A Killing Frost

Chapter 4

A petulant wind rattled the windows of the Incident Room. It was a lousy night for a stakeout, but you couldn’t pick your moment. Frost surveyed his team and was pleased to note that Bill Wells had included two WPCs, one the girl who had sat with the rape victim at Denton General, looking even younger out of uniform. This was good. A man and a woman in a shop doorway late at night would look far less conspicuous than a man on his own, and the blackmailer was sure to be edgy and ready to abort. Frost swilled down the dregs of his tea, lit up another cigarette from the stub of the old one, which he dumped in the mug, then clapped his hands for silence.

‘Right. You all know what we’re in for. A long, boring wait in the bleeding cold in the happy knowledge that Mullett begrudges paying you the overtime. We ought to catch the sod tonight, but as he can only withdraw a maximum of?500 a day, we’ll have plenty of other chances. All the indications are that he’s a rank amateur, but a dangerous one. He laced Supersaves own-brand wine with bleach – the fact that most of the customers thought it tasted better that way isn’t the point. He also put a lethal dose of salt in babies’ milk powder and nearly killed one. So we want him caught quickly.’

The young WPC put up her hand. ‘You say he’s a rank amateur, but this is a pretty ingenious way of getting his money.’

‘You’re right, love,’ agreed Frost. ‘It’s bloody ingenious, but he didn’t think of it himself – this is a copycat crime. A few years ago, back in London, an ex-cop – you can’t trust the bastards – found a way of getting his blackmail money paid without risk. He opened up a building society account with a false name and address and got the money paid into that account. He then made withdrawals using his cashpoint card. Today, building societies won’t let you open an account without the most vigorous of checks, so it shouldn’t happen again. But our clever bastard amateur has found a way round that. He pinched a legitimate card on which the prat of an owner had written his pin number in large letters, just in case any crook should miss it. But for a change, we’ve got a bit of luck on our side. With the ex cop, the Met had hundreds of cashpoints to cover. The Fortress Building Society has only got five cashpoints, so if our bloke wants to withdraw his money, his choice is limited. We’ve limited it even further by arranging with Fortress to put two of their cashpoints out of action, so we now have only three to watch.’

‘Detective Sergeant Hanlon has done a recce for us to find safe places where we can observe the cashpoints and not be seen. We will cover them by lurking in shop doorways, and I want a male and female officer together where possible. If anyone comes, go into a passionate embrace. That should both divert suspicion and give you a thrill. And you can take that dirty grin off your face, Taffy Morgan. We haven’t got enough chastity belts to go round, so you will be with me, watching the main cashpoint in Market Square. No convenient shop doorways, so you and I will be in the car, round the corner. As soon as chummy withdraws the money, you will dash out and grab him.’

‘How will we know that it’s our bloke who’s using the cashpoint?’ Jordan asked.

‘The Fortress technical staff are monitoring their main computer. As soon as chummy sticks his card in the slot, they will phone me and I’ll phone you.’ He checked his watch. Eight forty-five p.m. ‘Right, just time for a quick wee, then off to your assigned stake-out positions. Hold it -’ He looked up as Bill Wells came in and beckoned him over.

‘Slight change of plan, Jack.’

‘Oh?’ said Frost warily.

‘Skinner’s just phoned. Mullett has talked him into cutting the overtime men by half.’

‘Sod that!’ exclaimed Frost. ‘We’re working to the barest minimum as it is.’

‘He told me to tell you it’s not a request, it’s an order. He’s going to need the extra men for the search of the woods for those two missing kids tomorrow morning.’

‘Sod him!’ repeated Frost vehemently. ‘Tell him you couldn’t find me.’

‘Then he will expect me to phone or radio you.’

Frost took his mobile from his pocket and switched it off. ‘My phone battery needs charging and my radio is on the blink’

‘He won’t believe you, Jack.’

‘The bastard doesn’t believe me when I’m telling the truth, so what’s the difference?’

Frost sat slumped in the passenger seat of his car, coat collar turned up, his scarf wound tightly round his neck against the cold. Parked down a side street, they didn’t have the cashpoint in view, but would be able to reach it at a sprint in a few seconds. He shivered. ‘I thought I told you to get this heater fixed.’

‘I’ve booked it in for tomorrow, Guv,’ lied Morgan, who had forgotten all about it.

‘Lying Welsh bastard,’ grunted Frost. He rubbed his hands together, then checked his watch. Coming to midnight and no sign of the sod. He felt his stomach rumble. ‘There’s a chippy round the corner. Get me a cod and chips and put salt and vinegar on it. You can buy your own if you like.’ He passed over a five-pound note. ‘And I’m going to count the change.’

‘Right, Guv.’ Glad of the chance to stretch his legs, Morgan slid out of the car and disappeared round the corner. Frost sank lower in his seat.

This was going to be a sodding waste of time, he just knew it. He was stuck in a freezing-cold car and the blackmailing bastard was probably tucked up snug in a nice warm bed. He might as well have given Skinner those extra men he wanted. There’d be hell to pay tomorrow if he didn’t get a result.

The radio buzzed. ‘PC Jordan to Inspector Frost. Come in please. Urgent.’

‘Yes?’ said Frost, popping a cigarette in his mouth.

‘We’ve just arrested a junkie trying to pinch money from people using the cash machine. He grabbed fifty quid from this old dear. We’re going to have to take him back to the station.’

‘Bloody hell,’ moaned Frost. ‘Now everyone will know that the fuzz is in the vicinity.’

‘We had to arrest him, Inspector. We couldn’t let him get away with it – the old dear was screaming blue murder.’

‘All right,’ sighed Frost. ‘Take him back, book him in, then get back here. Our bloke hasn’t turned up yet. And check with Sergeant Wells about that poor cow who had her handbag nicked earlier today. This might be the same man.’

A tapping at the side window made him look up. Someone was standing there. He wound the window down and a blast of cheap scent hit him in the face.

‘Looking for a bit of fun, handsome?’

‘Piss off,’ groaned Frost, flashing his warrant card at the hard-faced, cheap-fake-leather-coated woman in her late forties with an equally fake smile.

‘Bloody hell. It’s the flaming filth!’

‘Exactly,’ said Frost. ‘Now sling your hook, darling, before I run you in for offering goods past their sell-by date.’

She jerked two fingers at him and wandered off into the night, swinging her handbag like a gladiator’s chain. A burble of conversation floated from round the corner, then Taffy slid into the car clutching two greasy packages.

‘Just bumped into a cracking bit of stuff, Guv. I reckon I could have had her.’

‘Only if you had the 50p to pay her,’ grunted Frost, checking his change before slipping it into his mac pocket. ‘I hope you didn’t let her touch my chips. I shudder to think what else she’s been fingering tonight.’ He opened the package, broke off a chunk of fish and looked up angrily. ‘This is haddock.’

‘They didn’t have cod,’ lied Morgan, who had forgotten what Frost had asked for.

Frost reached for the door handle. ‘Do you want me to go back there and check?’

Morgan looked shamefaced. ‘Sorry, Guv. Actually, I forgot.’

Frost had just settled back in his seat when the sound of angry voices floated across the square He wound down the window, but couldn’t make out what was going on. ‘Nip over and check that, Taff.’

A couple of minutes later, Morgan was back.

‘It’s that tom, Guv. The punter has only got thirty quid and she wants forty.’

‘Not for her bleeding body, surely?’ grunted Frost. ‘She must be throwing in her car as well. So what’s the hold-up?’

‘The machine keeps rejecting his card. They’re both getting stroppy.’

‘This isn’t going to be my night,’ gloomed Frost. ‘I’m in the excrement with fat-guts Skinner, arrests we don’t want are cropping up all over the bleeding place, and you bought me haddock instead of cod.’ He snatched his mobile up at the first ring. ‘Frost?’ It was Fortress Building Society. He listened. ‘What?… Where?… Thanks.’ He chucked the mobile up in the air with delight, but missed catching it so had to scrabble for it on the floor. ‘Foot down, Taffy. He’s bitten the bait. The card is currently being used to withdraw cash in Minton Street.’ He groaned. The cashpoint Jordan had had to leave unwatched.

Morgan couldn’t get the engine to fire and kept fiddling frantically with the ignition. ‘If we’re out of flaming petrol – ’ began Frost, but was cut short as the engine spluttered then suddenly roared to life with a jerk, sending his haddock and chips flying all over the car.

He brushed chips from his mac as the car sped round to the main road. He was right. The bloke must be a rank amateur. Surely he might have guessed that the police would be watching all the cashpoints. And Frost couldn’t believe his luck. Catching the sod on the very first night of the stake-out. Minton Street was only a couple minutes away, but just to be on the safe side he radioed through to Jordan, who with any luck should be on his way back now and approaching from the opposite direction. If chummy wasn’t still at the till, they would stop and search any pedestrian or motorists in the vicinity. There would be very few people around at this time of night.

As they turned the corner into Minton Street, Frost scrubbed the windscreen with the sleeve of his mac. ‘I can see him. The bastard is still there.’

The dimly lit area around the cashpoint showed a man checking some notes then stuffing them into his pocket. Seemingly unaware of the approaching car, he turned down a side street.

‘Left, left,’ screamed Frost as Morgan missed the turn and had to brake sharply and skid the car round. There was a sickening crash and the tinkle of broken glass. Morgan had hit one of the parked cars. ‘It was his fault,’ yelled Frost. ‘Drive on.’ As they turned into the side street they could see the rear lights of a car driving off into the night.

‘Tally ho!’ cried Frost. He snatched up the radio handset and alerted Jordan that the suspect was heading his way. At the T-junction Taffy slowed as Frost, eyes squinted, scoured left and right. ‘There!’ Tiny pinpricks of red in the distance, then the sound of a police siren Jon had spotted the car and was in pursuit. The pinprick of red was followed by a flashing blue light.

‘He’s slowing,’ radioed Jordan triumphantly. ‘He’s stopped.. . he’s bloody stopped!’

Frost punched the air in delight. ‘We’ve got him, Taff!’ He screwed up the greasy chip bag and hurled it through the car window as they drove towards the flashing blue light of a parked Allegro. Jordan was opening the door as Frost’s car pulled up behind.

‘What the flaming hell is this all about, officer?’ demanded a man’s voice. ‘I wasn’t speeding and I’m not bloody drunk. You got a quota of arrests to make?’

Frost stopped dead in his tracks. He recognised that flaming voice. He was out of the car and over in a flash. ‘Hello, hello, hello. Where have you been all the day, Billy Boy?’ he beamed. The driver was Billy King, the man who claimed his building society card had been stolen.

King’s face fell when he saw Frost. ‘Twice in one flaming day! I must have run over a black cat or something. What am I supposed to have done now?’

Frost flashed a smug, self-satisfied smile. On the passenger seat next to Billy was a Fortress Building Society passbook, poking out from which was a cashpoint card. ‘Been making a little withdrawal, Billy?’

‘It’s not a flaming crime, is it?’

‘It’s too cold standing here talking, Billy. Let’s get you down to the nice, warm station so we can rough you up a bit. First of all, where’s the money?’

‘What flaming money?’

Frost sighed. ‘Search him, Taffy.’

King shrunk back. ‘Oh no. Not with them greasy fish-and-chip fingers. Let the other bloke do it.’ He raised his arms as Jordan patted his pockets then withdrew a wallet from inside his jacket. Jordan opened it and pulled out a couple of notes.

‘Twenty quid, Inspector, that’s all,’ reported Jordan.

‘And there had still better be twenty quid in there when I get the wallet back,’ sniffed King. ‘I know what sticky-fingered bastards you coppers are.’

‘Where’s the rest, Billy?’ asked Frost.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘It’s in the car somewhere,’ said Frost. ‘Too bleeding cold to search here. We’ll do it back at the station.’ He took King’s arm. ‘Come on, sunshine. Let’s go to the nice cop shop. My Welsh colleague will drive your car back.’

‘He’d better take care of it,’ scowled King. ‘I ain’t paid for it yet.’

‘He’ll treat it as if it were his own, Billy,’ Frost assured him. ‘He wrote his off yesterday.’ He radioed through to the stake-out team and told them they could go home, but to book an extra hour for their trouble.

Frost dribbled smoke through his nose and watched King through the haze, on the other side of the table in the Interview Room. Billy squirmed in his chair. ‘I don’t know what this is all about, Inspector. You’re setting me up, aren’t you? You’re flaming well setting me up.’

Frost puffed out a smoke ring and watched it writhe its way up to the nicotine-stained ceiling. ‘I have a strict code of ethics, Billy. I only set people up if I can’t beat a confession out of them.’ He was feeling pleased with himself. He never expected such a quick result. He was just waiting for Morgan and Jordan to return from their search of Billy’s car bearing the five hundred quid.

‘How much longer before you tell me what this is all about?’ asked King. ‘My old lady will be worried sick.’

‘Not long, Billy,’ said Frost. ‘Ah!’ He could hear approaching footsteps. Jordan and Morgan came in. In reply to his questioning gaze, they shook their heads. They had searched the car and found nothing.

Frost groaned and scrubbed his face with his hands. This was going to take longer than he had hoped. ‘Give us a clue, Billy. Where have you hidden the money? Have you swallowed it? Shall we get out the syrup of figs or the enema we use for our horses?’

‘You give me a clue, Inspector Frost. What money are you talking about?’

‘The money you withdrew from the building society’

‘It’s in my bloody wallet, if that copper hasn’t nicked it.’

‘There was only twenty quid in there, Billy.’

‘So? That’s all I had in my account. I told you.’

‘You also told us, Billy, you had your cashpoint card stolen.’ He flashed the plastic under Billy’s nose. ‘So what is this?’

‘That’s my wife’s card. It’s a joint account. Mine was pinched, so I used hers. So how about telling me what this is all about, or is it a flaming state secret?’

Frost’s heart took a nosedive. He looked at the card. It was in joint names. ‘You didn’t bloody tell me it was a joint account.’

‘You didn’t bloody ask!’

Frost just stared at him. His mobile phone rang. Still looking at Billy he fumbled for the phone and put it to his ear.

‘Frost,’ he grunted.

As he listened, his heart nosedived even further into the depths of his stomach. Vindictive fate was kneeing him in the privates. ‘Shit! Thanks for telling me.’ He clicked off, shifted his gaze from Billy and stared in disbelief at his phone, then spun the chair round to face Jordan and Morgan. ‘You want the bad news or the bad news? That was the Fortress Building Society. While we’ve been wasting our time with this prat, someone has used the stolen card to with draw four hundred and eighty quid from the Minton Street cashpoint.’

‘Four hundred and eighty?’queried Jordan

‘That was all the machine would let him have. Apparently twenty quid had been withdrawn earlier.’

Billy King smirked. ‘That was me. Will you believe me now?’

Jordan moved to the door. ‘Shall I get over there?’

Frost shook his head. ‘It’s too flaming late. He’ll be miles away by now.’ He buried his face in his hands. ‘It’s not my bleeding night.’

‘It even more of a rotten night for you now, Inspector Frost,’ smirked Billy. ‘I’m having you up for false arrest.’ He stood and scooped up the stuff taken from his pockets, which was on the table between them.

Frost’s hand shot out to grab King’s wrist.

‘Hold on, Billy, it might not be your bleeding night either.’ He hooked a keyring on his index finger and spun it so it flashed in the light. ‘I meant to ask you about this before, but there’s an awful lot of keys here for just one small-time crook’s crappy house.’

The smile faded from Billy’s face. ‘Oh – they’re old keys, Inspector. I’ve never got around to throwing them away.’ He held out his hand. ‘If I could have them…’

Frost whirled the keys around.

King stared at them as if hypnotised.

‘You used to rob old ladies, didn’t you, Billy? Nick their handbags, pinch their money and then use their door key to sneak into their houses when they were out.’

‘That was a long time ago. I don’t do things like that any more.’

Frost gave him a long, hard stare, remembering how worried the man had seemed when the wallet was first taken away from him. Frost had only done a quick flip through, looking for the money, and Billy had seemed quite relieved when the wallet was put down again. Frost held out his hand. ‘Show me your wallet again, Billy.’

An even more worried look. ‘What for? You’ve seen it once.’

‘I’ve got a looking-inside-wallets fetish,’ said Frost, thrusting his open hand forward. ‘Give it to me.’

Reluctantly, King pulled the wallet from his pocket and handed it over, watching apprehensively as Frost flipped it open. There were two credit cards inside. One was in Billy’s name, but the other…

Frost smiled. ‘What a coincidence, Billykins. We had an old lady in here earlier complaining some toe-rag had nicked her handbag. Now, her name is exactly the same as the name on this credit card and you’re a toe-rag. Isn’t that a coincidence?’

‘I found it in the gutter, Inspector. I was going to hand it in, but what with you trying to stitch me up on a false charge…’

‘She identified you, Billy,’ continued Frost. ‘We showed her the mugshots and she picked you out. “That’s him – that fat little sod,” she said.’

‘You’re lying. Any mugshot of me must be years old.’

‘Policemen don’t lie, Billy – unless they want to get a conviction. You know that.’

‘I still think you’re lying, Inspector.’

Frost opened the Interview Room door and yelled down the corridor to Sergeant Wells. ‘Sergeant, was Bill King’s mugshot in those photos we showed the old dear this morning?’

‘Yes,’ shouted back Wells.

‘And did she pick him out as the bastard who robbed her?’

‘You know she did!’ yelled Wells.

Frost shut the door quickly, in case Wells decided to qualify his statement by adding that she identified every flaming face she saw. He sat down, put on his disarming smile and pushed his packet of cigarettes across the table. ‘It’s late, Billy, we’re all shagged out and we want to go home. Now we can either bang you up for the night, sharing a cell with a frustrated, seventeen-stone raging queer, or you can cough the lot, give us a statement and we’ll let you go home on police bail.’

‘You’re a bastard,’ said Billy.

‘So people keep telling me,’ said Frost, ‘but I don’t see it myself.’

Frost stood by his office window to watch Billy climb into his car, slam the door angrily and drive off.

‘We should have searched his house, Guv,’ said Morgan. ‘I bet we’d have found a whole pile of loot.’

‘It’s too flaming late for those larks,’ yawned Frost, passing his cigarettes around. For a while they smoked in silence.

‘Not entirely a wasted evening then, Guv,’ offered Taffy.

Frost shrugged. ‘It could have been a damn sight better. Still, what is it Rhett Butler says in Gone with the Wind?’

‘Something like “Quite frankly, I don’t give a monkey’s”?’ suggested Jordan.

‘No,’ said Frost. ‘Something like “Tomorrow is another bleeding day.” ’

‘Scarlett O’Hara says that,’ said Morgan.

‘Whatever her bleeding colour, she was flaming right,’ said Frost. ‘So we missed him tonight. There’s other nights. He can only draw out five hundred quid at a time, so he’s got to do it again and again. Even someone as stupid as me won’t be able to continually sod up catching him.’ He stood up and crushed his cigarette underfoot. An unmade bed in a cold house wasn’t much of an attraction, but he was dead on his feet. ‘Right, we try again tomorrow.’

His mobile rang. He frowned. Who the hell would be calling him at this flaming hour? Late-night – or early-morning – phone calls always spelled trouble.

‘Frost… What?… Bloody what?’ He collapsed back in his chair. ‘Then how the flaming hell…?’ He glanced up at the wall clock. ‘Shit! Thanks for telling me.’ He clicked off the phone and rammed it back in his pocket. ‘Tomorrow isn’t another bleeding day. It’s tomorrow already. The bastard’s withdrawn another five hundred quid.’

‘I thought he couldn’t withdraw more than five hundred a day,’ said Jordan.

‘He can’t. But it’s gone midnight. It’s tomorrow. He’s a cleverer bastard than I thought. Still, he can’t take out anymore until Wednesday, so we’ve tomorrow night off. And now we know what time he usually makes withdrawals, we can concentrate our efforts.’

‘Providing he follows the same pattern,’ said Jordan.

‘Oh, he must,’ yawned Frost. ‘He knows I’m relying on him.’ He turned to Morgan. ‘Don’t they have CCTV cameras covering those cashpoints?’

‘On some, Guv, not all.’

‘Then let’s hope this is one of them. First thing tomorrow – or today, rather – nip down to the building society and use your slimy Welsh charm to get hold of the tape.’ He tipped the contents of his ashtray into the waste-paper bin. ‘Let’s go home.’

They didn’t make it. As he reached the door, his phone rang again. It was Lambert from Control.

‘Another girl’s gone missing, Inspector. Jan O’Brien, thirteen years old.’

‘Shit!’ said Frost.

‘May have nothing to do with it, Inspector, but at 23.52 we had a phone call from a man using the public phone box in the town square. He sounded drunk, but insisted he had just heard a girl screaming round the back of the multi-storey car park – where that other girl was raped. He hung up without giving any more. I sent an area car round there, they’re touring the area, but there’s no sign of anything yet.’

‘Double shit,’ said Frost.

‘She hasn’t gone missing, you stupid cow,’ yelled the man.

‘How can you be so bloody complacent?’ shrieked his wife. ‘It’s two o’clock in the morning. She left Kathy’s house at ten o’clock – that’s four hours ago. She should be here by now.’

‘She’s been late before.’

‘Not this bloody late, she hasn’t.’ Frost, sitting between the couple in their tiny dining room, his head moving from side to side like the audience at a tennis match, raised a weary hand. ‘Shut it, you two. Let’s have a few facts.’

‘You give him the bloody facts,’ snarled the man to his wife. ‘You brought the bleeding police in. When she comes waltzing back and saying she’s sorry, we’ll be a bloody laughing stock.’

‘I’d rather be a bloody laughing stock than the mother of a raped and murdered girl.’

‘Rape? That little madam is more likely to rape the boy. She comes and goes as she damn well pleases and does what she likes. If you want to make a fool of yourself to the police, good luck – count me out!’ With a slam of the door he was gone, only, to reappear almost immediately to shake a finger at his wife. ‘Tell that copper how many other times she’s come in late when I’ve been tramping the flaming streets looking for her. “Sorry, Dad, I should have phoned.” Little cow! And what about the time she didn’t come home until the next afternoon? Tell him that. I’m going to bed.’ The door slammed behind him again, making Taffy Morgan, who was nearly asleep in the chair next to Frost, open his eyes with a start.

Mrs O’Brien jumped up, opened the door and yelled up the stairs, ‘Good riddance, you bastard!’ The bedroom door slammed.

Frost, whose head had started to throb, winced at each door slam and lit up another cigarette. ‘Perhaps ‘we could have a few details, Mrs O’Brien. You’ve checked with her friends?’

‘Yes. She left Kathy’s house at ten o’clock. No one has seen her since.’

‘Your husband suggested this isn’t the first time Jan has been out very late?’

‘That was last year. She hasn’t done it since. I had a talk with her and she promised she would always let me know if she was going to be delayed.’ She wiped her eyes and sniffed. ‘Something’s happened to her, I know it has.’

‘And the time she stayed out all night?’ Frost asked.

‘An all-night party at her friend’s house. She said she’d be back by eleven, without fail. We gave her the money for a cab. The next morning her bed hadn’t been slept in. Sid raised the flaming roof. She was still round at her friend’s. She said she phoned for a cab, but it never came, so she thought it was safer to stay the night.’

Frost sucked down a lungful of smoke as he absorbed this. ‘Your husband suggested she was sexually precocious.’

‘She’s physically developed for her age. But that’s not her fault, is it? And she puts on make-up when she goes out with her friends and wears tight T-shirts, but all kids do that. Sid says she’s a tart, but she’s not. She’s a little innocent. Don’t you think I know my own daughter?’

Frost nodded, as if in agreement, and studied the photograph of the ponytailed Jan given to him by her mother. The kid looked like a right little goer to him. ‘Has she got a mobile phone?’

‘We’ve tried it. It’s switched off. She always leaves it on.’

‘Have you checked her room to see if she’s left a note, or taken any clothes or anything?’

She jumped up. ‘No. I’ll do it now.’

‘We’ll come with you,’ said Frost, nudging Taffy Morgan awake and following her up the stairs.

A typical young girl’s bedroom. Pop posters, a hi-fl with twin speakers and a fourteen-inch TV. A single bed, unmade, pyjamas and school clothes on the floor, and a chest of drawers with two of the drawers pulled out. ‘She’s so untidy,’ said Mrs O’Brien, picking the pyjamas up, folding them and laying them on the bed. She opened the wardrobe and riffled through the clothes swinging on their hangers. ‘All her things seem to be here.’ She looked around the room. ‘And no sign of a note.’

‘Does she have a bank book?’

Mrs O’Brien opened a drawer, rummaged around and pulled out the bank book.

Frost nodded gloomily. It was too much to expect that this would be a nice, simple run-away-from-home, with missing clothes and a note on the mantelpiece. ‘She’s probably with a friend,’ he said, trying to sound reassuring. ‘I’ll get our patrol cars to keep a look-out for her, and if she hasn’t come home by tomorrow, we’ll start a full-scale search. But my bet is she’ll be back full of apologies.’ Some flaming bet! he told himself. ‘Try not to worry.’ Empty bleeding words. ‘You said she had gone round her friend Kathy’s house. Where does Kathy live?’

‘Moorland Avenue.’

Shit, thought Frost. Jan would have had to go round the back of the multi-storey car park, where we got that report of a girl screaming. But what credence could you put on it? A bloody drunk phoning! Let’s hope and pray the kid’s home by morning. He looked round for Taffy Morgan, who was studying a photo of the girl in a skimpy swimsuit. He took it from him and jerked his head. ‘We’re going

… and you’re dribbling.’ He turned to the mother. ‘If your daughter comes back, phone the station – but I’ll be sending someone round tomorrow anyway.’

She saw them out and stood at the open door watching until the car drove away and disappeared round the corner.

‘What do you reckon, Guv?’ asked Taffy.

‘I reckon you ask too many stupid bleeding questions,’ said Frost. Another thirteen-year-old girl was missing. Anything or nothing could have happened to her. But he was worried. Bloody worried. There was a rapist on the loose. The kid was sexually precocious, the sort of girl who’d attract the wrong sort of dirty bastard and Denton was full of dirty bastards. Yes, he was I worried.

The trip back to the station to collect Morgan’s car took them past Denton Woods and along the road past the house of the other missing girl, Debbie Clark. The lights were still on. The poor mother was probably sitting by the phone, willing it to ring with good news. A black Mercedes Estate roared past them and turned into the drive

‘Hello, that’s Debbie’s father,’ said Frost.

‘What the hell is he doing out at this time of night?’ He looked at his watch. Half past three. The wee small hours of the flaming morning.

Back at the station car park, Frost slid into the driving seat vacated by Morgan and yawned.

‘What time tomorrow, Guv?’ asked Taffy hopefully.

‘You can have a lie-in, Taff,’ said Frost. ‘As long as you’re here, excreting Welsh charm, by nine on the dot. I want you to go straight to Fortress and collect their CCTV tapes.’ He looked again at the photo of ponytailed Jan O’Brien. ‘And if Jan hasn’t phoned her mum to say she’s safe and sexually satisfied, we’re going to have to make an early start with that one.’ He screwed up his face and slowly shook his head from side to side. ‘But somehow, Taff, I don’t think that’s going to happen. I’ve got one of my nasty feelings… the same sort of feeling I had when they dumped you on us. “This Welsh git’s going to be a real right prat,” I said, and I was right.’

Morgan grinned. ‘You know you really love me, Guv.’

‘Only because it’s great to have someone who’s a bigger prat than me,’ said Frost. ‘I didn’t think it possible. Anyway, pleasant dreams.’

‘Pleasant dreams, Guv,’ echoed Taff, walking over to his car.

As Frost turned the key in the ignition, his mobile rang. It was Lambert from Control again.

‘That call from the drunk – I sent Evans and Howe out in the area car to check. They’ve found Jan O’Brien’s mobile phone.’

‘Where?’ asked Frost.

‘In the gutter, just outside the car park – where the drunk said he heard someone screaming.’

‘Excrement!’ Frost drummed his fingers on the steering wheel and shook his head vigorously to wake himself up. It was nearly four o’clock in the morning. A bit flaming late to do much. If the parents hadn’t reported the girl’s return first thing in the morning, he’d make media appeals for the drunk to contact Denton police. At the moment they had sod all to go on. And it was too late to check her girlfriend to find out what time Jan actually left. If the drunk heard her around midnight she either left her friend’s house much later than stated, or she went somewhere else first…

‘Are you still there, Inspector?’ asked Lambert.

‘Yes… sorry… I was thinking. The mobile phone – it’s probably been mauled about enough already, but don’t let anyone else touch it without gloves. I want it checked for prints. If she was attacked, she might have tried to use the phone and the bloke snatched it from her and chucked it. If our luck’s in for a change, it could have his dabs.’

‘Right, Inspector. Anything else?’

There was something else, but what the hell was it? He lit up a cigarette he didn’t want to help him think. ‘Yes. Check with the mobile phone company. I want to know all the calls she made on it tonight.’

‘The parents?’

‘We tell the parents sod all at this stage. If the kid hasn’t turned up by morning, then I’ll speak to them.’

‘Right. Is that all, Inspector?’

Frost yawned. ‘That’s all I can think of.’ He snatched the cigarette from his mouth and hurled it out of the car window. ‘I don’t want anymore calls. Not unless it’s a regicide or something funny like Mullett topping himself.’

‘OK, Inspector. Good night.’

‘Good night,’ said Frost. He fired the engine and headed for home.