by Danny Miller
‘So the acorn fell far from the tree, in this case.’
‘Eloquently put, Inspector. Terry’s a good man, just not as shrewd as his father.’
‘Was that why his wife left him?’
‘Money? No, Allison wasn’t like that. She’s a sweet girl, really. And Terry always fancied himself as a bit of a ladies’ man, so I wasn’t surprised his marriage didn’t stick. But when she left him I knew it shook him to the core. I think he thought he’d always be with her, that he could rely on her and she’d forgive him his dalliances. I did warn him. She left him for a gas fitter.’ Billings gave a derisive snort. ‘Do you really suspect him of the shooting? He’s not good with guns.’
‘Well, we don’t suspect the gas fitter.’
‘Touché, Inspector.’
‘You said he’s not good with guns. Did you ever know him to have any sort of firearm in his possession?’
‘Not to my knowledge, no. But I do remember a weekend a few years ago, we stayed at a rather grand hotel in Yorkshire with our wives and tried our hand at clay pigeon shooting. Terry was a lousy shot, couldn’t hit a barn door, never mind a disc spinning through the air. So we stuck to the fishing instead.’ Billings smiled at the memory. ‘Poor sod wasn’t much better at that.’
‘Well, you’ve been very helpful, and I’m sure you realize the sooner we can talk to him, the better it will be for him.’
Billings, who struck them as a practical man, agreed.
‘And it’s no secret he didn’t like George Price,’ added Frost, ‘because of what happened to his father.’
‘I don’t think he ever got over it. Not really.’
‘But there’s the other matter …’ Frost left it hanging.
Billings was about to say something then stopped himself.
Frost prompted, ‘There’s always another matter, Mr Billings, and I’ll find that one out just as fast.’
‘Underneath all the Jack-the-lad bravado, he’s a good man, you know?’
‘Who just happens to be in love with Melody Price?’
Sue Clarke, who had been momentarily distracted by the riders and horses just coming into the adjacent field, turned sharply towards Frost, a look of surprise on her face.
Peter Billings’ pensive look disappeared. ‘Ah, you know about that,’ he said in a voice that sounded relieved.
Frost smiled. ‘Not until now. It was a hunch, but an educated one. I have met Melody Price. And I suspect crimes of passion sort of come with the territory.’
‘And to make things worse, I don’t think it was reciprocated, not in the way he wanted.’ Billings let out a sigh.
‘You said that the end of his marriage shook him to his core.’
‘That’s right.’
‘How would you describe his state of mind lately?’
Billings puffed out his ruddy cheeks. ‘Tell you the truth, not that I’m a shrink or anything, but he did seem a bit shaky. He wanted to be left on his own most of the time. I’d invite him up to the house, and we’d occasionally sit in front of the fire, chatting away, depleting a decanter of port. But in the end he always got so bloody maudlin about everything. Going on about missing his father, and how he’d let him down by ruining the business; his wife leaving him and the family they’d never have now; and then, of course, the Price woman. His one real chance at love, he reckoned. Convinced of it, he was: it was her or nothing.’ Billings shook his head, as if the very memory of it was simultaneously too much to bear and, frankly, ridiculous. ‘After the third drink, it always ended in tears – and that’s not a turn of phrase, Inspector, I mean real ones. Bloody great tears streaming down his cheeks. Well, I stopped inviting him up in the end. I can’t say I agree with all that.’
‘All what?’ asked Clarke.
‘Well, it’s different for us chaps. I know you chapesses are very good at it, talking about everything, feelings and such like, all the time. But I think there’s a lot to be said for stiffening your resolve and just bloody getting on with it. Blubbering like a baby won’t get you anywhere, will it?’
Frost didn’t dare look round at the ‘chapess’ next to him.
‘Thank you, Miss Smith, if you can make sure everyone who needs to be gathered in the briefing room is gathered, I’ll be right out to meet her.’
Stanley Mullett put the receiver back in its cradle as if one wrong move and the thing would explode. Such was his fragility this morning that he was sure he could hear dust settle. Mullett was hosting the hangover from hell. All the other hangovers he’d endured over the years were impostors compared to this one; this one was the real deal. He was also hosting DI Eve Hayward from West End Central. She was to do a presentation on the evils of knock-off goods, which had increasingly been turning up of late at Denton markets and car-boot fairs. The memo he’d received from County was very firm, it was a three-line whip, and all of Denton CID and a good representation of uniform were to be present, despite it being a Saturday morning.
Mullett picked up his mug of tepid coffee with its three heaped teaspoons of Nescafé; it was his third mug and it still hadn’t done the trick. He was barely conscious. He gripped the arms of his leather-upholstered executive chair and lifted himself out of it. Once up, he took a sonorous breath, straightened his tie and headed for the conference room.
Ten minutes later and Mullett was in the front row of the large briefing room, smiling, his hangover a distant memory as he listened intently, and watched closely, totally immersed in DI Eve Hayward’s presentation.
‘The idea that counterfeit goods are a victimless crime is as big a fraud as the goods themselves that make it on to the market. And this idea is often perpetuated as much by law enforcement as by the general public,’ asserted DI Hayward to her audience of some fifteen Eagle Lane officers of varying rank. ‘From Sergio Tacchini tracksuits to Sony Trinitron TVs to TDK videotapes with Footloose recorded on them before the film’s even come out in this country. Branded designer goods have never been more important to consumers, and equally never have they been bigger business for the counterfeiters. But not only can the goods themselves be dangerous – for instance, fake perfume that causes serious skin damage, faulty electrical goods that cause fires and loss of life – but the profits are often reinvested into other criminal activities, such as the funding of large-scale drugs deals.’
Mullett approved of DI Eve Hayward on many levels. One being the way she delivered her message, with firm authority. Mullett’s monster of a hangover had been vanquished more or less the very second he’d clapped his rheumy red eyes on the London inspector. She was in her mid to late thirties, he’d surmised, with auburn hair worn in a short bob that had a lustre as satisfying as his toecaps, and plucked eyebrows that were as expressive as a cracked whip. And with her full lips and a voice that was husky and warm, with the hint of an accent, Irish perhaps, she was making quite an impression.
She turned round to switch on the TV and video player for the training film. As she bent over to insert the video in the machine, Mullett had to avert his eyes, and instead turned his attention towards the audience behind him. He wasn’t happy with what he saw. There was David Simms and some other young PCs nudging each other the minute she’d turned her back, licentious grins stretching their pimply faces. Then he caught sight of John Waters, married less than a year, and yet Mullett was sure he heard him make an obscene noise, like someone sucking their teeth. Arthur Hanlon was as usual not paying attention, his gaze drifting aimlessly around the room and finally floating out of the window, probably down to the canteen as he pondered the lunch menu.
No Frost. Typical. And no DC Clarke either. He’d heard the rumours about Frost and Clarke; there was even talk of the DI being the father of her child. And as unpalatable and unbelievable as it seemed, he knew that women found the widowed Frost attractive. His late wife had been a good-looking woman from a well-connected local family. Mullett had even once courted her father with a view to joining the Masons. But as for the troublesome inspec
tor, that whole rumpled maverick look obviously had some traction with the opposite sex.
DI Eve Hayward would need someone to show her around Denton and the surrounding area, and knowing that with his other duties it couldn’t be him, Mullett had just the right person in mind. As Hayward turned to address her audience again, Mullett emitted a satisfied sigh. For once he was happy that Frost had ignored his instructions. He was happy Frost wasn’t—
‘Excuse me, sir.’
Mullett turned sharply to his left to find DS John Waters crouched at his shoulder, whispering in his ear.
‘What is it?’
‘I’ve got to go, community outreach at the Southern Housing Estate?’
This was news to Mullett, and his frown expressed as much.
‘Some of the mothers are concerned about drugs on the estate. Inspector Frost said I should follow it up. I’ve had some experience, and we thought I would—’
‘Yes, yes,’ interrupted an impatient Mullett, almost shooing him away. He watched Waters leave, mouthing an apology to Eve Hayward, which she graciously accepted with a smile. Again, it vexed him that Frost had suggested Waters for community outreach on the estate. It was a good idea. Damn good idea. Again, corroborating the super’s theory that the men respected Frost, that he had their ear. Mullett was determined to stem this pernicious influence. Frost would slip up, men like him always did. And when he did …
Saturday (2)
Radleigh Park Racecourse was situated some eight miles north of Denton town centre. It was best known as an all-weather racecourse, and it was one and a half miles in length, with a finishing straight of four furlongs to the winning post. Opened in 1949, it went into a steep decline and was then closed for almost five years in the 1970s, when everything seemed to be closing down, going on strike or just taking it easy with the three-day week. The punters were no longer turning up as they didn’t have the money to throw away. But now it was boom time again, and 1984 was doing a good job of harking back to the golden age of the 1950s, when the nation was told they’d never had it so good, and the great Sir Gordon Richards won the Radleigh Classic in 1953 on the Queen Mother’s horse in front of a crowd of some 30,000. There weren’t quite that many here today when Frost took his place in the grandstand to survey the scene. But the bars were busy and the bookies in the betting ring looked like they were doing a roaring business.
Frost, always keen to learn something new about the patch he’d lived and worked in all his life, perused his race programme to discover that what made the reinvigorated Radleigh Park a course of interest was that it was now composed of Polytrack, a mixture of silica sand and synthetic fibres, as opposed to good old-fashioned turf. In many ways the course mirrored large parts of the ever-expanding town of Denton itself: modern, new and supposedly efficient, but also unpredictable.
He looked up from his programme, and even from the distance of the main stand, you couldn’t miss her. Melody Price was standing on two upturned crates at her bookie’s pitch, chalking up the runners for the next race on the betting board which bore the legend ‘George Price & Son, Turf Accountants’. Frost wondered where the ‘Son’ was, and why he hadn’t come up on his radar yet. Hadn’t Clarke mentioned something about a son?
Melody Price was wearing a full-length fur coat with a matching Russian-style hat, and patent-leather boots with a heel that made standing on the crates a feat in itself. Amongst the rows of camel-coated, trilby-hatted and cigar-chomping bookies, she struck a glamorous figure, and certainly drew to her flocks of male punters eager to fritter away their hard-earned cash in return for a moment of her attention.
The detective then made his way down to the betting ring and picked his way through the crowds; he could tell that a lot of these were the real hard-nosed gamblers who weren’t interested in taking in the scenery or enjoying a pleasant day out at the races. They were there to wage war on the bookies and try to beat the odds, and had started to gather around the boards to see the starting prices. Frost was soon in Melody Price’s eyeline. She welcomed him with the sort of big smile and wave normally reserved for dear old friends, not coppers investigating a husband’s attempted murder. Frost would have liked to put money on how long she would keep up this charade – not long, if he was doing his job right.
‘Ah, Jack, how lovely to see you, but I thought you weren’t a betting man?’
‘Still not, I’m afraid, but I’m always on the lookout for a hot tip. And I do need to talk to you, Mrs Price—’
‘Melody, Jack, please, how many more times?’
‘Well, Melody, there have been some further developments.’
‘I am rather busy, Jack.’
‘And this is very important.’
Melody Price stopped smiling and turned towards a man posted at what looked like a music stand, but instead of a score there was a large open ledger, in the columns of which he was adding figures with a worn-down pencil. Frost took him to be Jimmy Drake, the clerk. He was in his sixties, short, around five four, with a thickset build and an appearance that would best be described as dapper, in a beige covert coat with a dark-brown felt collar, topped off with a Lincoln green fedora. On the tip of his hawkish nose a pair of half-moon spectacles rested precariously. Perhaps to ensure they remained in place, Jimmy Drake didn’t look up from his bookkeeping duties to acknowledge Frost’s presence, and he replied to Melody’s instructions with barely a grunt.
Frost and Mrs Price made their way out of the betting ring towards the hospitality tents and refreshment stalls, and soon found themselves at a table in the Champagne & Oyster Marquee. The DI had fancied a bacon sarnie and piping-hot tea from one of the many vans offering such fast-food delights, but Melody had insisted otherwise. She was drinking a Buck’s Fizz in a flute. Frost was pacing himself for what he thought would be a long day by drinking what he assumed to be a Buck’s without the Fizz. He wasn’t used to anything quite as healthy as plain orange juice and it left an unpleasant tang in his mouth, which he quickly countered by sparking up a Rothmans.
‘To be honest, I’m surprised to see you here today.’
‘George would go mad if I missed a day’s racing.’
‘All things considered, I’m sure he’d understand.’
‘No, if I know my George, and I think I do, it’s not just about the money we’d be missing out on today, it’s the principle of the thing. George would view it as surrendering, letting them win. No, I had to fly the flag today.’
He looked confused. ‘I’m sorry, Melody, let who win, exactly?’
‘The bad guys, the robbers, the ones that put George in the hospital.’
Frost gave a cautious smile of acknowledgement, but didn’t altogether agree with the logic, and suspected that Melody’s stoicism in turning up at the races today had as much, if not more, to do with the money than anything else. He watched as she raised her tall glass to her glossy lips and sipped her drink, seemingly without a care in the world, as if turning up at the races and ‘flying the flag’ for George Price really was fulfilling her wifely duties.
To be fair, the tent was packed with people who looked like they didn’t have a care in the world. There were groups of young men in double-breasted suits, candy-striped shirts, floral ties and red braces; and girls with big hair to match their big shoulder pads. As the champagne flowed, there were off-colour jokes to scare the horses followed by raucous laughter from the flash young men, and tittering giggles from the pliable girls. Frost had them pegged as City boys, or the new breed of estate agents who, like that Jason, seemed to be cropping up like toadstools all over the place. Denton and the surrounding area were on the up, with the council freeing up green-belt and brown-belt land, and old properties were being bought up and quickly converted and redeveloped. Frost got back to the business in hand.
‘Terry Langdon used to have the pitch next to yours, I believe.’ Melody took the opportunity to wave to someone at the bar. Frost wasn’t so easily distracted. ‘Tall fella, drives a Porsche 924, b
ears a passing resemblance to Magnum PI?’
Her head rolled back and she let out a peal of laughter. ‘My God, Terry would love to hear you say that! He’ll be selling the Porsche, too, I hear he owes the taxman.’ She stopped laughing. ‘Are you suggesting Terry Langdon might …?’
‘We have two eyewitnesses who saw a man leaving the scene of the crime in a red Porsche 924. Apparently he looked like some actor called Tom Selleck in one of these American cop shows, or at least they thought so. As you know, Terry does own a 924.’
‘Makes sense. He’s broke so he robbed George. What do you think?’
He took a moment, then leaned in closer to her. ‘I think there’s another motive that makes a lot more sense to me. A lot more.’
Frost’s hushed tones and seeming tactfulness must have appealed to her vanity, because she didn’t deny it or even question it. She took in a dramatic breath and said, ‘I don’t take you for an idiot, Jack. And I assume you’ve been doing your job since I saw you yesterday, namely, trying to find out who did this to my husband.’
‘I have.’
‘And you’ve spoken to some people and found out that Terry … shall we say, has feelings for me?’
‘Correct. More than just feelings, I’d say – allegedly, he’s in love with you.’
‘I’d say, allegedly, that’s about right.’
‘Were you having an affair with him?’
Melody Price was about to raise her glass again but stopped. Her glossy red lips were pursed in an almost perfect O. She held the position longer than was necessary, as if posing on a photoshoot.
‘Please, Melody, don’t look so shocked. It’s not the most outrageous suggestion in the world, considering the circumstances. And it does require a truthful answer, because I will find out.’
She put her glass back down on the table, stopped pouting and adopted a very formal and businesslike tone. ‘No, I wasn’t having an affair. That was simply out of the question because I love George and I would never cheat on him, never mind with someone like Terry Langdon. And talk about doing a doo-doo on your own doorstep, so no, it would never happen. But yes, Terry had made it clear how he felt about me.’