Winter Frost (56 page)

   
"Should be down the far end somewhere," said the porter, leading them past shelves labelled with the dates of the files they held. It was like walking back in time as the files got yellower and yellower and the years rolled further and further into the past: '80s, '70s, '60s . . . Frost shivered and tightened his scarf. The far reaches of the corridor were damp, cold and mildewy just like the smallholding.

   
"There you go," said the porter, waving a vague hand at the 1957 section where shelves groaned under the weight of files and bundles tied with string held in fossilized knots. "If he came here with a broken ankle and if it's been filed correctly, which doesn't always happen, you should find him amongst this little lot." The racks of 1957 files seemed to go on and on. 1957 was a bumper year for people going to hospital.

   
"This could take all bloody week," moaned Burton,

   
"At least," grunted the porter. "Turn out all the lights when you've finished."

   
"A helping hand would be nice," said Frost hopefully.

   
"That's what I thought when you bastards nicked me for speeding," said the porter.

   
They waited until he was out of earshot, his footsteps fading in the distance. "Find out the number of his car and nick him again," said Frost. Ignoring the 'No Smoking' sign, he passed his cigarettes around and lit up. "It's so bleeding damp, nothing would burn down here," he muttered, "but I've half a mind to give it a bleeding good try." He pulled out a bulging file. The string broke and the contents spewed out on the floor. "We're in for a flaming good time," he moaned, kicking the file to one side. He nodded at an overflowing rack behind Morgan . . . "What are those big green envelopes?"

   
Morgan pulled one out and looked inside. "X-rays, guv."

   
"Right," said Frost. "If he broke his ankle he'd have it X-rayed. Ignore all the other files, just get the green envelopes out."

   
Frost and Burton looked through the envelopes while Morgan dragged them from the shelves. The Pile of discarded files grew higher and higher. "Didn't people have anything better to do in 1957 than break their flaming arms and legs?" complained Frost, adding yet another file to the discard heap.

   
"You realize he might not have come to this hospital, guv," said Morgan.

   
"If you haven't got anything helpful to say, shut up!" snarled Frost. There were very few green envelope files left and he was beginning to give up hope, when "Bingo! This is it! Derek Fernley, aged twenty-six." He skimmed through the patient's record card . . . "Single. Address: 3a St Clement Road, Denton. Occupation, Assistant Manager."

   
"Damn!" This as the tottering pile of discarded files suddenly toppled over and ancient string snapped, sending the contents all over the floor in an untidy mess. The two DCs bent to pick them up, but were restrained. "That's what hospital porters are paid for," Frost told them, tucking Fernley's file under his arm and marching out, deliberately neglecting to switch off all the lights.

The phone in the incident room rang. Harding from Forensic. "Yes, Inspector, the break in the ankle of our skeleton corresponds exactly with the X-ray photograph. It's him all right."

   
"Thanks," grunted Frost. "I'd have settled for him even if the X-ray didn't match." He hung up and scratched his chin thoughtfully. The assistant manager of what? A shop, an office, a factory? An assistant manager goes missing and no-one reports it? Surely someone would have noticed by now that he wasn't at his desk? He took a look round the room. "Where's Taffy?"

   
"He's still checking that address in St Clement Road," said Hanlon.

   
"If Derek Femley opens the door to him, we're back to square one," grunted Frost. "And if a nubile young tart opens the door we won't see Taffy back here today."

   
"And who's taking my name in vain?" Taffy had returned, his clothes smothered in dust, an ancient police file tucked under his arm. He plonked a black and white photograph in front of Frost. "That, guv," he said proudly, "is Derek Fernley." The photograph was of a man in his early twenties, arms folded, dark hair glossy with brilliantine, an over-large nose and a small, neatly trimmed moustache.

   
Frost studied it, then checked the photograph of the skeleton before shaking his head. "Nothing like him, Taff. Our one hasn't got a moustache."

   
"It is him," insisted Morgan. "I went to his old address. They couldn't help, but I found someone in the street who remembered him."

   
"So where did you get the photograph?"

   
"From our store room. We've got a file on him. Look!" He dumped the file in front of Frost and opened it. A yellowing newspaper cutting clipped to the top had headlines that read: SUPERMARKET MANAGER AND TAKINGS BOTH GO MISSING! Below the headline was a reproduction of the photograph of Fernley. Frost picked up the cutting and read the story out aloud:

   
" 'Derek Fernley, twenty-six, Assistant Manager of the large Superwise Supermarket in Denton, is being sought by the police in connection with the disappearance of some £6,000 from the store's safe. Denton police are anxious to interview Fernley who has not reported for work since the money went missing. Neighbours said Fernley did not return home on the Friday and has not been seen since.' "

   
Frost looked again at the photograph. "Call me a suspicious old sod, but I reckon Fernley took that money." He flicked through the investigating officer's typed notes. Small sums of money, between £5 and £10 a week, had been disappearing and it was obvious that Fernley had been milking the supermarket's petty cash float. Checking his flat they found he had cancelled the milk and drawn the balance from his bank account. There was no sign of his passport.

   
"They never found him," mused Frost. "They should have looked in that old cow's back garden." He closed the file. "So why wasn't he listed as a missing person?"

   
"Missing isn't the same as absconding," explained Burton.

   
Frost handed the file back to Morgan. "He was milking the petty cash. The auditors are coming which means he's bound to be found out, so he empties the safe and legs it, pausing only for that last fatal grumble and grunt with big-nippled Nelly and her creamy white belly. But what happened to the six thousand quid and how did big-nippled Nell suddenly find the money to buy the smallholding? Do we see some sort of a connection?"

   
"You're saying she took it?" Morgan asked.

   
"Yes, I am," said Frost. He stood up. "Come on, Taff. Let's go and ask her."

She was in the kitchen, still preparing vegetables, chopping them into small pieces with a knife.

   
"We've found out who your last client was," Frost told her. "Derek Fernley, assistant manager of a supermarket."

   
Her eyes flickered briefly, then she concentrated on dicing the vegetables. "I didn't know his name."

   
"He paid a bit over the odds for his last bit of the other, didn't he? And he didn't even get a cup of tea afterwards."

   
She kept her eyes down, the blade of the knife chopping, dicing, missing her fingers by a hair's breadth. "Don't know what you mean."

   
"Where did you get the money to buy this place?"

   
"Don't remember."

   
Frost dragged a chair out to sit down, saw the state of the seat and decided against it. "I'll jog your memory, shall I? He comes round for his usual Friday night nooky, but this time he's got a suitcase with him. After his unfortunate demise, you take a look inside and there's more money than you've ever seen in your life, over six thousand quid. So here's a chance to move out, to hide away somewhere, to keep little Sonny Boy under wraps in case he blurts out about the naughty man he and mumsie planted in someone's garden. You buy this place for cash, poke Sonny Boy under the stairs and if anyone asks about him, you dab away a tear and say the angels grew lonely and wanted him for a sunbeam. Is that it?"

   
She shrugged. "I don't know nothing about any money." Chop, chop, chop.

   
The door creaked open and Boy lumbered in. He started at the sight of the two detectives.

   
"Go and chop some wood, Boy," she snapped.

   
Obediently, like a well-trained dog, Boy went to the sink and pulled out an axe from under it. He shouldered it like a rifle. "I'll chop some wood," he announced, as if he had just thought of it. They watched him march out.

   
"You told us your son kept hitting Fernley on the head again and again."

   
"That's right."

   
"The pathologist reckons he was only hit once."

   
"It was a long time ago. I don't remember it clearly."

   
"Did you know Derek had the money with him when he came?"

   
"I don't know nothing about no money." She scooped up the diced vegetables in a gnarled hand and dropped them into a saucepan.

   
Frost sighed. They weren't going to get anything out of her. "All right, Mrs. Aldridge. We'll leave it for now." He jerked his head for Morgan to follow him out.

"You let her off the hook pretty easily, guv," said Morgan.

   
"Maybe," grunted Frost.

   
Outside, near the coop of squawking chickens, Boy was chopping a fallen tree trunk into sizeable pieces, the axe blade flashing in the dying sun as it hissed through the air. Morgan nudged Frost. "I reckon I could get him to talk, guv."He wandered over to the man, who stopped his chopping and eyed him suspiciously.

   
"Go away. Mustn't talk to you."

   
"Just a couple of questions," wheedled Morgan, but Frost tugged him away.

   
"Leave it, Taffy."

   
"But, guv—"

   
"I said leave it!"

   
Frost spun on his heel and marched off to the car, leaving a puzzled Morgan trailing behind him.

"So she wouldn't admit to taking the money?" asked Mullett when they reported back to him.

   
"We pushed her as hard as we could, Super," said Frost. "She denied all knowledge of it."

   
"What about her son? Did you question him?"

   
"No, we didn't—Aww!" said Morgan, cut off in mid-sentence as a well-aimed kick from Frost hacked his ankle.

   
"We really put him through it," said Frost. "He says he knows nothing about any money and I don't think he's capable of lying. My guess is that Fernley hid the cash somewhere and we'll never find it."

   
Mullett nodded his satisfaction. "A loose end that needn't concern us unduly. Now, we know his name, I can forward the papers to the CPS. Like you, I very much doubt that they will prosecute, but that is their concern." His hand reached out for the phone. "If you'll excuse me, I'll let the Chief Constable know of my—er, our success."

   
"I don't understand, guv," said Morgan when they got back into Frost's office. "You told Mr. Mullett we talked to the son and we didn't."

   
Frost kicked the door shut behind them. "We didn't talk to the son, Taffy, in case he told us something we don't want to hear." 

   "Like what, guv?"

   
"Like what really happened with Fernley."

   
"We know what happened. The son killed him."

   
"No, Taff. I reckon the old girl killed him." He flopped down at his desk and lit up a cigarette. "Did you clock the knife the old girl was using to dice up the carrots?"

   
"Yes, guv. It looked very similar to the one she stuck into me."

   
"And it also looked very similar to this." Frost opened his desk drawer and took out the plastic bag containing the rusty knife that had been found buried near the skeleton. "In fact it could be its bloody twin, the same ring at the end of the handle for hanging it up."

   
Morgan examined the knife carefully. "It does look similar," he admitted grudgingly.

   
"Similar? It's flaming identical. One of a pair, I reckon."

   
"So what are you suggesting?" Morgan asked.

   
"I'm suggesting, Taffy, that this knife, which we found buried with the skeleton, came from her kitchen. Now why would she bury a perfectly good knife? She's too bleeding mean to throw anything away; she probably uses her toilet paper on both sides. She chucked it because there was blood on it, and not chicken's blood . . . Derek Fernley's blood."

   
"You're saying she stabbed him?"

   
"Yes, I am. She said there was blood everywhere. You don't get that amount of blood from a crack on the nut. The boy might have been involved somehow, but she killed Fernley, probably to get the money, and that makes it murder."

   
Morgan stared at him. "Where's your proof, guv?"

   
"I haven't got any proof, son. I just know she did it."

   
"Then why didn't you let me question her son? I could have got the truth out of him."

   
"And suppose he told you that mummy stabbed the naughty man with her knife? Mullett wouldn't let it rest and we'd then have to start wasting our bloody time investigating an ancient murder case that would be thrown out of court, and I've got better things to do."