaned. Lambert was right - there was no other option. "All right - send Charlie Baker. We want Allen back here. Tell him it's a murder enquiry."

   The hatch slammed shut. Wells spun round quickly, just in time to catch Frost before he sidled out. "Hold it, Jack."

   "I'm on holiday until the end of the week," said Frost.

   "We've got to have a senior officer over there . . . Please, Jack. I only want you to hold the fort until Allen arrives - fifteen minutes, half an hour at the most . . ."

   "All right," sighed Frost reluctantly. "But if he's not there in half an hour, I'm off."

   "You're a diamond," said Wells.

   "I'm a prat," said Frost.

   The door was closing behind him when Lambert slid up the hatch. "I've got hold of Liz Maud, sarge."

Detective Sergeant Maud was late arriving at the house. She still didn't know her way around Denton and the ancient, well-thumbed street map Sergeant Wells had given her was falling to pieces with lots of the street names unreadable. After twice retracing her route, she pulled up outside the front door just as the doctor was leaving. "Kiddy's not too badly hurt," he told her. "Couple of superficial wounds to the upper arm, which only required a dressing." He glanced back and winced at the hysterical shrieking and sobbing from inside. "That's the mother. She's in a worse state than the kid. I offered her a sedative, but she chucked it at me." He edged past her. "I wish I could stay, but I've got other calls." He plunged out into the street, relieved to get away from the noise.

   Liz switched off her radio. She didn't want her interview with an overwrought mother interrupted by trivial messages. She homed in on the crying which was now accompanied by a banging noise. It led her to the child's bedroom, a small room with a single cot, its walls decorated with nursery wallpaper.

   The banging was caused by a middle-aged man who was hammering nails into the window frame which had been forced open by the intruder. A young woman, the mother, jet black hair, slightly olive skin, was sitting in a blue-painted chair, rocking from side to side, moaning and sobbing continuously. Liz sighed. She obviously wouldn't be much help.

   A plumpish woman in her fifties was standing next to the mother, holding the child, wrapped in a blanket. The child, a boy, barely a year old, his face flushed and tear-stained, had cried himself to an exhausted sleep.

   "Detective Sergeant Maud," announced Liz, holding out her warrant card.

   "Took your time getting here," said the man, knocking in one last nail and putting down the hammer. He gave the window frame a testing shake. "That should keep the bugger out."

   "If you could try to avoid touching things," said Liz. "There could be fingerprints."

   "You wouldn't need fingerprints if you got here earlier and caught him," said the man.

   Liz ignored this. "Are you the husband?"

   "I'm her next-door neighbour - George Armitage." He nodded at the woman with the baby. "And that's my wife."

   Liz addressed the mother. "What's your name, love?"

   It was Mrs. Armitage who answered her. "Lily - Lily Turner. She's in a bit of a state, I'm afraid."

   "Is there a husband?"

   "Well - there's a father. Not sure if he's actually her husband, if you follow my meaning." She lowered her voice. "He's inside . . . doing eighteen months - stealing radios from cars."

   Liz gently touched the mother's arm. "Lily, I'm from the police. Can you tell me what happened?"

   The mother's only response was to moan louder.

   Liz turned to the other woman. "Perhaps you can tell me what happened, Mrs. Armitage."

   "Half a mo." She gently laid the boy down in the cot and pulled the bedclothes over him, careful to avoid touching the injured arm with its strip of pink plaster. There were tiny flecks of blood on the sheet. "Lily was in the other room watching- telly when she heard little Tommy crying. When she tried to get to him, she couldn't get the door open."

   "The bastard had jammed that chair under the door handle," said the man, pointing to the chair the mother was sitting on. Liz made a mental note to ensure it was fingerprinted, and nodded for the woman to continue.

   "The kiddy was screaming and she could hear someone moving about. She thought it was burglars. Anyway, she came running in to us and George went straight back with her and managed to kick the door open."

   "Let me tell it now," said the man. "I kicked the door open. That window was wide open with the wind roaring in. I nipped across and looked out, but there was no sign of him. The kid was crying fit to bust, so she picked him up and then she spotted the blood and next she was yelling and screaming louder than the bleeding kid. I got my wife to phone the police and the doctor. The rest you know."

   Liz walked over to the window and looked out on to a small back garden. There was a gate in the rear fence leading to a lane. Easy to get in and out without being spotted. The window had been crudely levered open, exactly the same as the other three stabbings. "Do you know if she's noticed anyone watching the house, or following her?"

   "We're not on speaking terms," said Armitage. "We wouldn't be in here tonight if it wasn't an emergency. I was one of the people her old man nicked a car radio from, so we're not coming in for tea and biscuits and a chat, are we?"

   Liz snapped her notebook shut. She would have to come back again tomorrow when the mother had calmed down. "Well, thank you very much. Try not to touch anything. There'll be a fingerprint man here in the morning."

   Mrs. Armitage walked with her to the front door. "Do you think you'll catch him?"

   "We'll get him," said Liz. She wished she shared her spoken optimism. A maniac who had a thing about seeing blood on children. They had no description, no fingerprints - they didn't even know if it was a man or a woman, and all of the known sex offenders she had painstakingly questioned had cast-iron alibis. "We'll get him all right." The front door slammed shut behind her, but she could still hear the mother wailing.

   In the car she switched her radio back on and they told her about the dead boy. She fished out the map and tried to find how to get to Patriot Street.

"She had her damn radio off!" said Wells incredulously. "What does the silly cow think we give her a radio for - just to keep in her bloody handbag?" The phone rang. "Yes?" he snapped. 

   It was Mullett and he sounded just the tiniest bit drunk. "My wife tells me you've been trying to reach me, sergeant."

   Wells clapped his hand over the mouthpiece and yelled for Lambert to call back the area car. Then he told Mullett about the murdered boy.

Mike Packer stamped his feet and flapped his arms. It was damn cold. He wished he could go back on his beat and walk around to keep warm, but he had been delegated to stand with a cupboard and record details of everyone who approached the body. So far he had recorded himself, PCs Simms and Jordan, DC Burton and the two Scene of Crime officers in their white overalls who had screened off the area, plus, of course, the police surgeon who was in and out in a flash, simply confirming the boy was dead and the circumstances were bloody suspicious. Across the road Jordan and Simms, in the warmth of the area car, were waiting to be told what to do. No sign yet of the pathologist, nor Detective Inspector Allen who should be in charge.

   An old Ford Escort wheezed round the corner and shuddered to a halt. Simms nudged Jordan who climbed out of the area car, ready to send the newcomer away. But the man getting out of the car, maroon scarf streaming in the wind, was Detective Inspector Jack Frost. What was he doing here? He should be on holiday.

   Burton, kneeling by the body, heard the car draw up and swore softly. Control had told him that Detective Sergeant Liz Maud was on her way over, so this must be her. The pompous little cow would soon start taking charge, lording it over everyone and barking out her orders. But that raucous laugh that came slicing across the gloom had him hurrying out. There was only one person with a laugh like that.

   Frost took a quick look round the scene. Everything seemed to be in order. The street was cordoned off and a tent-like structure erected around the shop doorway. A small generator installed by the SOCmen chugged away, providing the emergency lighting, and everyone seemed to be doing what they ought to. He nodded happily to himself. DC Burton was competent enough to handle all the fiddling details.

   "Right," he said, after lighting up one of Mullett's cigarettes for Burton, "I'd better know what we've got, just in case some nosy bastard asks."

   "Dead boy, aged about seven," said Burton, leading him to the body. "Believed to be Bobby Kirby, reported missing from home. Mother separated from husband. She and her boyfriend nipped out to the pub for a couple of hours leaving Bobby watching telly. When they got back around ten o'clock, Bobby wasn't there."

   The body was still in the plastic sack and wouldn't be removed until the pathologist, a stickler for insisting on things being left exactly as found, had examined it. Frost knelt down and looked at the white face, the brown plastic masking tape round the eyes and mouth still in place. He shook his head sadly. "Poor little sod. Have the parents been told?"

   "Not yet," Burton told him. "We're waiting for Mr. Allen."

   "Rather him than me," said Frost. He peered more closely, his face tight with compassion. "What dirty bastard did this to you, sonny?" He examined the tape binding the mouth, and the dribble of vomit. He sniffed. That smell. What the hell was it? He knew it from somewhere . . . Of course, the hospital. It was always lingering around the ward when he went to visit his wife, when he sat by the bed for hours on end to watch her slowly dying. He worried away, trying to identify it, but gave up. It wasn't his case, so it wasn't his problem. "Cause of death?"