Night Frost

by R D Wingfield

  Again the shop bell quivered and rung and an old woman shuffled in. ‘We’re closed,’ said Frost, taking her by the arm and steering her out into the street. He reversed the Open/Closed sign and rammed home the bolts.

  ‘Tell me about the day she went missing.’

  ‘I’ve already told all this to the other detective . . . the ferret-faced bloke. An absolutely normal day. She left as usual to go on her round and that was the last I saw of her.’

  ‘Had she complained about men molesting her . . . or following her?’ asked Gilmore.

  ‘Not to me, she didn’t. She hardly spoke a bloody word to me.’

  Frost ambled over to the counter and glanced at the paper Rickman had been reading. He studied the naked Page Three girl, his cigarette drooping dispassionately. ‘How was young Paula set up? Well stacked, was she?’

  ‘No different to most of the other girls. They mature so bloody quickly these days . . . see them at fifteen you think they’re twenty. Mind you, Paula didn’t flaunt it. She used to wear loose woolly cardigans and things like that.’

  ‘Did she go out with any of the newspaper boys?’

  ‘No. Between you and me, I don’t reckon she’d ever been with a boy or knew anything about sex.’

  Frost raised his eyebrows. ‘Why do you say that?’

  ‘Something that happened three months ago. I’m in the shop sorting out the papers for the rounds. Only two of the kids were in, Diana Massey and Jimmy Richards.’

  ‘Who are they?’ asked Frost.

  ‘They were both in Paula’s class at school – both just turned fifteen. Anyway, I’m sorting out the papers when I realize they’ve both gone missing. Well, not that I mistrust anyone, but I keep the day’s takings in that other back room there until I can get to the bank, so I sticks my head round the door and what do you think I saw?’

  ‘Tell me,’ said Frost.

  ‘Diana’s on the floor, jeans round her ankles, he’s on top of her, jeans ditto and they’re having it away on a stack of Radio Times. Fifteen flaming years old. Didn’t even stop when I yelled at them.’

  ‘I don’t think I would, either,’ observed Frost.

  ‘Anyway, I hears a gasp behind me. I turned around and there was Paula Bartlett. She was staring at them horrified. She dropped her papers and just ran out of the shop. It was obvious to me she didn’t know what the hell they were up to. Innocent, that’s what she was.’

  ‘If our plumber lets us down, we’d better check out this Jimmy Richards,’ said Frost. ‘He might have acquired a taste for innocent newspaper girls.’

  While Gilmore was noting down the address, an area car drew up outside and two uniformed officers rattled the door handle. Frost let them in. ‘Stack of pornographic gear in the back,’ he told them. ‘Take it and our friend here down to the station and charge him under the Obscene Publications Act.’

  Back to the car. Gilmore slammed the door, hoping this would wake up Burton who didn’t deserve to sleep after causing all this trouble, but to no avail. He was fastening his seat belt when the damn radio called for the inspector. Frost reached for the handset as Gilmore slumped back wearily, waiting for the worst.

  ‘Can you do a quick job for me, Inspector?’ asked Sergeant Wells.

  ‘No,’ replied Frost. ‘Gilmore’s got to get home. He’s left his wife on the boil.’

  ‘It’s on your way, Jack. Probably a false alarm. Number 46 Mannington Crescent. A pensioner, Mrs Mary Haynes. She lives there on her own, but yesterday’s milk is still on the doorstep and her cat’s miaowing like mad inside. The milkman’s phoned us. He thinks something might have happened to her. Take a look, would you?’

  ‘This is uniform branch stuff,’ snapped Gilmore.

  ‘The only spare car is loaded down with your filthy books,’ Wells snapped back.

  Frost sighed. ‘OK, Bill. We’re on our way.’

  The houses in Mannington Crescent were just waking up. A milk float was outside number 46. They parked behind it and Frost shuffled over to the milkman and flapped his warrant card.

  Relieved at their arrival, the milkman blurted out the details. ‘Might be nothing in it, but she’s usually so regular. She’d never go away and leave her cat and it’s miaowing like hell in there and yesterday’s milk is on the step.’

  ‘Couldn’t she have run off with the lodger?’ yawned Frost, following the man to the doorstep.

  ‘She’s seventy-eight years old!’ said the milkman.

  ‘Well – hobbled off with the lodger, then?’

  ‘She hasn’t got a lodger,’ said the milkman.

  Frost yawned again. ‘Another brilliant theory shot up the arse.’ He moved to one side to let Gilmore tackle the door.

  Gilmore jammed his finger in the bell push.

  ‘The bell don’t work,’ said the milkman.

  Gilmore hammered at the knocker.

  ‘I’ve already tried that,’ said the milkman.

  Ignoring him, Gilmore hammered again. Silence. A look of smug triumph on the milkman’s face. ‘What did I tell you?’

  Across the road a fat woman in a shortie nightie called, ‘Milkie! You haven’t left me any milk.’ The milkman signalled he was coming over and she waddled back into her house, acres of fat bottom wobbling below the hem of her nightdress.

  Frost winced. ‘It must be my day for horrible sights. You’d better carry on with your round, Milkie. Thanks for phoning.’

  ‘What do you think?’ asked Gilmore, who was staring at the Cortina, where Burton, oblivious to all this, was still asleep on the back seat.

  Frost looked up and down the street, hoping to see the reassuring sight of a uniformed constable who would take the responsibility from him, but no such luck.

  The downstairs window was heavily curtained and held firmly closed by a security catch of some kind. Frost did his letter-box squinting routine, seeing only an empty passage with a pot plant drooping dejectedly on a side table. There was an open purse on the side table, a small bunch of keys alongside it. He straightened up wearily. It looked bad. The old dear certainly wouldn’t leave the house without her purse and her keys. ‘We’ll have to break in.’

  Gilmore picked up the bottle of milk from the step and used it to smash one of the coloured glass door panels. He put his hand through and turned the lock. They stepped inside.

  The first door they tried led to the kitchen. From a dark corner two green eyes flashed, then a plaintive mew. Frost took some milk from the fridge, slopped it into a saucer and watched the cat’s frantic lappings. He tried the back door, but it was firmly bolted on the inside. Gilmore looked in the other downstairs room, a musty-smelling, rarely used lounge.

  The cat finished the milk and waited expectantly, its tail swishing. Frost topped up the saucer. ‘Hundred to one she’s upstairs, son. Dead in bed. Nip up and take a look.’ As Gilmore’s footsteps thudded overhead, Frost found a tin opener on the draining board and opened a tin of Felix which he emptied on a plate for the cat.

  A sudden yell from Gilmore sent him running. ‘Inspector! Up here. Quick!’

  She was on the bed. She had been knifed repeatedly in the stomach and her throat was a gaping, open wound. The body was cold. Ice cold.

  ‘I know you’ve got no-one to send,’ Frost told a complaining Sergeant Wells, ‘but I want four of them.’ He pressed the handset against his chest so he couldn’t hear the sergeant insisting this was impossible. ‘I can’t manage with less than four. I need people knocking on doors before everyone leaves for work. Over and out.’ He clicked the switch, cutting off Wells in mid-moan and returned to the house.

  Gilmore was waiting for him in the bedroom, anxious to show him a mess of blood on the carpet, hidden behind the open door. A lot of blood. On the floor, a crumpled heap that was her best black coat. ‘He was hiding behind the door. He slashed her as she came in to hang up her coat, then dumped her on the bed.’

  Frost nodded glumly. Gilmore was probably right, but knowing where he killed her wasn�
�t going to help them catch the bastard. ‘Sod that bloody milkman,’ he said. ‘We could have been in bed and asleep by now.’

  Burton thudded up the stairs. He had been sent out to knock on doors. ‘Two things, Inspector. A woman across the road says the old lady visited Denton Cemetery every Sunday afternoon to put flowers on her husband’s grave. She saw her leave about three. The bloke next door – a Dean Reynold Hoskins – says the old lady knocked him up on Sunday afternoon just after five, all agitated. She reckoned someone had nicked her spare front door key which she kept hidden under the mat in the porch, but when Hoskins looked, there it was.’

  ‘Have you checked to see if it’s still there?’

  Burton nodded and held up a bagged key. ‘Hoskins called her a silly cow and went back to his own house. She kept ranting on about it not being in the same place she’d left it.’

  ‘The poor bitch was right,’ said Frost. ‘There’s no sign of forcible entry, all doors and windows are internally secured. The killer must have let himself in through the front door. He was already in the house.’

  Gilmore grunted begrudgingly. He couldn’t fault the inspector’s logic.

  ‘Right,’ continued Frost. ‘He got in after she went off to the graveyard at three. He wouldn’t have hung about after slicing her up, so we can assume he left fairly soon after five. Knock on more doors. People usually go deaf and blind when there’s been a crime but someone must have seen or heard something. And ask if it was general knowledge that she secretly kept a spare key under the mat.’

  ‘Right,’ said Burton, swaying slightly.

  The poor sod’s dead on his feet, thought Frost. ‘I’ve got some more men coming soon, Burton. You can go home when they arrive.’

  The detective constable shook his head. ‘I can hold on for a while, sir.’

  Stifling a yawn, Frost wished there was someone to tell him to go home. He wouldn’t refuse. He turned his attention to Gilmore who was waiting to speak.

  ‘I’ve checked her purse,’ Gilmore told him. ‘Empty except for a membership card for All Saints Church Senior Citizens’ Club and a hospital appointment card. Nothing else in the house appears to be disturbed or taken.’

  ‘A few quid,’ said Frost. ‘I can’t believe the bastard ripped her up for the few quid in her purse.’ He let his gaze wander around the bedroom, which smelt stalely of blood and lavender furniture polish. He lit a cigarette and added the smell of tobacco smoke. On the wall above the veneered walnut dressing table hung a framed black and white wedding photograph, the bride in white and the groom in morning dress amidst a snow shower of confetti. That same bride was now in funeral black, eyes wide open and staring up at the yellowing ceiling. Her dress and the bed-cover were rusted with gummy gouts of dried blood.

  ‘That must be her grave-visiting dress,’ muttered Frost. Something brushed against his legs. The cat. He leant down and scratched its neck, then put it outside. Crossing to the window he twitched aside the curtain and looked down on the empty street where black clouds kept the morning dark. His head was buzzing. So much to do and he didn’t really feel he was capable of handling it.

  An area car nosed into the street and stopped outside the house. PC Jordan and two disgruntled-looking detective constables who had thought their shift was over climbed out. A second car brought Roberts, the SOC officer, with his cameras and flash-guns, and hardly had this pulled up when a green Honda Accord brought the two men from Forensic. Gilmore led them all up to take turns to view the body before sending the constables to join Burton, knocking at doors.

  ‘Find out if anyone saw a blue van,’ bellowed Frost as they left.

  ‘You haven’t touched anything?’ asked one of the Forensic men.

  ‘I haven’t even touched my dick,’ said Frost, giving his well-worn, stock reply.

  The door knocker thudded. ‘The doctor’s here,’ called Gilmore, pushing Maltby up the stairs.

  ‘Bit of fresher meat for you this time, doc,’ said Frost as a bleary-eyed Maltby, his face flushed, squeezed between the Forensic men into the tiny bedroom.

  ‘I might have guessed it would be you again,’ growled Maltby, who seemed to be in a sour mood.

  ‘Three bodies in one shift,’ agreed Frost. ‘I’m beginning to suspect I’m on Candid Camera.’

  The doctor grunted and bent over the body. His examination was brief.

  ‘She’s dead.’

  ‘I worked that out myself,’ said Frost. ‘I offered her a fag and she wouldn’t reply. When did she die?’

  Maltby took a pad from his bag and scribbled something down. ‘You’ve sent for the pathologist, I understand?’

  ‘That’s right, doc.’

  ‘Then let him answer your questions. He gets paid a lot more than I do. Found out who’s been sending those poison pen letters yet?’

  ‘Blimey, doc,’ moaned Frost. ‘It was only six hours ago when you last asked me. I haven’t even had a pee since then.’

  Maltby blinked at the inspector. His eyes didn’t seem to be focusing properly. ‘Hours ago? Is that all?’ He felt for a chair and sat down heavily.

  ‘Are you all right, doc?’ asked Frost with concern.

  ‘Yes, yes, of course I’m all right.’ He grabbed the inspector’s arm and pulled him down, dropping his voice and engulfing Frost in Johnnie Walker fumes. ‘Did you know Drysdale’s put in a complaint about me, just because I examined that body in the crypt before he did? He phoned me especially to tell me.’

  ‘The man’s a bastard, doc,’ soothed Frost. He nodded towards the bed. ‘How long has she been dead?’

  Maltby lurched over to the corpse and prodded the flesh. ‘Rigor mortis has come and just about gone. Some time Sunday evening, say. Anything else you want to know, ask Drysdale.’ With a sharp snap he closed his bag and bustled off. ‘God’s here,’ he bellowed from half-way down the stairs. A burble of exchanged frigid conversation and the pathologist swept into the bedroom accompanied by his secretary. He stared pointedly at the Forensic men who took the hint and retired downstairs.

  ‘Was that Dr Maltby who just brushed past me?’ he sniffed.

  Frost nodded.

  ‘And he’s been mauling the body about, I suppose?’

  ‘He never touched it,’ said Frost. ‘He didn’t want to spoil your pleasure. If you could speed it up, doc.’

  Drysdale gritted his teeth at the ‘doc’, but his eyes gleamed when he saw the body. He took off his long, black, expensive overcoat and handed it to his secretary. She, in turn, passed the coat over to Frost who screwed it into a ball, dumped it on a chair and sat on it. He shook a cigarette from his packet.

  ‘Please don’t smoke,’ snapped Drysdale, glad to have the chance of putting this oaf in his place. Methodically he examined every inch of the body, murmuring the results of his findings to the secretary whose pen translated the great man’s words into the loops and whirls of Pitman’s shorthand.

  After fifteen long minutes, ignoring Frost’s repeated and over-loud signs of impatience, he straightened up to deliver his verdict. ‘She’s been dead approximately thirty-six hours.’

  ‘That’s what Dr Maltby said,’ grunted Frost.

  The pathologist smiled thinly. ‘Delighted to have my opinion confirmed by such an expert. The pattern of the bloodstains indicates she was standing upright when she was attacked. The killer would have come at her from behind . . .’

  Frost wriggled in the chair. The overcoat buttons were biting into him. ‘He was waiting for her behind that door, doc. There’s a couple of lovely blood puddles there if you want to have a paddle.’

  Drysdale allowed himself a brief look, then carried on. ‘The killer would have clamped his hand over her mouth – you can see the thumb pressure mark on the left cheek?’ He moved away to allow Frost to inspect this if he wished, but Frost declined with a flick of his hand. He didn’t need a pathologist to point out something he had noticed as soon as he entered the bedroom.

  The pathologist shrugged. ‘The k
iller then stabbed her three times in the abdomen with a knife. The blade would be single-edged, non-flexible, about 6 inches long – and – and razor sharp.’

  ‘Something like a kitchen knife, doctor?’ asked Gilmore who had returned after giving instructions to the door-knocking team.

  ‘Could very well be,’ accepted Drysdale.

  ‘There was a similar attack last night . . . an old lady in Clarendon Street. He left a knife behind.’

  ‘Clarendon Street?’ barked Drysdale. ‘Why wasn’t I called?’

  ‘You can have first crack at her as soon as she dies,’ replied Frost, ‘but at the moment she’s still alive.’ He related the details.

  ‘If you let me examine the knife,’ said Drysdale, ‘I’ll do some tests to confirm whether it could be the same weapon used to inflict these wounds.’

  Frost scribbled a reminder about the knife on his discredited car expenses. ‘I’ll get it sent over. Carry on, doc. I’m sure you and your secretary want to get back to your bed . . . er, beds.’

  Not noticing Frost’s lewd wink to Gilmore, Drysdale continued. ‘The killer jerked back her head, pushed the tip of the blade into her throat just there.’ His thumb pointed to the left-hand side of the gaping wound. ‘He twisted the knife so the blade was horizontal – that’s why the wound is much wider at that point, then slashed open her throat from left to right.’

  Frost yawned openly. The pathologist was making a damn meal of this. She was stabbed from behind and dumped on the bed. He’d deduced that himself within seconds. ‘Would he have got blood on his clothes?’

  ‘Yes. Possibly on his upper left arm, but almost certainly a considerable amount of blood from the throat would have gushed on to his right hand – the knife hand – and the sleeve of his coat or whatever he was wearing. He also stepped into the pool of blood when he carried the body across to the bed. You can see the imprints on the carpet.’

  ‘You mean the ones Forensic have ringed round in chalk? Yes, we did spot them, doc.’

  ‘How did blood get there?’ asked Gilmore, pointing to a patch of discoloration on the left-hand sleeve of the black dress. ‘That doesn’t fit in with any of the wounds.’