First Frost (33 page)

Frost could see Litchfield getting agitated again.

Frost fished in his pockets for his cigarettes. ‘If we don’t get a break soon we’ll have to go public on this. Amazing what crops up when we put something juicy on the telly.’

‘What do you mean, “go public”?’ Litchfield asked anxiously.

‘Do I really need to spell it out?’

‘Yes, I think you do, Detective,’ Litchfield said, his bravado surprising Frost.

‘Your wife had a very active sex life, to put it mildly. You too, I’d bet, and your friend over there. A TV appeal for information would certainly attract the public’s attention.’ Frost paused, focusing on Mrs Cooper, who was well within earshot. He caught her glancing at Maurice Litchfield, a look of resignation across her face. ‘Do you want me to carry on?’ Frost asked, exhaling. ‘In fact, perhaps you can help me out with some of the more extreme practices and equipment. It’s a whole new world to me. A real eye-opener.’

‘How dare you!’ Maurice Litchfield spat. ‘My wife was raped and then murdered. My poor darling wife, my Vanessa …’ Tears of rage formed in his raw, swollen eyes.

‘How dare I?’ Frost snapped. ‘How dare you waste police time. Your wife wasn’t raped and murdered, and you know it. Your wife was asphyxiated while monkeying around in the sack.’ Drysdale’s quiet words came back to him. ‘Plastic bag over her head, maybe? Except this time someone left the thing on for too bloody long and she sodding well died.’

Frost stopped, suddenly feeling very wretched. He looked up at the heavy sky, and said, ‘I don’t know how many of you were present, I’m not sure I really care. But stop wasting my time.’

Litchfield looked ruined, his bottom lip quivering, his shoulders beginning to shake uncontrollably.

Frost had to step aside to let a gang of boys hurtle past pushing a pathetic Guy Fawkes in a shopping trolley.

‘Oi, you lot! Watch where you’re going!’ Frost yelled.

‘Up yours!’ was the collective retort.

‘Tell me, Mr Frost,’ Mrs Cooper said, stepping forwards, as the noise of the boys died down, ‘is it usual police procedure to interrogate the recently bereaved so brutally in a public park? You should be ashamed of yourself. Look at him’ – she gestured to Maurice Litchfield – ‘he’s in a state of collapse.’

‘He’s only got himself to blame,’ Frost said, turning to leave. He wanted to get to Aster’s before it shut.

Hanlon walked into the CID office, saw DC Sue Clarke sitting at the main desk, her head hanging low over a Forensics report. She hadn’t heard him come in.

‘Good read?’ he asked cheerily.

‘Just what I wanted,’ she said, looking up. ‘Kevin Jones’s scarf matches the piece of fabric I picked up down by the canal. Plus they found a couple of short, peroxide-blond hairs on that scrap, too. What’s more, they found teeth marks on it and the rest of the scarf, consistent with a large animal – a Labrador or Alsatian.’

‘Can’t believe the lout was stupid enough to hang on to the scarf,’ said Hanlon. ‘Do we need to get the doc to have a look at Jones’s hand, see whether they’re definitely bite marks from a dog?’

Clarke took a sip of lukewarm coffee, threw the near-empty polystyrene cup into the bin. ‘Not sure we’ll need to. I’ve just been on to Harbinger’s, the sports shop on Gentlemen’s Walk. They recalled selling football scarves to a bunch of young yobs – in Denton’s new away colours – only a week ago. There hasn’t been much call for the new strip.’

‘There’s a surprise.’

‘Be easy enough to organize a line-up starring young Jones. He looks distinctive enough.’

‘We’ll still need to get him to confess.’

‘To what, exactly?’ said Clarke. ‘Affray? Actually attacking the man and pushing him into the canal?’ She suddenly looked more resigned. ‘I suppose I thought we had enough evidence to pin him to the location and to the fact that he was set upon by a guide dog protecting its master.’

‘Hardly enough for a murder charge, is it?’ said Hanlon. ‘Let alone one involving a minor.’

‘I suppose, then, I just need an admission that he was there, with some others, and that they got into a scuffle with Graham Ransome, who ended up in the canal, dead. And hope the jury does the rest. I want a result.’

‘From what I gleaned of Kevin Jones earlier,’ said Hanlon, ‘it’s not going to be easy. You’ll need to scare the little shit. That way he might at least point the finger at whoever else was there with him. That lot have got no scruples, and if we round up the others, interview them separately, the true picture might emerge.’

‘I’ll try my best.’ Clarke rose from her chair, and gathered her papers. ‘But it doesn’t seem like a priority right now, with all this Fortress stuff. It’s going to be an uphill struggle.’

‘It always is,’ said Hanlon. ‘Guess what Liz Fraser’s up to now? She wants to retract everything she said yesterday, while Simon Trench says he’s going to sue us for brutality.’

‘Shit,’ said Clarke.

‘Fortunately,’ continued Hanlon, ‘Drysdale’s toxicology report came in this afternoon. Becky Fraser’s blood contained a huge amount of Temazepam. Seems she drank it with her milk. The little girl was as good as dead before she was suffocated. I already know Liz Fraser was prescribed the drug.’

‘How? I thought medical records were out of bounds.’

Hanlon retrieved the empty brown plastic bottle from his jacket pocket and held it up. ‘Just found this in the bin in her bathroom. She was only prescribed these last week.’ He pointed to the label. ‘Should have lasted her a month.’

‘So that’s where you’ve been this last hour. But where’s Frost gone?’

Hanlon shrugged his shoulders. Buggered if he knew.

Frost carefully scanned the ground floor of Aster’s. It was near to closing time on a dismal Thursday afternoon, and there were no crowds around the bargain bins at the front. No crowds around any counter or display stand, in fact.

What staff were there looked bored, desperate to get home.

There was no trace of Blake Richards, or the other security guard, whose name Frost had forgotten, either. Frost headed for the manager’s office.

The access to the admin floor, five flights up, was unmanned, all doors open. Frost walked straight to Ken Butcher’s office, remembering the layout from his visit with Hanlon last Sunday. The door was ajar and Frost strolled straight in, saying, ‘Busy time of the day?’

The smartly dressed and bearded manager of Aster’s had his feet on the desk and was reading the
Racing Post
. Startled, he quickly removed his feet, flung the paper to one side, sat up and straightened his tie.

‘Do you usually just barge into people’s offices?’ Ken Butcher said. ‘DS Frost, isn’t it?’

‘There was no one to stop me. What’s happened to the security around here? Didn’t see either of your esteemed store detectives on patrol, either.’

‘Ah,’ Butcher said. ‘We’re slightly understaffed today.’

‘I bet you were understaffed yesterday, too,’ said Frost.

‘I’m not sure I get your drift, Detective.’ Butcher shifted uneasily in his chair.

‘Blake Richards, not in today?’

‘No,’ said Butcher.

‘Or yesterday?’

‘I do believe he didn’t report for work either yesterday or today. Most unlike him. He’s been completely dependable up to now.’

‘And your other chap?’ asked Frost, searching his mac pockets for his cigarettes. ‘You have two security guards, don’t you?’

‘Keith Nelson’s been ill,’ said Butcher. ‘Flu.’

‘So what is it, a free-for-all downstairs?’

‘All my staff are trained to be vigilant,’ said Butcher. ‘We all do our best to keep an eye out for any untoward behaviour.’

‘No one spotted twelve-year-old Julie Hudson being dragged out of here,’ said Frost, lighting his cigarette. ‘And that’s not to mention fire exits being left unalarmed, and bits of your mannequins turning up at major crime scenes.’

Butcher was looking more and more uncomfortable. He was now loosening his tie. ‘Yes, I heard about the mannequin parts being found in that van. Someone from your station rang me this morning. But for the life of me, I have no idea how they got there.’

‘Easily enough, I imagine,’ said Frost. ‘You’ve got a skip full of them out the back, haven’t you? Someone just helped themselves.’

‘But why?’ asked the store manager. ‘Why would they do that?’

Frost wasn’t going to admit he had no idea. Though it seemed like someone was trying to make a point by it. ‘That’s what I was hoping you’d tell me.’ Unless it really was coincidence – that the mannequin parts were already in the van when the armed gang stole the vehicle. The van having previously been owned by a low-rent, opportunistic thief. Frost disconsolately exhaled a large plume of smoke.

‘I just can’t help you, Detective,’ said Butcher. ‘Sorry.’

Frost wasn’t getting anywhere here. ‘Don’t suppose you’ve tried to contact your missing security guard?’

Butcher stood up. ‘Of course we have. When there was no answer on his phone, I even sent a lad round to his home. The curtains were shut, no one in.’

Frost wasn’t surprised. Blake Richards had probably well and truly scarpered by now. ‘Did he ever mention any friends, acquaintances he had round here?’

‘Not to me,’ said Butcher. ‘I barely knew him. Just seemed to be a rather solitary figure.’

Butcher walked with Frost to the door. ‘Why are you so interested in him, anyway?’

Frost laughed, walked down the corridor, and threw over his shoulder, ‘Armed robbery, murdering a police officer … and that’s just for starters.’

‘I want my mum,’ said Kevin Jones. ‘I want to go home.’

Were those really tears welling in his eyes? ‘You should have thought about that before pushing a blind man into the canal,’ said Clarke.

They were in Interview Room One, just her and him, in clear contravention of the procedure governing the formal questioning of a minor. But Clarke didn’t care. She was going to break him down.

‘I didn’t,’ Jones said. ‘Want me to say it again? I didn’t, I didn’t, I didn’t.’

‘Who did, then?’

‘That would be telling, wouldn’t it.’

Though it wasn’t strictly a formal interview, Clarke had made sure it was being recorded. She knew she could always dispose of the tape if things didn’t go according to plan – that’s what everyone else did.

‘At last, you admit you were there,’ said Clarke. ‘Don’t bother denying it. We’ve got all the evidence we need.’

‘Me and my mates always go down to the canal. What of it?’

‘Kevin, things aren’t looking very sunny for you, are they? You’ve admitted you were down by the canal, you’ve admitted you know who pushed a poor, defenceless blind man into the drink. At the very least you’re looking at accessory to murder – that’s still a life sentence. You won’t be going home for a very long time indeed.’

‘He attacked us,’ Jones suddenly said, brightening up.

‘With what?’ said Clarke. ‘His white stick?’

‘Yeah, yeah, that’s it.’

‘How would he see to do that?’ protested Clarke. ‘He was just waving it randomly about, was he? You stupid little shit.’

‘And then he fell in,’ Jones added, with a smirk.

She slammed her hand on the table top and stood up, kicking her chair back. ‘If you don’t start cooperating …’ She calmly walked round the table, leant in close to him, seeing something resembling panic cross his face, and shouted in his ear, ‘I’m going to make sure you never see daylight again.’

As she slowly backed away, towards the door, Kevin Jones looked up and straight into her eyes, and said, ‘It’s not my fault he died. We were just messing about with his dog and stuff. Having a laugh. We didn’t kill him. Not our fault he couldn’t swim. You can ask my mates, they’ll tell you the same.’

‘And who are they?’ said Clarke, returning to her seat. ‘I want all their names, addresses. Miss anyone out and you, me and a few of my friends from the station – and they’re all bigger than me – will be going back down to the canal. See if that jogs your memory.’

Thursday (6)

Feeling an increasing sense of urgency to confirm his suspicions about the gang – and to start making some arrests – Jack Frost pulled into the Coconut Grove’s weed-strewn and pot-holed, dimly lit car park. He knew he was clutching at straws. But Blake Richards wasn’t the only collar he wanted. There were at least three other members of the gang.

It was just after five, and Frost realized he was starving, realized also that there was unfinished business with Maurice Litchfield.

Turning the engine off, he lifted the handset and called the station, leaving a message with Control for DC Clarke: she was to meet him at Maurice Litchfield’s place in Denton Close in twenty minutes. He didn’t expect to enjoy the Coconut’s exotic hospitality for very long.

He climbed out of the Cortina and stepped straight into a massive puddle. He swore, and lit a cigarette. He started to walk round to the entrance of the sleazy strip joint, but was overwhelmed by an acute stab of pain in his lower abdomen. ‘Christ,’ he uttered, bending double. As the pain eased a little he shuffled on until he was thumping at the heavy, fortified door, bearing a brass plaque with the words
Gentlemen’s Club
.

Eventually a mountain of a man opened up, eyeing Frost suspiciously. ‘Yeah?’ he barked. His head was round and bald and shiny, like a huge billiard ball.

‘Harry Baskin in?’ Frost wheezed.

‘Depends. Who wants him?’

‘An old friend,’ Frost said, the pain now rapidly easing – yet he found it had brought him out in a sweat. He wiped his forehead on the sleeve of his mac.

‘He’s got plenty of those,’ the man said. ‘Doesn’t need any more.’

‘Really? You can never have enough friends in this business.’ Craning round the man Frost saw some punters in the bar; looked like a performance was going on. ‘Wasn’t aware you had an all-day licence for this joint.’

The bouncer stepped forwards, blocking Frost’s view. ‘Auditions, isn’t it. What’s it to you, anyway?’

Frost produced his warrant card and waved it at the bouncer. ‘Tell Mr Baskin that Jack Frost’s here to see him.’

Two minutes later Frost was in Harry Baskin’s office. The black gloss walls were studded with chrome-framed photographs of Harry with an array of long-forgotten VIPs and strippers. Baskin’s desk was also black, glinting under the soft spotlights. Baskin was smiling away, his dyed-black hair slicked back and glinting too, along with his gold front tooth.