Night Frost

Tuesday night shift (3)

The smell of burning oil from Frost’s clapped-out Cortina grew stronger as Gilmore roared the car up the hill. ‘I can see the sod!’ yelled Frost. A hunched shape was moving across the lawn towards the house. Gilmore braked violently, slewing the car across the gravel driveway, and flung open the door. The sound of breaking glass shivered the silence, followed by the shrill urgency of an alarm bell.

‘There he goes!’ said Gilmore as something darted back across the lawn and was swallowed by shadow. ‘I’ll cut across that field, round to the side of the house. You nip that way to the end of the lane and cut him off as I flush him out.’ Frost, his running days long past, listened without enthusiasm, and was still fumbling with his seat belt as Gilmore streaked away into the darkness.

The radio called to report that the alarm at The Old Mill was ringing. ‘Yes, we know,’ said Frost.

Gilmore, out of breath, was clinging to a tree, sucking in air for dear life as Frost eventually ambled over. Frost lit a cigarette and pushed a mouthful of smoke in the sergeant’s direction. Gilmore fanned it away and, at last, between gasps, was able to croak, ‘Where were you?’

Frost ignored the question. ‘Did you see him?’

Gilmore’s head shook in tempo with his panting. ‘No. I told you to head him off.’

‘I must have misheard you,’ said Frost. ‘Let’s go to the house and see what he’s done.’ He spun round abruptly as a figure crashed towards them out of the black. ‘Who the hell’s this?’

‘Did you get him?’ It was Mark Compton, flourishing a heavy walking stick.

‘He was too fast,’ panted Gilmore. ‘We thought your wife would be here on her own.’

‘That’s probably what that swine thought,’ snapped Compton. ‘I changed my schedule. I’ve just got in.’ He led them back to the house and through to the lounge where curtains billowed from a jagged hole in the centre of the large patio window. Glass slivers glinted on the carpet. The cause of the damage, a muddied brick, probably from the garden, lay next to what looked like a bunch of flowers. Frost picked it up. It wasn’t a bunch of flowers.

‘My God!’ croaked Compton.

It was a funeral wreath of white lilies, yellow chrysanthemums and evergreen leaves. Attached to it was an ivory-coloured card, edged in black. A handwritten message neatly inscribed in black ink read simply, and chillingly, Goodbye.

‘The sod doesn’t waste words, does he?’ muttered Frost, passing the wreath to Gilmore. He stared out at the empty, dead garden, then pulled the curtains together. The night air had crept into the room and that, or the wreath, was making him feel shivery. ‘Did you see anything of the bloke who did it?’

‘No. Jill said she’d heard someone prowling around, but I couldn’t spot anyone. I thought she’d imagined it, then the glass smashed, then the damned alarm. I saw someone running away, but that was all.’

‘And you’ve no idea who it might be?’

‘I’ve already told you, no.’

Frost scuffed a splinter of glass with his shoe. ‘He’s going to a great deal of trouble to make his point. He must really hate you.. or your wife.’

‘There’s no motive behind this, Inspector,’ insisted Compton. ‘We’re dealing with a nut-case.’

‘Mark!’ His wife calling from upstairs.

‘I’m down here with the police.’

Gilmore pushed himself in front of the inspector. ‘A quick question before your wife comes in, sir. Simon Bradbury — the man you had the fight with in London…’

‘Hardly a fight, Sergeant,’ protested Compton.

‘Well, whatever, sir. It seems he’s got a record for drunkenness and violence… and now we learn that his wife — the lady you obliged with a light — has given him the elbow. Any reason why he might believe you were the cause of her leaving him?’

Compton’s face was a picture of incredulity. ‘Me? And Bradbury’s wife? I lit her damn cigarette over four weeks ago and that is the sum total of our relationship. You surely don’t think Bradbury’s responsible for what’s been happening here? It’s ridiculous!’

‘The whole thing’s bloody ridiculous,’ began Frost gloomily, quickly cheering up as the door opened and Jill Compton entered in a cloud of erotic perfume and an inch or so of nightdress. Her hair hung loosely over her shoulders and while Frost didn’t know how breasts could be called ‘pouting’, pouting seemed a good word to describe Jill Compton’s breasts as they nosed their way through near-transparent wisps of silk.

She smiled to greet Frost then she caught her breath. ‘Oh my God!’ She had seen the wreath. Her entire body began to tremble. Mark put his arms round her and held her tight. ‘I can’t take much more of this,’ she sobbed.

‘You won’t have to, love,’ he soothed. ‘We’ll sell up and move.’

‘But the business…’

‘You’re more important than the bloody business.’ He was squeezing her close to him, his hands cupping and stroking her buttocks, and Frost hated and envied him more and more by the second.

From somewhere in the house a phone rang. It was 00.39 in the morning. Everyone tensed. The woman trembled violently. ‘It’s him!’ she whispered. Her husband held her tighter.

‘I’ll take it,’ Frost barked. ‘Where’s the phone?’

Mark pointed up the stairs. ‘In the bedroom. We switched it through.’

Frost and Gilmore galloped up the stairs, two at a time. The bedroom door was ajar. Inside, the room held the sensual smell of Mrs Compton. Frost snatched up the onyx phone from the bedside table and listened. A faint rapid tapping in the background. It was the sound of typing. At this hour of the morning? And indistinct murmurs of distant voices. Frost strained to listen, trying to make out what was said. There was something familiar… Then a man s voice said, ‘Hello.. is there anyone there?’ and he flopped down on the bed in disappointment. The caller was Sergeant Wells.

‘Yes, I’m here,’ replied Frost. ‘Sorry if I’m out of breath. I’m in a lady’s bed at the moment.’

‘Got a treat for you, Jack. Another body.’

‘Shit!’ said Frost. The only body he was interested in just now was Mrs Compton’s. ‘What’s the address?’ He snapped his fingers for Gilmore to take it down.

‘The body’s out in the open. It was dumped in a lane at the rear of the corporation rubbish tip.’

‘Ah,’ said Frost. ‘Sounds like a job for Mr Mullett. I’ll give you his home phone number.’

‘Don’t mess about, Jack. Jordan and Collier are waiting there for you. Could be foul play, but I’ve got my doubts.’

‘Collier? You’re pushing that poor little sod in at the deep end?’

‘I had no-one else to send. Both area cars are ferrying the wounded down to Denton Casualty after the pub punch-up. There’s blood and teeth all over the floor down here.’

‘Excuses, excuses,’ said Frost, hanging up quickly. ‘Why do I always get the shitty locations? Rubbish tips, public urinals… I never get knocking shops and harems.’ Well, he was in no hurry for this one. He stretched himself out on the bed and inhaled Jill Compton’s perfume. ‘Nip down and tell the lady of the house I’m ready for her now,’ he murmured to Gilmore. ‘And ask her to wash her behind. I don’t fancy it with her husband’s sticky finger-marks all over it.’

‘Don’t you think we should hurry?’ asked Gilmore.

‘I can’t work up much enthusiasm about a body in a rubbish dump.’ Reluctantly, he hauled himself up from the soft, still warm bed and had a quick nose around. Other people’s bedrooms fascinated him. His own was cold, cheerless and strictly functional, a place for crawling into bed, dead tired, in the small hours, and out again in the morning to face a new day’s horrors. But here was a bedroom for padding about, half-undressed, on the soft wool carpeting, and for making love on the wide divan bed with its beige velvet headboard. By the side of the bed, a twin-mirrored, low-level dressing table where pouting-breasted Jill Compton would splash perfume over her red-hot, naked body, before sprawling on the bed, her hair tumbled across the pillow, awaiting the entrance of her rampant, adulterous sod of a husband.

He shook his head to erase the fantasy and walked across to the wide window to look out, across the moonlit garden. The wind had dropped and everything was quiet and still. ‘Any chance the bloke we saw could have been the husband?’

‘The husband?’ Gilmore’s eyebrows shot up. What was the idiot on about now? ‘Smashing his own window? Scaring the hell out of his own wife?’

‘I just get the feeling there’s something phoney about this.’

‘I don’t share your opinion,’ sniffed Gilmore. ‘And in any case, there was no way it could have been the husband. He was with his wife when the window was smashed.’

‘Then I’m wrong again,’ shrugged Frost.

Downstairs, husband and wife were in close embrace, the shortie nightdress had ridden up to pouting breast level and hands were crawling everywhere.

Frost scooped up the wreath and passed it over to Gilmore. ‘We’ll see ourselves out,’ he called.

They didn’t hear him.

Police Constable Ken Jordan, his greatcoat collar turned up against the damp chill, was waiting for them at the lane at the rear of the sprawling rubbish dump. The lane was little more than a footpath with rain-heavy, waist-high grass flourishing on each side. In the background the night sky glowed a misty orange.

‘Blimey, Jordan, what’s that pong?’ sniffed Frost, inhaling the sour breath of the town’s decaying rubbish. ‘It’s not you, I hope?’

Jordan grinned. He liked working with Frost. ‘Pretty nasty one this time, sir. The body’s a bit of a mess.’

‘I only get the nasty ones,’ said Frost. ‘Let’s take a look at him.’

They followed Jordan, stumbling in the dark, as he led them down the narrow path, the wet grass on each side slap ping at their legs, ‘The old lady died, sir — at the hospital. I suppose you know.’

‘Yes,’ said Frost. ‘I know.’

The lane curved. Ahead of them sodium lamps gleamed and flickering flames of something burning bloodied the haze. The tip was perimetered by 9-foot high chain link fencing, giving it the appearance of a wartime German prisoner of war camp.

Behind the wire fence, towering proud through streamers of mist, rose mountains of black plastic rubbish sacks and chugging between them, pushing, scooping and rearranging the landscape, a yellow-painted corporation bulldozer splashed through slime-coated pools of filthy water. As it demolished heaps of rubbish, rats scampered and scurried, their paws making loud scratching sounds on the plastic sacking. The smell was stale and sickly sweet like unwashed, rotting bodies.

Frost wound his scarf around his mouth and nose as he nodded towards the bulldozer. ‘I didn’t know they worked nights.’

‘It’s this flu virus,’ explained Jordan. ‘Half of the work-force are off sick and the rest have to do overtime to keep ahead. It was the bulldozer driver who spotted the body.’

‘Then sod him for a start,’ said Frost.

‘This way, sir.’ Jordan led them off the path, trampling a trail through the lush, sodden grass to where a pasty-faced PC Collier stood uneasily on guard over rusting tin cans and a tarpaulin-covered huddle.

Frost lit up a cigarette and passed around the packet. Everyone took one, even Collier who didn’t usually smoke. Frost looked down at the tarpaulin and prodded it with his foot. ‘I can’t delay the treat any more.’ He nodded to Collier. ‘Let’s have a look at him.’

Collier hesitated and didn’t seem to want to comply.

‘You heard the inspector,’ snapped Gilmore. ‘What are you waiting for?’

Keeping his head turned well away, Collier fumbled for the tarpaulin and pulled it back.

Even Frost had to gasp when he saw the face. The cigarette dropped from his lips on to the chest of the corpse. He bent hurriedly to retrieve it, trying not to look too closely at the face as he did so.

Jordan, who had seen it before, stared straight ahead. Gilmore’s stomach was churning and churning. He bit his lip until it hurt and tried to think of anything but that face. He wasn’t going to show himself up in front of the others.

The body was of an old man in his late seventies. There were no eyes and parts of the face were eaten away with bloodied chunks torn from the cheeks and the lips.

‘The rats have had a go at him,’ said Jordan.

‘I didn’t think they were love bites,’ said Frost. He straightened up. ‘Still, we’re lucky the weather’s cold. Did I ever tell you about that decomposing tramp in the heat-wave?

‘Yes,’ said Jordan hurriedly. Frost was fond of trotting out that ghastly anecdote.

‘Did I tell you, son?’ said Frost, turning to Gilmore. ‘The hottest bloody summer on record. I can still taste the smell of him.’

‘Yes, you told me,’ lied Gilmore.

The dead man, the exposed flesh yellow in the over-spill of the sodium lamps, lay on his back, lipless mouth agape, staring eyeless into the night sky. He wore an unbuttoned black overcoat, heavy with rain, which flapped open to reveal a blue-striped, flannelette pyjama jacket which bore the bloodied paw marks of the feeding rats. The pyjama jacket was tucked inside dark grey trousers which were fastened by a leather belt.

‘Do we know who he is?’

‘Yes, Inspector.’ Collier came forward. ‘It’s that old boy whose daughter-in-law reported him missing from home last week. He was always walking out and sleeping rough.’

‘I bet the poor sod has never slept as rough as this,’ observed Frost. ‘Sergeant Wells said you think it’s foul play?’

‘His face looked battered, sir,’ said Collier, pointing, but not looking where he was pointing.

Frost haunched down, slipped a hand beneath the head of the corpse and lifted it slightly. He dribbled smoke as he stared long and hard at the mutilated face, then stood up, wiping his palm down the front of his mac. ‘That’s just where the rats have been tucking in, son. There’s no other marks… see for yourself.’

‘I’ll take your word for it, sir, if you don’t mind,’ said Collier.

Jordan’s personal radio squawked. He pulled it from his pocket. Sergeant Wells wanted to speak to Inspector Frost urgently.

Frost took the radio. ‘Everything’s bloody urgent,’ he moaned.

‘Fifteen Roman Road, Denton,’ said Wells tersely. ‘Mrs Betty Winters, an old lady living on her own. A neighbour’s phoned. He reckons he saw a man breaking in through the front door. The intruder is still in the house. Sorry about this, but I’ve got no-one else to send.’

‘On our way,’ said Frost, stuffing the radio back in Jordan’s pocket. ‘Jordan, come with us. Collier, stay here and wait for the police surgeon.’ At the young PC’s look of dismay at being left alone with the body, he added, ‘You can handle it, son. If death isn’t due to natural causes, let me know right away.’

With Jordan driving they made it to Roman Road in three minutes, coasting past number 15 and stopping outside the public telephone box where a middle-aged man emerged and hurried over to them. ‘It was me who phoned,’ he announced. ‘I knew he was up to no good the minute I saw him. I thought he was going to pee in the porch. They do that, you know — dirty sods. You put your empty milk bottles out…’

‘What did he look like?’ cut in Frost as the man drew a breath.

‘A big, ugly-looking sod. I couldn’t get to that phone quick enough. Stinks of urine in that phone box. When they’re not peeing in your porch or your milk bottles they’re peeing in the phone box…’

‘Are you sure he’s still inside?’ asked Gilmore.

‘Positive.’

‘Is there a back way out?’

‘Through the gardens and over the rear wall. But I don’t think he’s got out that way. You’d hear next-door’s bloody dog barking… bark, bark, bark, all bleeding night.’

‘Go with the gentleman, Jordan,’ said Frost, anxious to get rid of the verbose neighbour. ‘Get into the garden over his fence and block the escape route.’

As soon as Jordan radioed through that he was in position, Frost did his letter-box squinting act. Utter blackness. A quick examination of the front door. No sign of a forced entry, so if there was an intruder, how did he get in? Hope fully he looked under the porch mat for a spare key. Nothing.

‘Shall I smash the glass panel?’ offered Gilmore.

‘No,’ grunted Frost, poking his hand through the letter- box and scrabbling about until his fingers touched some thing. A length of string looped at the end. He gave the string a tug. There was a click as the door knob was pulled back. Cautiously he pushed open the door, grabbing it as a sudden gust of wind threatened to send it crashing against the wall of the hall.

They tiptoed inside and Frost flicked the beam of his torch to show Gilmore how the string ran through staples and was tied round the door catch. ‘The burglar’s friend, son.’ If the tenant forgot his key, he just had to pull the string. But so could anyone else who wanted to gain entry.

They held their breaths and listened. The house stretched and creaked and breathed and sighed. Then an alien sound from upstairs made Frost grab at Gilmore’s sleeve, willing him to silence. A small click like a door closing. Signalling for the sergeant to stay by the front door, blocking that escape route, Frost padded along the passage and began creeping up the stairs.

Every stair seemed to creak no matter how carefully he placed his feet. At the top his torch picked out a small landing and two doors side by side. He clicked off the torch and slowly turned the handle of the nearest door.

Pitch black and a feeling of cold and damp. A hollow plop. Water slowly dripping from a tap. And a smell of sweat. Of fear. His thumb was on the button of the torch when he caught the metallic glint of a knife just as something hit him, sending his head smashing against the wall.

The torch dropped from his grasp as arms locked round him and dragged him down to the ground. Someone was on top of him, punching. There was hardly any room to move. His arm was trapped between his body and the wall, but he strained and wriggled frantically until he managed to free it. He reached up. Cloth. Flesh. Then a clawing hand clutched his face. He grabbed it trying to tear it away while his other hand scrabbled in the blackness over cold, wet lino. ‘Where was the damned torch?

He started to yell ‘Gilmore!’ when a fist crashed down on his face. He jerked up a knee, blindly. A scream of pain as his assailant fell back. His groping hand touched something metallic. The torch. Thankfully he grabbed it and swung it upwards like a club. A sharp crack and a groan as his attacker collapsed on top of him. Frost pushed and wriggled and managed to get on top.

Thudding footsteps up the stairs. ‘Are you all right, Inspector?’

‘No, I am bloody not!’ panted Frost. ‘I’m fighting for my bleeding life in here.’

Gilmore pushed in and fumbled for the light switch. They were in a small white-tiled bathroom. Frost, astride the intruder, was wedged between the wall and the bath. His tongue took a trip round his mouth, prodding at teeth, tasting salt.

He stood up to get a better look at the unconscious man on the floor. His attacker was around twenty, fresh complexion, his hair black and cut short, dressed in grey slacks, a grey polo-neck sweater and a windcheater. Gilmore searched his pockets. No wallet, no identification. No sign of a weapon but over the sweater a heavy silver crucifix on a chain glinted like the blade of a knife.

The man on the floor groaned and stirred slightly.

‘Hadn’t we better get him to a doctor?’ asked Gilmore.

Frost shook his head. ‘He’s only stunned.’ Then he remembered the old lady who should have heard all the noise and be screaming blue murder. ‘Let’s find the old girl.’

She was in the bedroom. In the bed, eyes staring upwards, mouth wide open and dribbling red. The bedclothes had been dragged back, exposing a nightdress drenched in blood from the multiple stab wounds in her stomach. On the pillow, by her head, was a browning smear where her killer had wiped the blade clean before leaving.

While the little house swarmed with more people than it had held in its lifetime, Frost and Gilmore closeted themselves in the bathroom with their prisoner, now securely handcuffed. He lay still, apparently unconscious. A dig from Frost’s foot resulted only in a slight moan. On the bath rack was an enormous sponge which Frost held under the cold tap until it was sodden and dripping, then he held it high over the man’s face and squeezed.

The head jerked, and twisted, the eyes fluttered, then opened wide. He blinked and tried to focus on the piece of white plastic bearing a coloured photograph.

‘Police,’ announced Frost.

A sigh of relief as the man struggled up to a sitting position. ‘In the bedroom — she’s dead…’ He winced and tried to touch his head and then saw the handcuffs. ‘What’s this? What’s going on?’

‘Suppose you tell us,’ snapped Frost. ‘What’s your name?’

‘Purley. Frederick Purley.’

‘Address?’

‘The Rectory, All Saints Church.’

‘Are you trying to be funny?’ snarled Gilmore.

Purley raised his dripping face to the sergeant. ‘I’m the curate at All Saints Church. Please remove these handcuffs.’ He tried to rise to his feet, but Gilmore pushed him down.

‘Since when do curates break into people’s houses in the middle of the night?’ asked Frost.

‘I only wanted to see if Mrs Winters was all right. I never dreamed…’ His head drooped.

‘Why did you think she wasn’t all right?’ asked Frost, dropping his cigarette end into the toilet pan and flushing it away.

‘I’d been sitting with one of my parishioners — an old man, terminally ill — giving his daughter a break from looking after him. As I walked back I saw Mrs Winters’ milk was still on the step. After that dreadful business with poor Mrs Haynes, I had to make sure she was all right.’

Gilmore’s head jerked up. ‘You knew Mrs Haynes?’

‘Yes, Sergeant. I was with her on Sunday. Her husband’s grave was vandalized. She was so upset.’

‘It wasn’t the poor cow’s day,’ said Frost. Then his eyes narrowed. ‘There was no milk on the step when we arrived.’

‘I brought it in with me. I put it in her fridge.’

Frost yelled down the stairs for the SOC man to check if there was an unopened bottle of milk in the fridge and if so, to go over it for prints. Back to Purley. ‘How did you get in?’

‘There’s a string connected to the front door catch. I’ve used it before… Mrs Winters is a cripple — she’s under the hospital, chronic arthritis. She can’t always get to the door.’

‘Right,’ nodded Frost. ‘So what did you do next?’

‘The hall was in darkness. I couldn’t find the light switch, but I made my way upstairs. I tapped on her bedroom door. No answer. I went in and switched on the light and…’ He shuddered and covered his face with his hands, ‘and I saw her. And then I heard the door click downstairs. I thought it was the killer coming back. I switched off the light and hid in the bathroom. You know the rest.’

A brisk tap at the door. The SOC man came in holding a full pint bottle of red-top milk, shrouded in a polythene bag.

‘This was in the fridge, Inspector. Two different dabs on the neck — neither of them the dead woman’s.’

Frost squinted at the bottle. ‘One should be the milkman, the other ought to be the padre here. Take his dabs and see if they match.’ He ordered Gilmore to remove the cuffs.

Another tap at the door. ‘The pathologist has finished,’ yelled Forensic.

‘Coming,’ called Frost.

It was cold in the tiny ice-box of a bedroom with its unfriendly brown lino and the windows rattling where the wind found all the gaps. Drysdale buttoned his overcoat and rubbed his hands briskly. ‘I estimate the time of death as approximately eleven o’clock last night, give or take half an hour or so either way.’ He pointed to bruising on each side of the dead woman’s mouth. ‘He clamped his hand over her face so she couldn’t utter a sound, then he jerked back the bedclothes and stabbed her repeatedly — three times in the stomach and lastly in the heart. The wounds are quite deep. To inflict them he would have raised the knife above his head and brought it down with considerable force.’ Drysdale gave a demonstration with his clenched fist. ‘As he raised his hand, some of the blood on the knife splashed on to the wall.’ He indicated red splatters staining the pale cream wall paper.

‘Would he have got any of that on himself?’

‘Without a doubt,’ said Drysdale, pulling on his gloves. ‘Considerable quantities of blood spurting from the wounds would have hit his right arm and blood from the blade would have spattered him as he raised his arm to deliver the next blow.’

‘No traces of blood in the bathroom waste-trap,’ offered the man from Forensic, who was measuring and marking blood splashes on the wall, ‘so he didn’t wash it off before he left.’

‘Dirty bastard!’ said Frost. ‘What can you tell us about the knife, doc?’

‘Extremely sharp, single-edged, rigid blade approximately six inches long and about an inch and a quarter wide, honed to a sharp point.’

‘The same knife that killed the other old girl — Mary Haynes?’

‘It’s possible,’ admitted Drysdale, grudgingly. ‘I’ll be more positive after the post-mortem — which will be at 10.30 tomorrow morning. You’ll be there?’

‘Wouldn’t miss it for the world,’ replied Frost.

Gilmore was waiting for him at the head of the stairs. The vicar of All Saints had been contacted and had confirmed that his curate, Frederick Purley, had gone out to visit a terminally ill parishioner, and the SOC officer had confirmed that one of the thumb prints on the milk bottle be longed to the man in the bathroom.

Frost groaned his disappointment. ‘The old lady died yesterday. So unless Purley killed her last night, then came back today just to put the milk in the fridge, we’ve lost our best hope for a suspect.’

He waited in the kitchen while Gilmore brought down the verified curate, who was vigorously rubbing his freed wrists, and who declined the offer of a doctor to look at his head on which a lump had formed nicely.

They sat round the kitchen table where the plates were already laid for the breakfast the old lady hadn’t lived to enjoy. Frost utilized the egg cup as an ashtray. A rap at the door as PC Jordan entered.

‘We’ve been all over the house, Inspector. No sign of forced entry anywhere. The back door’s locked and bolted and all windows are secure. He came in through the front door.’

Frost nodded, then turned to Purley. ‘Who else knew about instant entry with the old dear’s piece of string?’

‘Very few people, I should imagine. She wasn’t a very friendly or communicative woman.’

‘So how did you know her?’

‘She used to be a member of our church senior citizens’ club until her legs got too bad. I like to keep in touch.’

‘Anything about her that would make her attractive to a burglar, padre? Was she supposed to have money, or valuables in the house?’

Purley shook his head. ‘Not as far as I know.’

Frost scratched his chin. ‘Was Mrs Haynes a member of your church club?’

‘Yes, but an infrequent attender. She hasn’t been for months.’

‘What about a Mrs Alice Ryder?’

‘Ryder?’ His brow furrowed, then he shook his head. ‘No. I don’t recall the name.’

‘We believe the same bastard killed them all,’ said Frost. ‘There’s got to be a link.’

Purley gave a sad, apologetic smile. ‘Then I’m afraid I don’t know it.’

On the way back to the station they detoured to drop off the curate at the vicarage. As the car passed the churchyard Frost was reminded of the wreath dumped in the Comptons’ lounge. He couldn’t remember picking it up and was relieved when Gilmore jerked a thumb to the back seat where the wreath lay between a pair of mud-caked wellington boots.

‘You might as well take the Compton case over, son. I’m not going to have much time for it.’

‘Right,’ said Gilmore, trying to keep the delight from his voice. A case of his own. He’d show these yokels how to get a result.

‘You don’t buy wreaths off the peg — they have to be ordered specially,’ continued Frost. ‘If I were you I’d get Burton to check with every florist in Denton.’

‘That’s what I intend to do,’ said Gilmore.

As they crossed the lobby with the wreath, Sergeant Wells looked up from his log book. ‘Who’s dead?’ he asked.

‘Glenn Miller,’ grunted Frost. ‘It just came over on the radio.’ He was in no mood for Wells’ jokes.

‘I’ll tell you who is dead,’ said Wells, anxious to impart his news.

Frost groaned, and walked reluctantly across to the desk. More cheer from Wells. The man was a walking bloody obituary column. ‘If it isn’t Mullett, I don’t want to know.’

Wells paused for dramatic effect, then solemnly intoned, ‘George Harrison! Heart attack as he was going downstairs. Dead before he hit the bottom.’ He leant forward to observe the effect this had on the inspector.

Frost’s jaw dropped. Police inspector George Harrison had only retired a few weeks ago after twenty-four years ser vice. ‘Bloody hell!’

‘First you come round with the list for their retirement present,’ said Wells, dolefully, ‘next thing you know you’re going round with the list for their wreath. You might as well collect both at once and be done with it.’

‘Bloody hell!’ said Frost again. The force was his life and retirement was the one thing he dreaded. The thought made him depressed. He jerked his head to Gilmore and headed for the stairs. ‘Come on, son, let’s get something to eat.’

‘If you’re going to the canteen, don’t bother,’ said Wells, happy to be the bearer of more bad news. ‘It’s shut.’

‘Shut?’ echoed Frost in dismay.

‘The night staff are still down with flu. If you want any thing, you’ve got to bring it in from outside.’

‘And eat it in this ice-box?’ moaned Frost, giving the dead radiator a kick. ‘Sod that for a lark!’ Then a slow grin crawled across his face. Somewhere in the building there was a room with comfortable chairs, a carpet and a 3-kilowatt heater. He pulled the car expense sheet from his jacket pocket and licked the tip of a stubby pencil. ‘I’m taking orders for the all-night Chinky. Who wants curried chicken and chips?’

‘I don’t like this, Jack,’ said Wells. ‘If Mullett finds out.. ’

‘He’s not going to find out.’ retorted Frost, peeping inside a foil container. ‘Who ordered the sweet and sour?’

They were in the old log cabin, Mullett’s wood veneer-lined office, Gilmore, Burton, Wells, and the four members of the murder enquiry team, the heater going full pelt, the room hot and steamy and reeking of Chinese food. The top of the satin mahogany desk was littered with foil containers and soft drink cans. Frost, in Mullett’s chair, smoking one of Mullett’s special cigarettes, was sorting out the food orders. ‘Who wanted pancake rolls?’

Gilmore stood near the door, hovering nervously, his eye on the corridor, expecting any moment to see an irate Divisional Commander bursting through the swing doors.

‘Come on, Gilmore,’ called Frost. ‘The chop suey’s yours.’

Gilmore smiled uneasily and sat himself where he could still see down the corridor. He shuddered to think what discovery would do for his promotion chances.

‘All we want is a disco and a few birds,’ said Frost, spilling sweet and sour sauce on the carpet, ‘and this job would be just about tolerable.’ He swung round to Burton who was demolishing a double portion of sweet and sour lobster balls. ‘Mrs Ryder died in hospital. Any news from Forensic on that knife the killer dropped?’

Burton swallowed hard. ‘Nothing that helps much, Inspector. Their report’s on your desk.’

‘You know I don’t read reports,’ said Frost, dipping a chip in his curry sauce. ‘What did it say?’

‘An ordinary cheap kitchen knife of a standard pattern. No fingerprints, but traces of blood type 0.’

Frost sniffed disdainfully. ‘That’s a coincidence — the victim was type 0.’ He peered suspiciously into his foil dish. ‘This looks like stomach contents.’ He sniffed. ‘Smells like it, too.’

‘Oh God, Jack,’ shuddered Wells, pushing his food away from him.

Frost addressed the murder enquiry team. ‘Any joy from the neighbours?’

‘Most of them are in bed,’ Burton told him. ‘We’re going to have to go back first thing in the morning to catch the rest before they set off for work. Those we’ve spoken to hardly knew the old girl. She stayed in most of the time. No-one seemed aware of the string.’

‘And no-one saw anyone suspicious hanging about,’ added Jordan.

‘Suspicious?’ said Frost, pulling a piece of gristle from his mouth and flinging it in the vague vicinity of Mullett’s wastepaper bin. ‘This bastard isn’t going to mooch about looking suspicious. He won’t have a stocking mask on and a bleeding great knife poking out of his pocket. He’s going to be inconspicuous. I want to know about everyone who’s been seen going up and down the street — and that applies to the other two victims as well. I don’t care if it’s the road sweeper, the postman, doorstep piddlers or even a bleedin’ dog — I want to know. People, vans, cars, the lot. We can then start comparing — see if anyone’s been seen in all three streets.’

‘The computer…’ began Gilmore.

‘The computer’s a waste of time,’ cut in Frost. ‘I’m only going along with it to keep Hornrim Harry quiet. The only way to solve these cases is by good, solid detective work. By beating the hell out of some poor sod until he signs a fake confession.’

Gilmore faked a smile. ‘It will be quicker with the computer, I promise you.’

‘All right,’ said Frost. ‘I’ll leave it to you.’

‘What about a search team for the murder weapon?’ asked Burton, wiping his mouth. ‘He could well have chucked it.’

‘Put a couple of men on it, but don’t waste too much time. My gut feeling is that the bastard has kept it — ready for next time.’

The room went quiet. ‘Next time?’ said Wells.

‘Yes, Bill.’ He pushed the empty container away and fished out his cigarettes. ‘I’ve got a nasty feeling in my water that he’s going to kill again.’

Mullett’s phone rang. A collective gasp and all eating stopped in mid-chew.

‘It’s all right,’ assured Wells, ‘I had the main phone switched through here.’

Frost picked it up. ‘Mullett’s Dining Rooms,’ he said.

Wells’ eyes bulged with alarm until he realized the inspector had his hand over the mouthpiece.

The caller was a technician from Forensic reporting that he had extensively examined all the items removed from 46 Mannington Crescent, Denton and found nothing that would link them with the murder of Mrs Mary Haynes. As Frost listened he raised his eyes to the ceiling in despair. ‘Sod clearing the innocent — what about nailing the guilty for a change? I asked you to drop that and check on those two newspapers as a matter of priority. No, I don’t know who I spoke to. All right, all right.’ He banged the phone back on its rest. ‘He never got the message. Flaming Forensic. They’re about as bloody efficient as we are. They can’t start on the newspaper until tomorrow.’

‘Well, it is two o’clock in the morning,’ Wells reminded him.

‘Then I’m bloody going home,’ said Frost, not bothering to cover up a yawn. ‘I’ve had enough for today. The rest of you, go home too. Grab some sleep and be back here by six. You can pinch some men from the next shift and start knocking on doors before people go off to work.’

‘But Mr Mullett’s rota…’ began Wells.

‘Sod Mr Mullett’s rota. See you in the morning.’

He looked in his office on the way out. His in-tray was overflowing. He tugged the top paper from his tray. It was PC Collier’s report on the dead body outside the refuse tip. He had almost forgotten about it. Natural causes — heart attack. Well, that was a relief. Clipped to the report was the SOC’s photograph of the dead man in situ, sharp, clear and full of graphic detail. He showed it to Gilmore.

‘I shall dream about that damn face tonight,’ moaned Gilmore as they walked out to the car.

‘I hope I don’t,’ said Frost. ‘I want to dream of Mrs Compton.’

He did dream of Jill Compton. But she was eyeless and screaming and crawling with bloody-snouted rats. He woke up just before five in a cold sweat and couldn’t. get back to sleep again.