The Murder Map

by Danny Miller

  ‘Well, bollocks to all that! The marriage-guidance counselling service is over. I’m on my way.’

  Frost put the receiver down. There was a tug at his elbow. It was a doe-eyed, near-tears and very contrite-looking Katy.

  ‘We’re ever so sorry, Inspector, for everything, absolutely everything. Would you like a cup of tea?’

  The doorbell rang; through the glass it was easy to see who it was. Frost smiled. They were good kids, young, having fun, and not about to be nicked for possession. ‘No thank you, Katy, we’ll leave you to your pizza.’

  Saturday (4)

  Clarke answered the front door. Frost said nothing as he stepped into the clean sweep of the hallway, with its blond wood floor, the reeds in tall glass vases, some Miró prints on the walls. A world away from the shared cosy clutter of the three girls he’d left munching on pizza. The house’s clean minimal design and order no longer spoke of an architect’s tasteful aesthetics, but of coldness, lies, deceit and a concealment of emotional chaos that went straight to the very heart of the home.

  Clarke led the way into the living room, and there they were, on the chrome-framed black leather sofa, holding hands and looking up at him expectantly, like a couple of contestants on the daytime quiz show Mr & Mrs, but utterly clueless about each other, and definitely not about to win the jackpot prize.

  ‘Any news, Inspector Frost?’ asked Richard Hanson.

  Frost considered them. ‘I’d like a word with you, in private.’

  The Hansons turned to each other in round-eyed bemusement, then back at Frost, like it was the strangest request in the world. Frost glared as if to convey his impatience. Richard read the look perfectly, disentangled his hand from his wife’s and got to his feet.

  Hanson led the detective through to the kitchen, which was sufficiently far away to allow for some frank discourse. There was a breakfast island with six stools gathered around it, and what wasn’t a sparkly grey granite surface was a brushed-steel one. Hanson headed to the shiny-looking Italian coffee machine – no Mellow Bird’s for this couple.

  ‘Would you like some coffee, Inspector?’

  ‘Louisa Hamilton.’

  He stopped fiddling with the Gaggia, and looked around at the detective. ‘How do you know …?’ He leaned heavily against the granite work surface. ‘I guess it doesn’t matter … Just doing your job.’

  ‘And you’re not helping.’

  ‘No. Louisa worked for me, it was only ever a temporary position, but I think she thought it was more …’

  As Hanson tailed off, Frost assumed the architect realized just how bad that sounded. ‘So you fired her?’

  ‘After three months. Of course, I shouldn’t have got involved with her.’

  ‘She was young, vulnerable – her first job out of poly, I believe.’

  ‘Yes … but she was twenty-one, not a complete child. And I didn’t realize how immature she was. But thanks.’

  ‘For what?’

  ‘For not saying anything in front of Gail.’

  ‘Expediency, not empathy. I don’t care about saving your marriage, just getting your kid back as quickly as possible, and I haven’t got time to sit through you and your wife tearing strips off each other. Though I have to say, it goes a fair way to explain your magnanimity at her indiscretions. I think Louisa Hamilton is just the tip of the iceberg with you, right, Dick?’

  Hanson looked like he wanted to address this slight, but stayed quiet.

  Frost continued. ‘And I’ll be taking the names and addresses of all of them, just in case there’s any wronged woman with a score to settle.’

  ‘Please, I’m not that bad, it’s just—’

  ‘Let’s start with Louisa Hamilton first, shall we? You think she’s capable of something like this?’

  ‘Taking Ruby?’

  Frost glared.

  ‘God, no.’

  ‘You’re lying.’

  ‘I’m not … I swear. I wouldn’t, not now.’

  ‘But you’re not certain, though, are you – how could you be?’

  Hanson shook his head.

  ‘Let me tell you what I think, and certainly the way it would look in a court of law. You didn’t want us involved when you got the doll’s head. You were annoyed with your wife when she contacted us, because you wanted to handle it yourself. Because you probably suspected that it was from Louisa, and even if she doesn’t have Ruby, she’s playing on it. She wants to hurt you, she wants money off you, a pay-off for the way you treated her, and now’s the time to get it because you’re vulnerable – right?’

  The architect staggered over to the breakfast island and propped himself on one of the stools. ‘I panicked. I don’t know. To be honest, she’s crazy enough to do something like this. She knew Ruby had that doll because she was the one who bought it. It was Ruby’s birthday, I wasn’t going to leave it all to Gail, thought I’d get her a surprise.’

  ‘Make yourself look good in front of the wife, I get it.’

  Hanson gulped hard, the irony of it wasn’t lost on him. ‘I didn’t know what to get her, Louisa said she knew exactly. She bought the Cabbage Patch Kid. Ruby loved it. Of course, I reimbursed her.’

  ‘Like the efficient secretary remembering the wife’s birthday and the perfume she likes?’

  ‘Yes, I guess so. It’s all turning into pretty cliché, grubby stuff, isn’t it, Inspector?’

  It was. But Frost didn’t comment. ‘Louisa also bought herself a Little Miss Lucy doll, right?’

  ‘That’s right, she did. Seemed a bit strange. I was going to offer to pay for it, but somehow that seemed stranger.’

  Frost couldn’t argue with that. ‘Were you in love with her?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Did you give her the impression that you were?’

  ‘She was young, it was a mistake. I’ve admitted that. It wasn’t tit-for-tat, but this did happen after Gail’s affair.’

  ‘You bought her presents, though. Those shoes. Comme des Garçons?’

  Hanson shrugged, looked confused. ‘Yes, yes I did. How do you know?’

  ‘She left them at the house she was renting a room in.’

  ‘I was in Japan, on business, doing some freelance work for my old firm, I picked up some samples. I thought she might like them, obviously not.’

  ‘Have you tried to contact her since Ruby was taken?’

  He nodded. ‘She’s not at her old place, as you know. I don’t know where she is. The more I think about it, the less I know about her. The job was paid cash in hand. I put a note in the Denton Echo, junior secretary wanted. She turned up …’

  Frost raised his hand for Hanson to stop talking. His eye was taken by something on the American-style fridge. Farmyard-animal fridge magnets held in place some photos. He went over to take a closer look.

  ‘You know Sally Fielding?’

  Hanson shook his head, then joined Frost over at the fridge. It was a photo of six mothers with their respective daughters, all dressed in netball kit.

  ‘The school has a parents and pupils netball event once a month. Gail enjoys it.’

  Frost pointed to Sally Fielding and her daughter.

  Richard Hanson shrugged. ‘Yes, I may have seen her about, but I don’t know her.’

  ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘What are you suggesting? I’m not that bad, I promise. After what happened last time at Ruby’s old school in Rimmington between Gail and that little wimp Bucknell, I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize Ruby’s happiness …’ Richard let out a strained sigh, turned his back on the fridge and slumped down on one of the stools, like the full weight of his actions had just hit him. He asked tearfully, ‘So tell me, Inspector, what the hell happens next?’

  Frost exited the kitchen without answering.

  Sunday (1)

  Dogs. Man’s best friend. He liked them well enough, in theory. The idea of them. Their loyalty, their reliability, their guilelessness. If you had a dog you had a routine. And Charles Wilkes ha
d a dog. And if Banes couldn’t get him today, he’d get him tomorrow.

  But Clive knew that time was becoming of the essence, he knew he’d have to move on soon. As invisible as he was, as anonymous as he was, the police would close in eventually. He’d budgeted for a couple of weeks. From the first blow to the last. So he still had time. There was no forensic trace to nab him, no prints, he’d made sure of that. He always cleaned up after himself, every teacup, every beer can, every surface was memorized, accounted for. Shoe prints on the sticky blood-drenched caravan floor? No chance, not him.

  And there was no description of him, either. A name might come up soon, but it would be just that, a name, and not the right one. But then again, he’d had so many, it was hard to remember what the right one was. As a foundling, he was given a name. Then, as a foster child, another name. And when that one didn’t work out, he was given another, and so it went on until no one would take him any more. No one would give him their name.

  But he didn’t care, names meant nothing to him now. You could go to a cemetery in any city or town and find a name on a gravestone of someone who was roughly around your age, and starting from something small – a membership of a club, say the Airfix modellers’ club, or a subscription to an innocuous magazine paid for with a postal order – you could start a whole new identity. People didn’t care, no one checked, as long as they got their money. Before you knew it, you had enough paper proof to get a utility bill, a bank account, a chequebook, a driving licence, a passport. You just had to be patient, watch the detail and be consistent. He had a knack for detail because that’s where the devil was. And he also knew that when it came—

  Ah, there he was. Banes stopped thinking about how good he was at not existing, and concentrated on the victim at hand. Charles Wilkes stepped out of his cottage, his springy little Jack Russell energetically trotting off in front of him, straining at the leash to cock its leg somewhere. Once that was done, they headed off in the direction of the fields, and beyond that, the river. It would be a nice long early-morning walk. Man and his best friend. It would be their last.

  ‘How’s the back, Jack?’

  ‘You being funny, Johnny?’

  Desk Sergeant Johnny Johnson thought about it, then laughed. It was more a laugh of relief. ‘After you getting me back at work, perish the thought. In all seriousness, though, was it a deep hole, the one you fell into?’

  ‘Not as deep as the one you’re digging for yourself.’

  Frost had just entered Eagle Lane, and he was patting himself down for a cigarette and coming up blank. Johnson was a complete waste of space, didn’t smoke. Still, the copy of Viz he’d just swiped off his counter held the DI’s attention for a bit.

  ‘You twist my words, guv, but I do have to admit I’ve missed our banter. That’ll teach me to fraternize with the likes of Jimmy McVale. Don’t know what I was thinking, it all happened so fast. One minute I’m standing there, next minute McVale’s put the book in my hand and Sandy Lane’s taking pictures.’

  ‘I saw what happened.’

  ‘He’s an arch manipulator, that McVale.’

  Frost dropped the Viz back on the counter and headed for the swing doors to the incident room … then stopped as a thought struck him. ‘Tell me, did you actually read McVale’s book?’

  ‘I did. And I have to say …’ Desk Sergeant Johnson did an archly comical glance from side to side, keeping an eye out for Mullett, Frost supposed. ‘… It was absolutely riveting.’

  ‘What was his MO? I remember hearing McVale and his mob developed a technique for kidnapping.’

  ‘That’s right. They did it first in ’63. They’d kidnap the bank manager when he left his house on his way to work. They’d drive him to a secure location and tell him that they had his wife and kids too. Then two of the men, armed with walkie-talkies, waited until they got the word, then strolled into the bank just as the bank manager was telephoning through to his assistant to say he was being kept hostage, and to do as they said or they’d harm him and his family. That way they’d get into the high-value vault, not just the cash tills.’

  Frost made a low growly sound in his throat as he considered the audacity of the technique. ‘It’s a cunning stunt, Johnny. Adds another emotional angle to the fear. More than just having a sawn-off pointed at your head.’

  ‘Worked every time, according to McVale. There were variations on the theme. They’d find out where the bank manager lived, force their way in, then hold the family hostage, and in the morning make the bank manager go to work as usual. Then two of the gang would walk in, and the bank manager would—’

  ‘Would lead them down to the prize. Thanks, Johnny!’

  Invigorated, Frost burst through the door into the incident room like one of Jimmy McVale’s robbers bursting into a bank. He was met by Sue Clarke, notebook in hand, looking equally invigorated as she said, ‘Just got off the phone from a DS Raines at the Met. They found Jamie Bucknell, in a drying-out cell in Streatham. At the time of the abduction, Bucknell was downing his sorrows in pubs all over south-west London and telling anyone who would listen that he was going to join the French Foreign Legion. Eventually, he got thrown out of a boozer at 5 p.m., then arrested at 5.45 p.m. for kicking over traffic cones and assaulting an officer with a kebab, then attempting to take his own life by throwing himself from a police car.’

  ‘Typical night out in Streatham, I’d imagine. Any news on Louisa Hamilton?’

  ‘I visited her mum who lives in Bamford first thing this morning. Last she heard, Louisa was staying with mates in Bristol, where she went to poly. Mum doesn’t have an address or number, but she’s worried about her, said she sounded upset last time she rang.’

  ‘Right. We need to find her. Let’s get a picture of her out there in the world, get on to Bristol CID, get back to her mum, get names of all her friends, call her old poly, the usual.’

  Clarke nodded and went off to do ‘the usual’. Frost looked around him, at the faces of his team, ears to phones, flipping through lists, ogling the green text coming up on their IBMs. Hard at it, yet looking despondent as the hours slipped away. He also knew that he’d have to release Gordon ‘Degsy’ Dellinpile soon. Releasing suspects never looked good in the press. It suggested wrong turns, mistakes, that somehow the case was getting away from you.

  Frost saw the pack of 555 cigarettes on Arthur Hanlon’s desk and plucked one out of the box without the burly DC seeing him, wrapped up as he was in trying to work out some simple equation. In for a penny, he then took another fag for ‘Ron’ and slipped it behind his ear.

  ‘You’re nicked!’

  Frost spun around to see John Waters approaching. The DS mouthed the word Longthorn and handed Frost a Manila file. Frost took it and headed off to his office, before Hanlon, who was now counting the cigarettes in his packet, could say anything. Waters followed him.

  Frost closed the door behind them and sat down, back again pressed against the radiator for pain relief. He opened the file; inside was a list of about forty names.

  Waters explained, ‘That’s all the recent employees of Longthorn Secure Hospital, the last six months. Here’s the funny thing: because it’s not actually deemed a prison, they don’t keep as tight a record of employees coming and going. And photo ID is pretty sketchy, too – when they leave they’re supposed to turn in their passes, but half of them don’t. They have lots of agency temp workers, cleaners, orderlies, and none of them stay too long. Even the psychiatric nurses tend not to stay the full term of their contract. Apparently, the place has a bad rep.’

  ‘Yeah, when I spoke to Edmunds, he said that when he took over it was a dangerous place, for both patients and staff.’

  The phone rang. Waters and Frost both looked around, trying to locate where the ringing was coming from, and where the actual phone was. Waters looked flummoxed, and left the office muttering something about not knowing how he could live like that.

  Frost followed the cord from the socket in the wall, gripp
ing it like a mountain climber easing up the rope, careful not to pull too hard as the whole edifice of heaped paperwork on his desk would fall to the floor. Once he answered the phone, he recognized the voice on the other end straight away: it was DI Garside, his opposite number from West Norwood.

  ‘Got some more bad news for you, Jack.’

  Frost let out a dispirited sigh, then nestled the receiver into his neck and sparked up the 555. ‘That’s our stock in trade around here.’

  ‘Suffolk police have been on the blower. They think they’ve got something that links in further with the Wheatons’ murders. A rambler found a bus pass yesterday in woodland near Longthorn. It belonged to Peter Allerton, the missing canteen worker. It was found beside a pile of leaves that were soaked in blood. There were also bone fragments. Their path bloke identified them as skull fragments.’

  ‘Jeez. Sounds like the same as the Wheatons. Ball-peen hammer to the head. His weapon of choice. Perfectly legal to carry one, and perfectly lethal in the wrong hands. Looks like all roads lead to Longthorn. I’ve just had a list of ex-employees sent over.’

  ‘Employees? How about patients!’

  ‘Yeah, we discussed that. Maybe someone’s not locking the door at night.’ There was a pause down the line that turned into a deep silence, as Frost’s throwaway statement seemed to take on a terrifying possibility. ‘You know what, maybe that’s not such a mad idea. Maybe they do need to look into their security.’

  Garside agreed. ‘You want me to go up there and check on it?’

  Frost glanced at the map pinned up on the wall. Longthorn was quite a drive for either of them. ‘I’d appreciate it, Dave. As you can imagine, we’ve got our hands full here.’

  Frost hung up. But didn’t move, just sat there mulling the conversation over. The phone rang again. ‘DI Frost.’