Hard Frost

Nineteen

He barged out of the interview room, crashing into Cassidy who was hovering outside and moved to block him. "I want a word," he said.

"Later," said Frost.

"It's about my daughter," hissed Cassidy, 'and it's got to be now!"

"Your daughter's dead," Frost snapped. "Bobby Kirby might still be alive." He pushed Cassidy out of the way and almost ran down the corridor to the incident room. Cassidy, his eyes spitting venom, followed him.

Hanlon was hanging up the phone. He didn't look very happy. "The other search party, Jack. They want to pack it in. In this weather it's hopeless."

"The kid's still alive," said Frost. "They've got to carry on. I'll talk to them."

Before he could do anything about it, Mullett charged in, his tongue hanging out for the good news about Finch. Frost told him.

Mullett felt for a chair and dropped into it. "He admitted he had taken the boy?"

"Off the record, no witnesses, with the tape switched off. He'd deny it in open court."

"And he said the boy was alive?"

"Yes, but probably wouldn't last the night."

"Do you believe him?"

"Yes."

Mullett knuckled his forehead, trying to think. "You haven't enough evidence to charge him?"

"Nothing that would stand up in court. The choice is that we do a deal, let him go and the boy lives, or no deal, we still have to let him go, but the boy dies."

Mullett turned to Cassidy. "What would you do?"

Cassidy was only too eager to tell him. "I wouldn't have got myself in this position in the first place."

"Quite," said Mullett before turning angrily on Frost. "This is all down to you. I absolve myself from all responsibility for this mess."

"I'll take all the bloody blame if it makes you happy," snarled Frost, 'but what are we going to do about the kid?"

"I've no authority to do deals," said Mullett. "That's a matter for the Chief Constable."

"Then ask the flaming Chief Constable." Frost picked up the phone and banged it down in front of the superintendent.

Mullett looked at the phone as if it was a live bomb, then, steeling himself, stretched out his hand. Then he flinched, anticipating what the Chief Constable would say. He snatched his hand back. "No, Frost. You goi us into this mess. You get us out of it." He strode to the door, then spun round, pointing a finger at the inspector. "I want a result on this, Frost. I want a watertight case against Finch and the boy returned safe and sound. The boy's safety is paramount. I don't care how you do it… but stick to the rules."

"Thanks for sod all," muttered Frost. He stood up and stretched wearily. He'd have to have another word with Finch… try a bit of subtlety like threatening to tear his dick off.

His path was again blocked by Cassidy.

"Whatever it is, it can wait," said Frost.

"It can't wait," said Cassidy, 'and it won't take more than a second of your valuable time." He unfolded a small sheet of paper and waved it at Frost. "Something you might recognize."

Frost bent forward to read it. A car registration number. His stomach tightened. He knew what it was.

"This," said Cassidy, waving it in front of Frost's face, 'is the registration number of the car that killed my daughter. The BMW, the car you said didn't exist. The car where Tommy Dunn was seen talking to the driver."

"How did you get it?" asked Frost.

"Never mind how I got it. You were given this registration number at the time. You conveniently lost it." He pushed his face right up to Frost. "How much did the drunken sod of a driver pay you and Tommy to keep him out of it, you bastard?"

Frost said nothing.

"I'm going to trace the driver and I'm having the case reopened," said Cassidy, his face a mask of disgust. "See if your damn medal can get you out of this!"

"Hold it, Cassidy!" Heads jerked round. Arthur Hanlon, who had been sitting quietly by the radio, was coming over. Normally placid, his face was as flushed and angry as Cassidy's. "You don't know the facts."

"Facts?" echoed Cassidy. "Frost lied his bloody head off and a drunken pig of a motorist was let free. Those are the facts."

"If he lied," said Hanlon, pushing between Cassidy and Frost, 'then he did4t for you, you bastard."

"For me? What are you bloody talking about?"

"How well did you know your daughter?"

"How well? I was her father, for Christ's sake!"

Frost tugged atJHanlon's sleeve. "Leave it, Arthur." But he was shaken off.

"You were her father," said Hanlon, 'but how often did you see her? You were career mad. The job came first, seven days a week, twenty-four hours a day sod your family, you hardly ever went home. You didn't know what she was getting up to."

"Getting up to? She was fourteen bloody years old. What the hell could she get up to?" shouted Cassidy.

"What are you daring to say about my daughter?"

"Your daughter was on drugs. Your lovely, pure, fourteen-year-old daughter was on hard drugs."

Cassidy's knuckles whitened as he clenched his fists tight. "You're lying!"

"And to support her habit," continued Hanlon doggedly, 'your fourteen-year-old daughter turned to prostitution."

"You take that back, you bastard." Cassidy had grabbed the front of Hanlon's jacket.

For a short man, Hanlon showed unusual strength. He pulled Cassidy's hand away. "What do you think she was doing at the Coconut Grove that night? She was stoned to the eyeballs and plying for trade to pay for her next fix. Tommy Dunn saw her and hustled her out. He put her into his car and was about to drive off when she opened the door and flung herself out, right into the path of an oncoming car. The driver had had a few drinks, but there was no way he could have avoided her."

Cassidy stared straight ahead as if he wasn't listening, but the muscle on the side of his face was twitching uncontrollably.

"She was killed instantly. Nothing could bring her back, but Jack Frost wanted to spare your feelings. He didn't want the facts to come out in court, so he let the driver go. Then he got the doctor at the hospital to do a very cursory post-mortem, ignoring the drugs abuse, the sexual activity, the disease. He wanted you to have the pure fourteen-year-old daughter you had always boasted about, so he lied and he covered up."

Cassidy stared blankly and shook his head as if it would shake away everything he had heard. He turned to Frost. "He's lying, isn't he?" Then back to Hanlon. "You're lying! The old pals act. Everyone cover up for everyone else… just like Mullett and his mates lied when Chief Inspector Formby wrapped his car round that lamp post."

He walked to the door. "Sod you all!" he yelled, almost in tears. A flutter of paper as he tore up the registration number and hurled it to the floor. "Sod you all!"

The door swung shut behind him.

"I wish you hadn't done that, Arthur," said Frost. "But thanks, anyway." He poked a cigarette in his mouth and tried to think. What was he going to do before Cassidy sounded off? Oh yes. Have another word with Finch.

Liz looked tired and washed out so he sent her home. "Burton will drive you," he said. Burton seemed pleased at this. He kicked the door of the interview room shut. Just him and Finch.

"No deal," he said tersely.

Finch shrugged. "A pity, but I gave you a chance."

Frost scraped a chair across the brown linoleum and sat down. "I might be able to get the court to go lenient with you. The first boy's death wasn't intended and you co-operated in letting us recover Bobby. You could be out in five years."

"According to my consultant, I haven't got five years," said Finch. "Any prison term, no matter how short, would be a life sentence, so you've got no carrots to offer me."

"Tell us where he is," said Frost.

"Only the kidnapper would know that," replied Finch.

Frost stood up. "I'll make you a promise," he said. "Whether we find that boy alive, or dead, or never, I'm going to nail you. I hope your consultant is right, because you are going to die in prison,"

He called for a uniformed constable to take Finch back to the cell. Fine bleeding words, he told himself, but how the hell am I going to do it?

Frost helped himself to a mug of tea from Bill Wells's thermos flask, then paid for it by having to listen to the sergeant's moans about the way Mullett kept blocking his chances of promotion and kept putting him down for duty on Christmas Day. He was only half listening. The kid was out there somewhere in the cold, torrential rain, and teams of men were looking for him. He was toying with the idea of driving over there to help, if only to be doing something constructive, but knew he'd just be getting in the way. He looked up as Burton returned from driving Liz back to her digs.

"Get your leg over, son?" he asked.

Burton grinned. "Never had the nerve to ask her."

"Did you hear about the bus conductress who married a bus driver?" asked Frost. "On their wedding night she stripped off and said, "Room for one on top." When he'd finished he said, "But you didn't tell me there was room for five standing inside." He cackled the loudest at his own joke, then stopped abruptly. It didn't seem right to be laughing while that poor little sod… He wryly recalled the empty threat he had made to Finch. Well, there was no way he was going to find the kid, drinking tea and telling dirty jokes. He swilled down the dregs and banged down the mug. "Come on, son," he said to Burton. "Let's go for a drive."

He sometimes thought better in the car so he lay back in his seat, smoking, eyes half closed, letting Burton drive through the stair rods of rain. The little buzzer in his brain started to sound off again. The house. There was something that had puzzled him when they went into the house in Wrights Lane. But what the hell was it?

"What happened when we banged on the door to get in there, son?" he asked Burton.

Burton couldn't help. "You sent me and Jordan round the back."

Frost leant back and gazed up at the roof of the car for inspiration, but none came. "Drive me to her digs," he told Burton. "I want to talk to Liz."

"She'll be in bed," said Burton.

"Then she can get out of it again," said Frost. "I've got to talk to her."

He banged on the door and kept his thumb jammed in the bell push. At last a light came on in an upstairs window, then the sound of footsteps descending the stairs. Bolts slid back and there was Liz, an unfastened dressing-gown over her nightdress, a police truncheon swinging menacingly in her hand.

"Bloody hell!" gawped Frost. This was a transformed Liz. Her hair, usually screwed back tightly, was now free-flowing down her back. It was gorgeous hair and she had a lot of it.

She had scrubbed off her make-up and her skin looked fresh and dewy. Her flimsy nightdress didn't conceal very much. "What do you want?" she hissed to the dark shape standing in the doorway.

I'd love to tell you, thought Frost. "It's me, Liz. Sorry it's so late." He told her what was worrying him.

Liz shook her head. "We knocked at the door, Finch let us in and then we searched the house."

"All right, love," he said. "You go back to bed. I'm going to take another look around that house."

"Wait," she said. "I'm coming with you."

He waited in the car with Burton, who wanted all the tantalizing detail.

"She had a dressing-gown on," said Frost, embroidering the facts to suit his audience. "Nothing on underneath… she must sleep in the nude… and it kept flapping open."

"Flaming heck!" breathed Burton.

"And her Bristols," he added. "Wow… I've never seen such nipples."

"Tell me, tell me!" pleaded Burton.

"Have you ever seen ripe, Royal Sovereign strawberries, warm from the sun with the dew still on them?" said Frost, getting excited at his own fantasy.

"No, but I can imagine it," said Burton, wriggling in his eat.

"Well…!" His expression changed abruptly. "Look out, she's coming." Burton leant back and opened the door for her.

Liz sat in the back seat. Burton kept eyeing her with renewed interest. She certainly looked different with her hair hanging loosely. As they paused at the traffic lights he turned and gave her a smile. "You look smashing with your hair like that."

"Keep your eyes on the road, constable," she said icily.

The house was unguarded. With the search party out in force they didn't have enough men for that luxury. They went inside with Frost mooching from room to room, not knowing what the hell he was doing there or what he was looking for. Fingerprint powder was everywhere, but the only prints found were those of Finch and a few of the householder and his wife which had survived Finch's vigorous polishing and cleaning operation. In the bathroom and the kitchen, the sink traps had been removed and the contents taken away by Forensic for examination. The couple returning from Spain were going to have a shock when they arrived home tomorrow.

Frost opened and closed closet doors aimlessly and dug through pockets of clothing swinging from hangers. From the back bedroom he stared through the rain-shimmering windows to the garden, an enormous rain puddle making the lawn a lake. In the distance, a few smears of lights flickered intermittently as the poor sods in the search teams floundered about in the woods. He wondered if the little boy was under cover. A mental picture of the seven-year-old, bound, gagged, probably with masking tape over his eyes, made him shudder. And they were nowhere near to finding where he was.

Downstairs, in the kitchen, Liz was rummaging through drawers that had already been thoroughly searched. "I wish I knew what we were looking for," she said.

"You and me both, love," he muttered, pulling open a drawer next to the sink. It held cutlery and a bread board. He took out the board and a long, razor-sharp carving knife and wondered if this was what Finch had used to cut off the finger for the ransom demand. The board, well grooved with knife cuts, had been scrubbed white. He dropped them back, nudging shut the drawer.

Burton came in, dusting himself down. He had been up in the loft, crawling behind water tanks. "We did a thorough job on the search first time," he said. "I don't see how they missed anything."

Frost stared into space. "It was right at the start," he said. "Right at the start. We banged at the door." He looked at Liz. "Then what?"

She frowned as she tried to remember. "We knocked… he opened the door… we all charged in."

Frost chewed his knuckle. There was something else. But what? "We knocked. Finch was already in the hall. He said, "Who is it?" I said, "Police" and then…" He snapped his fingers in triumph. "I've got it. He said, "Just a minute." He made us wait before he opened the door… only a few seconds, but he made us wait… Why?" He hurried out into the hall, Liz and Burton following. A pile of letters stood on the hall table awaiting the return of the holiday-makers; some of them, the ones that looked like bills, Finch had opened. He checked through the envelopes carefully, then pulled the table away from the wall in case anything had been jammed behind it. Nothing.

A door under the stairs led to the cellar, but there hadn't been time for Finch to nip down there. The only other things in the hall were the clothes hanging from the coat rack.

"Did we go through the pockets?"

"Yes," said Liz.

"The women's clothes as well as the men's?"

"We went through them all," said Liz. "Nothing there that shouldn't be there."

"Unless his dick was hanging out and he tucked it away before coming to the door, I reckon he hid something." He looked again at the clothes on the rack. "Let's go through these. Take everything out of the pockets and check the lining."

The pile of odds and ends from the pockets mounted. Old receipts, bus tickets, scribbled shopping lists… "What's this?" Frost had found something in the inside pocket of a woman's grey and white woollen coat. A black plastic credit card holder.

"Her credit cards," said Burton. "I checked them earlier."

Frost was about to add it to the heap when an impulse made him look inside. He smiled grimly at Burton. "You didn't check it thoroughly enough, my son." He showed him the credit cards inside. They were all in the name of H. A. Finch.

Burton stared, shamefaced. "I don't know how I missed that."

"It doesn't matter, son," said Frost. "If you had found it earlier we wouldn't have attached any importance to it." He went through it. "So why was Finch so anxious to hide this?" Tucked in the end pocket were two Visa receipts. The first was for Finch's shopping the previous day at the supermarket. But the other bore today's date… "Hatter's Garage, River Road, Denton… Petrol 12.74'.

He phoned the garage. "Can you tell me what time this receipt was issued?"

"Some time this evening," said the garage man. "Latish."

"Can't you be more precise… it's important."

"If you can give me the registration number, I might be able to pinpoint it precisely. We've got a security video camera running all the time… too many people driving off without paying."

Burton was sent off to get the number. Frost relayed it.

"Just a minute." The sound of the phone being put down… noises off while the man dealt with a customer, then the clicking of controls as the video was wound back Hello… Is it a Renault?"

"Yes."

"Ten twenty-three this evening."

"Thanks," said Frost. "Don't erase that tape. We're on our way now to pick it up."

It took just over twenty minutes to reach the garage, where they sat in the manager's office as the garage man loaded up the tape. "We get all sorts of things recorded on these," he said chattily. "Caught a bloke doing a number two behind the Derv pump last week. Want to see it?"

"No thanks," said Frost. "It might be me."

"There you go!" The man found the approximate place and pressed the play button. Black and white images of single shots jerked across the screen like old silent films. The man pressed the pause button and there, quivering on the screen, was Finch using the pump. Frost rose from his chair and almost pressed his nose on the screen as he studied the car. If he was hoping to see the missing boy grinning out of a window, he was disappointed. The running time was shown on the corner of each frame. Finch arrived at ten twenty-three and left at ten twenty-seven. They commandeered the tape.

"So what does it all mean?" asked Liz when they were back in the car.

"He hid the receipt," said Frost, 'which means he didn't want us to know he'd bought petrol here. Why not? Because he had Bobby Kirby in the boot. Finch was taking him to where he was going to hide him."

"And where was that?" asked Liz.

"Definitely not in the woods," replied Frost. "There's plenty of filling stations he would have passed going there. Hatter's Garage is in the opposite direction."

"He could have gone on to the woods afterwards," said Burton.

"So why go to great lengths to hide the petrol receipt? No, son. All those poor sods falling over each other searching the woods and running up our overtime bill have been wasting their time. The kid isn't there."

"Then where is he?" asked Liz.

Frost sighed. "All we can do is guess. The road past the filling station leads straight down to the river."

Liz paled. "You believe he's dumped the boy in the river?"

"Alive or dead, I reckon that's where he is." He told Burton to drive down there while he fished his radio out of the glove compartment. "Frost to Control… over."

"We've been trying to get hold of you, inspector," said Lambert. "Message from Mr. Mullett. He wants to see you in his office right away."

"Message for Mr. Mullett," said Frost. "Tell him to get stuffed. This is urgent. Contact the search team in the woods. Tell them to stop immediately and get over to the top of River Road bloody quickly. I'll meet them there. And try and rustle up a couple of frogmen. We could be fishing for a body."

"Right," said Lambert. "Mr. Cassidy wants a word."

A rustle as Cassidy took over the microphone. "What's happening?"

Frost gave him the details. "I'm getting a team over to search the river area in case he's still alive."

"I'm on my way," said Cassidy. If there was a chance of a successful outcome to this case with the boy still alive, he wanted to be part of the winning team.

"Great," said Frost, trying to sound enthusiastic. "The more the merrier."

The river, some twenty feet across at this point, was little more than an open sewer, receiving the effluent from the various factories on the far side who found it cheaper to pay fines than conform to the stringent requirements of the Rivers Authority. Its surface was usually a sluggish mass of discoloured foam and oil-rainbowed scum, but the heavy rain of the past few days had made it overflow the sluice gates and now the flow was galloping past.

The road ran alongside the river for about a quarter of a mile and it was in this section that Frost intended to concentrate his search. He stood, watching the boiling river, drenched to the skin, while Burton and Liz, heads down, almost blinded by the torrential rain, looked for places where a tiny body might be concealed. He shouted Bobby's name in the forlorn hope the boy might be able to answer him, but all he could hear was the machine gun bullets of rain making snapping noises, almost like the crackling twig sound of a forest fire, as they pock-marked the river.

Headlights reflected off the water and he turned to see cars approaching. The search parties from the woods. From the first car, Arthur Hanlon, his hair plastered and dripping, squelched over to Frost. He eyed the current tearing past carrying broken branches and floating debris. "Don't like the look of that, Jack,"

Frost nodded gloomily. "All it needs is bleeding Lilian Gish on an ice floe."

"You reckon Bobby's somewhere near here?" Hanlon had to shout over the noise of rushing water.

"Yet another one of my inspired guesses," said Frost. "If he's dead," he hurled a stone into the water, 'he'll be on the bottom, sharing a sack with some bricks."

He went over with Hanlon to the members of the search party, most of them still sitting inside their cars, not wanting to get any wetter or colder until they had to. All of them looked tired and dispirited, but they climbed out of the cars to huddle round him. "Isn't this better than being stuck inside a stuffy office?" he asked, which produced a few laughs. "All right. I've sodded you about up to now, but this has got to be our best lead yet. I know you're tired and fed up and hate my guts, but the poor little sod we're looking for is seven years old, shit-scared and could die if we don't find him quickly. Search everywhere, even the most unlikely places. If you're not sure, search again. So good luck."

Hanlon split them into groups and directed them to various search areas while Frost made his way back to the bank. More voices and car door slammings. The mobile lighting unit and the frogmen. Hanlon sent a couple of men over to help them unload their gear and get the lights set up.

Frost walked up and down the bank, the rain beating down heavily on his bare head and soaking through his shower proof water-blackened mac. The lights had been rigged and shone down on the river making it look like black velvet and bounced off the oilskins most of the men were wearing. False alarms as debris floating past looked just like a tiny body, but when it hit the lighted area turned out to be clumps of vegetation and earth from where the bank had collapsed into the river.

Jordan, in the small rowing boat with Collier at the oars, was prodding the muddy bottom with a pole. The monotonous, grating creak of the row locks as Collier fought to keep the boat steady against the drag of the current was setting Frost's teeth on edge.

"Something here, inspector!" Jordan calling from the boat, leaning over the side, dragging something from the water.

Frost's heart stumbled and skipped a couple of beats as an ominous-looking black plastic dustbin sack was hauled up and brought over to him. Don't let it be the boy, he pleaded silently. Please, don't let it be the boy. His knife slashed it open and it spewed stinking river water all over his feet. A long, low sigh of relief. Rotting household rubbish, dumped a long time ago.

Frost wiped the rain from his face and eyes and tried to concentrate to see if he got any feeling that the boy was somewhere near… that he was alive.

"Any luck?" called a familiar voice.

Bleeding Cassidy. He hoped he wasn't going to go on again about his daughter. "We haven't found a dead body yet… that's about as lucky as we've got."

"I had another word with Finch," said Cassidy.

Did you? thought Frost. He's supposed to be my bloody prisoner, but be my guest…

"Mr. Mullett thought I might be more successful than you."

"Mr. Mullett isn't questioning my infallibility, I hope?" muttered Frost.

"Finch is keeping shtum. I told him you were searching the river. He didn't seem at all worried."

"He's hardly going to say "Oh my God, not the river!" is he? If he looks blank and acts dumb, we can't pin anything on him."

"But if we find the boy '

"There'll still be no proof Finch put him here. The fact he filled up at a garage in the vicinity is hardly bloody conclusive." He pulled off his scarf, which was soaking wet and making him uncomfortable. "I'll be happy if we find the kid alive, even if it means letting Finch go."

The area was adazzle with all of the floodlights working and the generator throbbed away out of sight somewhere. Oars creaked, rain drummed and one of the floodlights sizzled and flashed intermittently as rain found a faulty connection. Searchers on the bank, in oilskins, bent low as they prodded the long wet grass.

"Put some bloody beef into it," roared Cassidy, walking over to one of the groups who had been out in the rain and cold all night. Backs stiffened, but no-one said anything. They were too tired.

"Looking for the boy, Jack?"

Frost groaned. Sandy Lane from the Denton Echo with one of his photographers ready for one of his "Police Fail Again' stories.

"Hello, Sandy," he grunted. "Been listening in to the police wave bands

The reporter grinned. "No, Jack. We just happened to be driving past and we spotted all the lights."

"Oh," sniffed Frost. "I thought there was an innocent explanation. Yes, we're looking for the boy."

"Any reason why you chose this particular spot?"

"No. We just happened to see the lights and we thought we'd have a look. Now leave me alone, Sandy, there's a good boy. We're busy."

The photographer took a couple of pictures of the searchers, then retired to the car with Sandy to wait for the body to be fished up, or the boy to be found alive. The reporter began working out alternative headlines to cover either eventuality.

The search had moved further down, leaving in its wake a trail of flattened grass and odd heaps of rubbish dredged from the river. Frost threw away the sodden cigarette that dangled from his mouth and tried to light up a fresh one from the damp pack in his pocket. He managed a couple of drags of bitter-tasting smoke before it sizzled and died. The feeling that the kid was here, almost within reach, was strong, but only as strong as the feeling they probably wouldn't find him. He felt like hurling himself in the car, tearing back to the station and doing a deal with Finch. Tell us where he is and we will drop all charges, give you a pension for life and all the Cup Final tickets you want.

He pulled back a sodden cuff to consult his watch. One o'clock in the morning. He could hear Cassidy shouting, redirecting one of the teams back to an area they had already searched. He thought of Finch in his nice, dry cell, snug and warm, and probably working out how much he could sue the police for harassment and wrongful arrest.

"Frost!"

A shudder quivered through him. Just what he wanted to make his misery complete. Mullett, immaculately turned out in his tailored raincoat which, in some mysterious way, seemed to repel the rain. He forced a smile. "Hello, super."

Mullett gaped at the floodlights, the frogmen, the teams of off-duty men, and tried to work out the cost. He transferred his glare to the drenched, drowned rat figure of Frost. "Who authorized this?"

"I tried to get you," said Frost, "I rang your house no-one answered."

"I haven't been more than six feet away from the phone all night," snapped Mullett.

"I must have got a wrong number, then," said Frost. "It rang and rang… and I knew you would have authorized it."

"So Finch told you where the boy was?"

"Not exactly, sir." He told Mullett about the petrol receipt.

Mullett stared at him in open-mouthed incredulity. "And on the basis of that flimsy piece of so-called evidence you have committed us to an overtime bill far in excess of our resources, even after I had specifically told you…" His lips tightened. "You deliberately didn't phone me, Frost, because you knew I would say no."

You clever bastard, thought Frost. That's exactly why I didn't phone you.

"Inspector! Over here."

A welcome diversion. Arthur Hanlon, Jordan by his side, was bending over something fished out of the river. He was waving. "Excuse me, super." He brushed past Mullett and hurried down.

Another dustbin sack. Hanlon had cut the white plastic tie. He tipped out the contents. A pair of fisherman's waders, plus a muddy stone to ensure the bag sunk. Frost lifted them up and examined the heavy rubber soles. No sign of any wear they could have been brand-new.

Cassidy, determined not to be left out, came running over. "What have we got?" Frost showed him. Cassidy shrugged. "So what does it mean?"

"Why would anyone want to chuck away a pair of brand-new waders?" asked Hanlon.

"A fisherman could have dropped them in by accident," suggested Cassidy.

"With a flaming brick inside to make sure it sunk?" snorted Frost. "Besides, fishermen don't come here. Any fish that survived through the chemicals being shunted in the river would be purple and shine in the dark." He shook his head. "I'll lay odds Finch dumped these."

"Why?"

"Because he didn't want us to know he'd been paddling in the bleeding river." He was getting excited now. "He's found a place to hide the boy, but had to get in the river to reach it."

"Another possibility is that he waded in the river to dump the body in the deepest part," said Cassidy.

"My brain can only deal with one possibility at a time," said Frost. He looked over to the far bank. "Could anyone wade across to that bank?" he asked Jordan.

Jordan shook his head. "Far too deep."

"Then we concentrate on this side." He looked down at the cold swirl, steeled himself then stepped into the river which came well above his knees. He didn't believe in asking people to do things he wouldn't do himself. "We need to search the bank from the river," he told Hanlon. "Get all the volunteers you can. Tell them they'll have to get their feet wet… their dicks too if it gets any deeper." The water was icy and the current threatened to knock him off his feet, but, unsteadily, he pressed on, pushing aside the overhang of vegetation from the bank which was now bobbing in the raised water level. Behind came a splash as Jordan joined him. Cassidy stayed on the bank, keeping pace with them.

At one point Frost got his foot stuck deep in the mud and in pulling it free lost his shoe, but no time to retrieve it, only to curse softly and limp on.

He nearly missed it. It was at the point where the river curved and the current was at its strongest and nearly kicked his feet from under him. He clutched at a clump of reeds to stop himself falling. And there it was, no longer hidden. An opening in the bank. Water was lapping almost half-way up a brown, glazed pipe, some eighteen inches in diameter. "Jordan!"

Jordan splashed- over to him. "It's part of an old drainage system to run off rain water from some of these fields at back of us. They're blocked off now." He pulled back the overhang of long, dank grass so Frost could look inside.

"Torch!" called Frost. Cassidy, from the bank, handed one down.

The beam ricocheted off something drably white. Passing the torch back to Cassidy, Frost squeezed his arm through and touched it. Cloth of some kind. Woollen cloth. He managed to get a grip on it and tugged. At first it didn't want to move, then it slid forward. The weight was right. His heart pounded. He now had it out and raised it out of the water. It was a child, cocooned in a sodden blanket which was bound round with cord. Brown plastic tape sealed the mouth and eyes. The flesh was cold. As cold as the river water. "I've got him," he yelled and could hear excited voices and people running towards him.

"Give him to me." Cassidy, bending over, held out his arms for the bundle. Frost passed it up.

Helped by Burton, Frost managed to clamber up on the bank, and was still on his hands and knees, shivering with cold, as Cassidy was cutting the cord and stripping off the sodden blanket. Under it the child was naked. Cassidy shrugged off his greatcoat and swaddled the boy. Then he carefully peeled off the plastic tape. The eyes were tightly closed. He could detect no sign of breathing.

He's dead, thought Frost, hugging himself for warmth. The poor little sod is dead.

Liz pushed through the huddle and bent her ear to the child's mouth. Her eyes narrowed as she listened. "He's breathing," she announced. "Just about, but he's breathing."

"Ambulance," yelled Mullett. "Get an ambulance."

Frost took charge. "No!" He grabbed Cassidy. "It will be quicker to get him straight to the hospital. Take him in an area car. Radio ahead and let them know you are coming."

Cassidy nodded and, clutching the child tight to his chest, pushed through to the area car. Electronic flash guns crackled as Sandy's man took photographs.

Mullett was beaming. He couldn't wait to get back to phone the Chief Constable. "A most satisfactory ending," he told Frost.

"Thanks, super." The wind on his wet clothes was chilling him to the bone. "Pass me the blanket… I'll get it over to Forensic'

Mullett bent and picked it up. He frowned. He was looking at something caught up in the folds. "Seems to be a receipt of some kind."

"Show me," said Frost excitedly. Soaking wet, but still readable, it was a till receipt for the purchase of petrol. Hatter's Garage. That day's date and paid for by credit card. Finch's credit card.

He looked up at Mullett and smiled. "You clever old sod," he said. "We've got him. Thanks to you, we've got him."

A doubtful smile flickered on and off Mullett's lips. He wasn't quite sure what it was he had done.

"The evidence we wanted," explained Frost, slipping the receipt between the pages of his notebook to dry it. "We can now tie Finch to the kid." He looked round for Liz and beckoned her over. "Ever charged a man with murder and kidnapping?"

She shook her head.

"Then here's your chance. Get that bastard Finch banged up."

"Aren't you going to do it?" asked Mullett.

"I'm soaking wet," answered Frost. "I'm going home to change." At the car he yelled his thanks to the search team. "Booze-up in the incident room in an hour. I'll bring some bottles, but don't let that stop any of you from bringing your own!"

Clutching tightly to his chest bottles which clinked and threatened to slip from his grasp, he backed through the swing doors and into the lobby. From the raucous sounds seeping from the incident room the celebration party was already in progress. Bill Wells on the front desk beckoned him over.

"Finch wants to see you."

"What about?"

"He didn't say," said Wells. "No-one takes me into their confidence."

He left the bottles on the front desk, reminded Wells he had counted them, then went down to the cells.

Finch was lying on his bunk. He got up when Frost entered. "You bastard!" he hissed.

"Sticks and stones…" said Frost, waggling a finger.

"You framed me. You fitted me up!"

"Fitted you up?" said Frost, his face a picture of injured bewilderment.

"That petrol receipt."

"What about it?"

"You planted it. You found it with my credit card and you planted it."

"My Divisional Commander found it not me."

Finch stood up and pushed his face close to Frost's. "I don't care who found it you planted it to be found."

Frost shook his head. "I know you like to think of yourself as infallible, Mr. Finch, but you slipped up this time. The receipt must have fallen from your pocket as you were stuffing the poor little git up that drainage pipe."

"There's a flaw in your reasoning, inspector, an insurmountable flaw. I drove to the river, I hid the child and I filled up with petrol on the way back. So how on earth could that receipt have got there?"

Frost shrugged and gave an enigmatic smile. "One of life's little mysteries." He paused. "Do you want to make an official complaint?"

Finch barked a scornful laugh and sat down again. "What use would it be? You'd lie your head off."

"How well you know me," said Frost.