A Killing Frost

by R D Wingfield

  Drysdale took temperature readings, which weren’t of much help. “She’s been dead some forty-eight hours or more, the same as the boy.” He stood up and held out his hands for his secretary to peel off his surgical gloves. “Get the bodies formally identified and I’ll do both autopsies at three. I’ve a very heavy schedule. It would be a welcome change if you were there on time.” He snapped his bag shut and, with a curt nod, padded after his secretary back to his car.

  Frost followed him out, then clambered up the embankment to the road, where Harding from Forensic was beckoning. Harding, who was taking photographs of a section of the fencing, pointed to a small particle of black plastic sheeting which had snagged and torn off on the rough woodwork of the fence rail. It was dead in line with the spot where the girl’s body had ended up.

  “That’s only been there for a couple of days, Inspector. I’ll lay odds the girl was dropped down from here. The body would have been wrapped in black plastic sheeting while it was transported, then lifted from the car or van, laid on the top of the rail, the sheeting pulled away and the body rolled down.”

  Frost chewed this over. “If we managed to find the plastic sheeting, would you be able to say for sure that it was the one used?”

  “Without a doubt,” said Harding.

  “And there was me thinking you were bloody useless,” grunted Frost. “There’s bits of gravel embedded in the boy’s hands. Take a sample. It might help us find where he fell.” He looked down at the lines of policemen searching painstakingly through the scrubland surrounding the bodies. “Waste of bleeding time,” he muttered, deciding he was of no further use here. He yelled down to Morgan, “Phone the morgue and get them to pick up the bodies. I’m off to the station.”

  “Skinner wants you,” called Sergeant Wells as Frost passed through the lobby. “He says it’s urgent.”

  “Right,” nodded Frost. He hoped Skinner would take over and attend Drysdale’s postmortem and would also volunteer to break the news to the kids’ parents about finding the bodies, but he wouldn’t be holding his breath. He was picking up his mac from the floor, after hurling it at the hook on the wall and missing, when the phone rang. It was Sandy Lane, the chief crime reporter from the Denton Echo.

  “I understand you’ve found Debbie Clark’s body.”

  He obviously hadn’t heard about the boy. Good. “We’ve found a body,” replied Frost warily, “but it hasn’t been identified yet.”

  “Is it Debbie Clark?”

  “It hasn’t been identified yet,” repeated Frost.

  “Cause of death?”

  “That will be determined when the postmortem is carried out.”

  “You’re not giving much away,” moaned Sandy.

  “The Denton Echo didn’t give much away last Christmas,” Frost reminded him. “A lousy Christmas card and a bleeding ballpoint pen that didn’t work. So who got my whisky?”

  “Times are hard, Jack. Our budget was slashed.”

  “Talking of slashes, I’ve got to do one, so if you’ll excuse me.” He banged down the phone and scratched a match on the desk to light up a cigarette. As he took a drag, Skinner crashed in.

  “You were told I wanted to see you urgently.”

  “I’ve only just got in. I haven’t even done a wee yet.”

  Skinner jerked his head for Frost to follow him back to his office, then nodded at a chair. “You’ve found the bodies. Fill me in.”

  Frost sat down and gave him the details. “The postmortem is at three.”

  Skinner looked at his watch. “I won’t have time. I’ve got to get back to my old division to clear up some loose ends that the prats there don’t seem able to handle. You go—and take that useless WPC tart. I won’t have time to break the news to the families, so do that as well—and get the bodies identified.”

  “Right,” said Frost, getting up out of the chair. “As long as you don’t think I’m creaming off all the plum jobs.”

  Skinner ignored this. “I’ve had all the newspaper boys on the phone so we’ll have to give them an official briefing. Arrange a press conference for six o’clock.”

  “You want me to do it?”

  “No I bloody don’t. This is my case, sunshine, not yours.”

  It’s your bleeding case when you’re in the spotlight, thought Frost, not when it comes to attending bloody postmortems and telling people their kids are dead.

  “I’ll be back in good time, so you can update me on the postmortem results. You’re just doing a watching brief.”

  “I like watching briefs,” said Frost, “especially on half-naked women.”

  “You think you’re so bloody funny, don’t you?” snarled Skinner.

  “I’m my greatest fan,” said Frost.

  As he closed the door behind him, Frost paused. Identification of the bodies. Shit. Who the hell should he get for the girl? The mother was in no fit state and the father was banged up on paedophile charges. Sod it. It would have to be the father. Well, no point in delaying telling him his daughter was dead. But even though there was no point in delaying, he lit up another cigarette and sucked hard on it, before summoning up the resolve to break the news.

  The cigarette dangling from his mouth, he looked into the Incident Room where Harry Edwards, the computer man, was printing out the downloaded photographs of child pornography recovered from the various houses of the prisoners. He looked up as Frost came in and shook his head in disgust. “I don’t know how much more of this I can take, Inspector. I’ve got kids of my own.”

  Frost nodded sympathetically and idly picked up one of the printouts. It showed a young girl of around four or five, wearing only a vest, seated on a chair with her legs parted.

  “How can anyone get a kick out of looking at an innocent kid like that?” asked Edwards bitterly.

  Frost nodded. He was about to toss the photograph back on the pile when, he paused and looked closer. Behind the child was a window with nursery-rhyme curtains. The curtains were open and the garden outside could be seen clearly. He had looked through that same window on to that same garden only two days ago. The nursery was now Debbie Clark’s room. The four-year-old was her.

  “They’ve all got one of those photos on their laptops,” said Edwards, noticing Frost’s interest.

  The bastard! seethed Frost to himself. Drooling over his own four-year-old daughter with the rest of those dirty sods. “I’ll borrow this,” he said, stuffing it into his pocket.

  Clark, who had been sitting hunched up on his bunk, jumped up angrily as Frost came into the cell. “When am I going to be let out of here?” he demanded.

  “Depends on whether the magistrate grants you bail,” Frost told him, his hand closing on the photograph in his pocket. Not perhaps the time to bring it out. “I’m afraid I’ve got some very bad news for you, Mr. Clark.”

  “Bad news?” shouted Clark, still angry. “I . . .” He stopped and the colour seeped from his face. “You mean . . . ?” He forced himself to say it. “Debbie?”

  Frost nodded. He’d lost count of the number of times he had had to break news like this, but it never got any easier. “We’ve found a body.”

  Clark just stared, his mouth gaping open, then he began to shake his head vigorously. “No . . . no . . . Please . . . no . . .”

  “We’re pretty certain it’s Debbie, I’m afraid, but we need formal identification. Do you feel up to it?”

  Clark collapsed on to the bunk, covering his face with his hands, his shoulders shaking. “This will kill my wife.”

  “Would you break the news to her?” asked Frost hopefully. Please, he silently pleaded. It was an ordeal he didn’t want to have to go through.

  Clark’s head shake was emphatic. “She hates me. She’ll blame me . . . I couldn’t . . .”

  Shit! thought Frost. That bastard Skinner . . .

  Clark raised a tear-stained face. “How did she die?”

  Again Frost’s hand touched the print in his pocket. Were these crocodile tears? Did y
ou get the other dirty bastards to give you an alibi for the night she went missing? Did you kill your own daughter for fear she would tell people what you had been doing to her, and then the boy to keep his mouth shut? “We believe she was strangled. There will be a postmortem.” He didn’t want to disclose any other details at this stage. There was always a chance that Clark might blurt out something he shouldn’t know about. Frost wound his scarf around his neck. “So if you’re ready, Mr. Clark . . . ?”

  He went to the cell door and yelled for Bill Wells to let them out.

  The mortuary attendant, with skill born of much practice, surreptitiously parked his chewing gum under the desktop and slid his dog-eared copy of Playboy under some papers before opening the door to Frost and Clark.

  They followed him through to the refrigerated section. He pulled open a newly labelled drawer, folded back the covering sheet and stepped respectfully back.

  Clark steeled himself to look. He stared, bit his lip and shuddered, then nodded.

  “Debbie?” whispered Frost.

  Again Clark nodded. “Yes.” He moved his hands to caress the face.

  “Don’t touch her,” yelled Frost, making the father start and jerk back. If this bastard had indeed killed his daughter, he didn’t want evidence on the body to be jeopardised because Clark had mauled her. “Don’t touch her,” repeated Frost, more gently, but more firmly.

  “I can’t touch my own daughter?”

  “Not at this stage,” said Frost, pulling him back and nodding for the attendant to close the drawer. He shivered at the burst of refrigerated air that was expelled as the drawer slid home.

  Clark straightened up and shook Frost’s hand off. “Who did this? Who did this to my little girl?”

  Frost stared back at him, hoping to see some vestige of guilt, but Clark wouldn’t meet his gaze. “We’ll get the bastard who did this, Mr. Clark,” said Frost emphatically. “I promise you. We’ll get the bastard, whoever he may be.” The print in his mac pocket crackled. What should be his next Skinner-donated treat—to confront Clark with the photograph or break the news to the girl’s mother? Breaking the news to the mother would be the greater hell, so he decided to get the worst over first.

  Frost had taken Clark back to his cell and had been sitting outside the house for nearly half an hour, smoking cigarette after cigarette, trying to pluck up the courage to walk up that drive and knock on the door. “I’m terribly sorry, Mrs. Clark . . . I’m terribly sorry, Mrs. Clark . . .” He kept muttering the words to himself as if repetition would make them come out any easier. He had brought WPC Kate Holby with him, but was not setting her a good example. She sensed his anxiety and sat in the seat next to him, saying nothing. “You never bloody get used to it,” said Frost. “Sod it. It has to be done, so let’s sodding well do it.” He snatched the cigarette from his mouth, crushed it and stepped out of the car. “Here we go then. Over the bleeding top.”

  It was even worse than he had feared. She screamed, she cried, she became hysterical, pounding him with her fists. Then she insisted on being taken to the mortuary to see the body, and when she saw it, her grief was uncontrollable and her body-racking sobs and screams echoed round the empty building. Enough to wake the bleeding dead, thought Frost. He could see that Kate Holby was even more shattered than he was and wished he hadn’t asked her to accompany him, but the poor cow had to get used to the joys of policing in case she thought it was all bleeding fun and games. He tried to catch her eye, then decided a reassuring smile would be out of place. He felt so shattered, he wanted to get outside, away from the piercing screams that were drilling holes through his skull.

  Mrs. Clark’s tears were now splashing down on the cold, white face of her daughter. Frost decided enough was enough. He put his arm around her and drew her back, motioning for the mortuary attendant to cover the face and close the drawer. “Come on, love,” he soothed. “Let’s get you home.”

  Angrily she shook his arm away. “He killed her. That perverted bastard of a husband of mine killed her . . . his own daughter . . .”

  “If he did, we’ll get him,” said Frost.

  “If?” she screamed. “What do you mean, if? Of course he did it. He lusted after her. He took photographs . . .”

  They managed to get her back to the car, where she resisted all the efforts of the WPC to comfort her. “I’ll kill him,” she kept muttering. “If he comes near me, I’ll kill him, so help me . . .”

  They dropped her back home. She didn’t want anyone with her. Her hands were shaking so much she couldn’t get the key in the door. Frost took it from her and turned it in the lock. She barged past him, slamming the door shut on them without a word. He could still hear her screams and sobs as he walked back to the car. He slid into the passenger seat and told Kate to drive to the boy’s parents’ home. God, this was a sod of a day.

  Drained and washed out, Frost staggered back to his office with a ham roll and a mug of tea from the canteen. Sandy Lane was in the visitors’ chair, waiting for him, he pointed to two bottles of whisky on the desk. “Merry last Christmas,” he said.

  “If I had any strength of character, I’d refuse them,” said Frost, picking one up and surveying the label. “I’ll hide them away before anyone sees how cheaply I can be bought.” He pulled open a drawer and dropped them in. “So what do you want to know?”

  “Was it the missing girl—Debbie Clark?”

  Frost nodded.

  “Cause of death?”

  “Some bastard raped her, flogged her and strangled her, but that’s off the record until the postmortem. You can say we’re treating this as a murder inquiry.”

  “And the boy?”

  “Skull caved in, but that’s not official until after the PM.”

  “I’m told you’ve arrested Debbie’s father.”

  “On an entirely different matter, Sandy. Keep him out of it.”

  “Are you going to charge him with possession of obscene photographs?”

  “You’ve had all that two bottles of cheap whisky can buy. Be satisfied.”

  “When will you be making the official press statement?”

  “Skinner’s doing that. It’s laid on for six o’clock tonight, I think. Now clear off.”

  Sandy rose from the chair. “For those few meagre crumbs, my half-hearted thanks. Enjoy the whisky.”

  “Whisky? What whisky?” asked Frost innocently, kneeing the drawer shut. As he took a bite of his ham roll, the phone rang. It was Mullett.

  “I understand we’ve found two bodies, Frost—the boy and the girl.”

  “That’s right, Super.”

  “Still no trace of the other girl?”

  “Not a trace.”

  “Right. I understand you’ve arranged a press conference for six o’clock tonight. I don’t want you there. I’ll be dealing with that.” There was no way he was going to let slummocky Frost appear on the nation’s TV screens, with his scruffy mac and cigarette drooping from his lips, as a representative of Denton division.

  Mullett clearly didn’t know that Skinner intended doing the conference. Frost decided not to tell him. “Right you are, Super.”

  “Put all the details on my desk and ask my secretary to get my best uniform from the dry-cleaner’s.”

  No sooner had Frost banged the phone down than it rang again. This time it was Bill Wells.

  “Drysdale’s screaming blue murder down at the morgue, Jack. He seems to think you ought to be there.”

  Frost looked at his watch and groaned. Ten past flaming three. Shit. “Tell him I’m on my way.”

  There was a tap at the door and an agitated WPC Holby looked in. “We’re going to be late for the autopsies, Inspector.”

  Frost grimaced. He had forgotten that Skinner had ordered her to attend. “Look, love, I know what Skinner said, but—”

  She cut him short. “I don’t want to be molly coddled. If it’s part of the job, then I’ve got to do it.”

  “All right, then,” sighed Frost.
“But if at any time you feel you want to walk out, do it—you won’t be the first, or the last.”

  “I won’t walk out,” she said. “I won’t give him the satisfaction.”

  “What’s he got against you?” asked Frost.

  She hesitated. “My father was in the same division as DCI Skinner when they were both inspectors. He wanted my father to lie in court about some evidence supposed to have been found in a suspect’s house. My father refused and the suspect got off. Skinner never forgets a grudge. Getting at me is his way of getting his own back on my father.”

  “The man’s a bastard,” said Frost. “The trouble is, he’s a bastard who’s a chief inspector and you’re only a probationer constable. He’s got the edge. He could tell lies about you and he’d be believed, you could tell the truth about him and you wouldn’t be.” God, he wished he wasn’t going to be kicked out of Denton. He’d like to be able to stay and keep an eye on the girl, if only to spite Skinner. He had to find some way to foil the bastard. “Look—why not apply for a transfer? Come with me to Lexton.”

  She shook her head defiantly. “There’s no way I’m going to run away from him. He would consider that a victory.”

  “It sometimes pays to run away, and come back and fight when the odds are better.” But he was wasting his breath. She was as stubborn as he was. He would never run away, even if it was the most sensible thing to do—sensible things to do weren’t his style.

  “I’m staying,” she said.

  “Good for you, girl,” said Frost. Bloody hell, if a flaming nineteen-year-old kid could do it . . . “If I can find a way to do the bastard down, I’m staying as well.”

  11

  Drysdale’s frigid glare lowered the chill factor of the autopsy room by several degrees as Frost and WPC Holby entered. “It would be an agreeable surprise if you were on time for once, Inspector.”

  “I hate giving people surprises, Doc,” said Frost, pulling on the obligatory green gown. He rubbed his forehead. The cold of the room was making his scar ache.