A Lethal Frost

by Danny Miller

  Frost blew out an exasperated breath – never enough time, never enough resources. ‘You can handle it, take Clarke with you if she’s available – but don’t be all day about it.’

  Hanlon gave a nod and disappeared from view. Waters looked surprised that Frost wasn’t doing the interview – he delegated as little as possible and always liked to hear things first-hand. The DI clocked his colleague’s reaction and explained, ‘It’s a three-line whip from Hornrim Harry, all eyes on this case. I’m seen anywhere near the George Price shooting, guts for garters.’

  ‘Never bothered you in the past.’

  ‘Kid dead on drugs, and if it’s a bad batch on the estate, there could well be more to follow him. For once I can see his point. Anyway, Arthur’s a big boy, he can handle it.’

  ‘And getting bigger every day.’

  A knock on the doorframe broke through their much-needed laughter.

  ‘What the bloody hell is it now, Arthur?’ Frost glanced over to the doorway and saw the curvaceous and far more appealing figure of Eve Hayward standing there.

  ‘Jack, is there any chance of that word now?’

  Frost turned to Waters and muttered, ‘The second most stupid question in the world.’

  ‘I’m really sorry, but I’d like to discuss the counterfeit-goods operation in your area.’

  ‘Now’s not the time.’

  ‘I understand. But I think I can—’

  ‘Sorry, Inspector Hayward, I know you have a job to do, but I’ve got a kid dead from a heroin overdose, and I can tell you straight off that I’m not remotely interested in knock-off copies of Risky Business or Gucci baseball caps.’

  Eve Hayward shot back, ‘And what if I told you I could prove a link between the two – the heroin and the knock-off goods?’

  ‘I’d probably say something along the lines of … prove it.’

  Tuesday (2)

  ‘I went round to see Cathy … but her sister said she wasn’t seeing anyone. I was relieved. I’m her best friend and I was relieved she didn’t want to see me. Does that sound terrible?’

  John Waters gave an understanding shake of his head – it didn’t sound terrible at all to him. The raw grief of a mother who’s just lost her child is overwhelming for anyone. He was in the living room of Ella Ross, the mother of Gavin. The room was compact and perfectly kept. There were lots of ferns and rubber plants in bright pots that Ella had decorated herself, and what looked like modern art framed up on the walls, in bold primary colours, but on closer inspection they’d been painted by Gavin, with his name and age, 7½, in the corner. There were photos dotted around the room, and some of them showed Gavin with Dean, and in some Cathy was present too, like one big, happy extended family.

  Waters reached into his jacket pocket and took out his notebook and pen. Ella Ross took a measured breath, as if the notebook and pen represented a frightening new reality. Her son Gavin was missing, he hadn’t returned home since Sunday night. On Monday morning first thing, Ella hadn’t thought to report Gavin missing as he often stayed over with a friend. Then at lunchtime she heard about Dean. And by the end of Monday, she knew something was definitely wrong. Gavin hadn’t turned up at school. So she’d phoned the police.

  She was about to call them again when the phone rang – it was John Waters, to tell her he was on his way to see her.

  ‘Sunday afternoon. It was about five-thirty.’

  Waters gave her a questioning look.

  ‘Sorry, I thought you were going to ask when I last saw Gavin. That’s usually the first question, isn’t it?’

  ‘Usually, yeah. So where was that?’

  ‘Here. I’d just got in. Gavin rushed out when he saw me. He’s been doing that a lot lately.’

  ‘Where did he say he was going?’

  ‘To play football.’

  ‘You don’t sound convinced that he was.’

  ‘If he was, it was just in the streets, because he didn’t have his football kit or boots with him. One thing is for sure, if Dean was messing with drugs, Gavin was too.’ She gave a heartbreaking sigh. ‘That’s why Cathy doesn’t want to see me. She knows the pair of them as well as I do. That’s why, if anything like this was going to happen, I’d have sworn it would be Gavin.’

  Waters heard the quake in Ella’s voice. He couldn’t tell whether it was grief, fear, or relief that it wasn’t Gavin who’d been found in the stairwell. It was probably a combination of all three, with some guilt thrown into the mix as well.

  ‘Had you noticed any changes in him?’

  ‘He’d snapped at me a couple of times, a bit short-tempered lately, but I just put that down to him being sixteen. But when he wasn’t out he was spending more time in his room. Which wasn’t like him, there’s only one TV in the flat … maybe he was listening to his Walkman. Apart from that, he seemed normal enough. He’s got exams coming up soon. Wants to go to college. Determined, he is.’

  John Waters smiled. ‘I bet.’

  There was a pause, and Ella’s gaze turned towards the window, where there were brightly coloured drapes that let in the light but made the view of the grey blocks of the Southern Housing Estate just a little more agreeable.

  ‘I’ve heard the rumours that it’s out there … on the estate. I asked Gavin about it, but he said he hadn’t heard anything.’

  ‘You know who?’

  Ella shook her head. ‘Usually you hear things, but I haven’t heard who’s actually dealing it. It’s like everyone’s too scared to talk. And someone is making them scared.’

  John Waters wrote that down verbatim and underlined it.

  ‘How was the flight?’

  ‘Short and sweet,’ said Eamon ‘The Hook’ Hogan, as he eased himself into the back of the black BMW. Eamon had got the nickname ‘The Hook’ from his early years as a boxer: as a handy middleweight in his youth he could soak up punishment for the first few rounds, and then get them with the one left hook. The left hook became legendary. But he’d been cultivating it for years – long before he’d stepped into a boxing ring, he was exploiting its formidable power on the streets of Dublin, and on the Finglas estates in particular, ever since he first knocked out another boy at the age of eleven. The boy he knocked out was four years older, about five stone heavier and a good foot taller than young Eamon. From that day on, Hogan never took another backward step and his reputation soared.

  There were lots of apocryphal stories out there about him that he hadn’t denied or corroborated; let them talk, let them exaggerate, it all added to the myths and the legend that men in his line of work needed to cement their position.

  Eamon Hogan retired from the ring aged twenty-one with some silverware and some prize money. And although he’d been considered a real contender, there just wasn’t enough cold hard cash in it for his liking. He was always drawing a lot of publicity, publicity he began to feel he could well do without. As other ‘opportunities’ presented themselves he didn’t like seeing his face in the papers; it just wasn’t good for business.

  But even though he hadn’t laced a pair of boxing gloves in anger for twenty years, the moniker of The Hook had stuck; it had just taken on a new meaning, and a darker purpose. But then he dropped it. Though it’s seldom within the recipient’s power to drop a nickname, he never heard anyone call him that again to his face once he’d let it be known that he didn’t like it. But every now and again it cropped up in newspaper headlines, when a rival was found slumped over his steering wheel with a bullet in the back of the head, or a body was dredged from the Liffey, or a dismembered corpse was discovered in the boot of a car at Dublin airport’s long-stay car park. Then The Hook was summoned up as part of an ongoing gangland feud.

  Eamon was happy to see Colm and Shane: they were two of his most trusted lieutenants. They’d grown up together in Finglas and been with him from the start. And now that he was ‘expanding’, as he preferred to call it, and moving part of his business over to England, they were perfect for the work of setting up the ope
ration. Infiltrating the existing provincial underworld and showing them what real gangsters looked like. And Denton was perfect for Hogan’s purposes.

  Colm reached into his jacket pocket, pulled out a small velvet bag and handed it to Eamon. He took a peek inside and saw fifteen brilliant-cut diamonds sparkling away.

  ‘This is from the jewellery job.’

  Eamon grinned and handed him back the bag. ‘Nice. Very nice.’

  ‘And there’s more of that where it came from,’ said Colm.

  Eamon nodded his approval. ‘Sounds good to me, lads, as long as it doesn’t interfere with the main event. How’s it going?’

  ‘We made our presence felt, told them what we expected of them, and now it’s up and running. As far as punters are concerned, we’ve had a single casualty. The gear we sold was too strong, so we’re gonna make some adjustments.’

  Eamon shrugged. ‘Mess with drugs, that’s what happens. They’re the ones buying it, not me.’

  It was said with a coldness that left a deep silence in the car. Colm and Shane nodded along to their boss’s sentiments. Not just because he was the boss, but because it’s what they wanted to hear. His words absolved them. They were in a supply-and-demand business, they told themselves. But all three of them knew that by selling the drugs dirt cheap, they were the ones creating the demand. And when the ‘demand’ rose, so would the price of the heroin. That’s how it worked. A fail-safe business model.

  ‘It’s Melody I’m worried about,’ said Eamon. ‘She thinks we did it, you know that?’

  Shane said, ‘The minute I heard what had happened, I contacted her, said it wasn’t us.’

  Eamon weighed this up. ‘Well, it doesn’t matter what you said, she doesn’t believe us. I know George Price was a flash bastard, proved difficult in the past, but he was playing along now, thanks to Melody. So I’ll ask this only once: did you twose shoot him?’

  Almost in unison both men said no and swore their innocence. Colm added, ‘Melody had him wrapped around her little finger, he’d have done anything for her. There was no profit in us doing anything to harm him.’

  Shane said, ‘We’re looking for whoever did it, and when we find him, we’ll take his head off.’

  ‘Any clues?’ asked Eamon.

  ‘The police reckon it was some rival bookie.’

  Colm agreed. ‘He was in love with Melody apparently, crime of passion, they’re calling it.’

  Eamon gave a knowing laugh; fellas falling in love with Melody was no surprise to him. He cautioned, ‘OK, well, if that’s what it is, there’s no need for us to get involved. Leave it to the police. I need to sort this out with Melody as soon as possible. Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned, right, lads?’

  The lads agreed.

  Tuesday (3)

  Frost and Sue Clarke eased themselves into one of the six red vinyl-covered booths that lined the walls of the Pellerocco Café. The menus on the light-blue speckled Formica tables informed them that breakfast was still being served, before the dishes listed got all Italian. Frost’s favourite of these was the spaghetti with meatballs in a rich ‘secret sauce’, but it was no secret that it had plenty of strong vino in it. Angelo, the owner, full of Mediterranean bonhomie and chatting away in broken English, would grate the fresh Parmesan over your bowl at the table, to try to staunch the alcohol fumes rising up from the food. Very little work was ever achieved after a spag and meatball lunch at the Pellerocco.

  It was Angelo’s unsmiling wife who took their orders: two bacon sandwiches and teas.

  ‘Why here, the canteen’s cheaper?’ Clarke wondered.

  Frost said, ‘I prefer the levels of grease in here. The new salad bar at the canteen is having a negative effect, corrupting everything, all the grub is getting so disgustingly fat-free and healthy. I suspect it’s another of Hornrim Harry’s stupider initiatives. By the way, good work on getting that bullet.’

  ‘It was just there. No big deal.’

  Frost tutted. ‘Take credit for your work, or someone else will. Look at young DC Kevin Perks in Robbery, he takes credit for everything and makes sure I hear about it. Sometimes I think he thinks I’m deaf, the way he repeats everything to me, and very loudly. But as unsubtle and annoying as it is, it gets him noticed. He doesn’t hide his light under a bushel. There’s no profit in being humble, not if you want to make sergeant.’

  Sue Clarke considered this. ‘Thanks for the heads-up, Jack.’

  ‘I want you to stay with the George Price case – we switch off and we’ll lose him.’

  ‘Unfortunate turn of phrase.’

  ‘Eh? Oh, yeah. You know what I mean. Maybe that’s the problem, if the poor sod was switched off it would probably get higher priority. But stick with Socks and Winston, see what you find.’

  The bacon sarnies and teas arrived. Frost asked for ketchup as there was none on the table. Angelo’s still unsmiling wife reluctantly obliged with a squeezy plastic tomato, but gave them disapproving looks like they were committing some culinary crime.

  ‘Eve Hayward, she seems very proficient. What do you know about her?’

  Clarke smiled. ‘This is why we’re here, away from the prying ears of the rest of Eagle Lane. What have you heard?’

  ‘I’m asking you?’

  ‘If it’s about what I told Arthur, then I was only joking—’

  ‘What did you tell Arthur?’

  ‘Nothing, just a stupid joke. I know Eve Hayward is single, if that’s what you want to know.’

  Frost stayed deadly serious. ‘No, it isn’t. I want to know what she’s up to.’

  ‘She’s with the counterfeit-goods unit—’

  ‘So she says.’

  Clarke was about to take a bite of her sarnie, then stopped. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  ‘How about she’s part of an anti-corruption team out to nail coppers? I don’t know for sure, you never do with those slippery sods – until it’s too late. But she seems to be asking a lot of questions about everyone in our unit. I know you’ve spent time with her, what has she asked you?’

  Clarke put her bacon sandwich back on her plate, and looked like she was giving it some serious thought, as her mind scrolled back over the time she’d spent with Eve Hayward. ‘Yeah, you’re right, she does ask a lot of questions. She also knows a lot of stuff.’

  ‘Thought so. About what?’

  ‘Stuff she asks about, or stuff she knows?’

  ‘Both.’

  She shrugged. ‘About everything, you can’t really put your finger on it. She just comes across as dead confident. Seems to know everything we’re up to, makes it all seem like simple deduction.’

  ‘That’s probably because she does know everything, has a big file on all of us and the cases we’re working.’

  ‘I don’t doubt she’s with the counterfeit-goods unit, though.’

  ‘I do. I’ve never heard of anything like that.’

  ‘They’re based at West End Central.’

  ‘Yeah? Good for them. Handy for the shops, I suppose.’ Frost’s voice dripped cynicism the way his bacon sarnie was dripping grease. ‘Let’s face it, the only time we ever hear about counterfeit goods is when something dangerous turns up. You know the sort of thing: a kid’s toy with a ruddy great metal spike sticking out of it, aftershave that burns your skin off. And even then they usually just send a memo around. But with this one, Eve Hayward, I smell a rat. Has she been asking things about me?’

  ‘You think she’s running a check on Eagle Lane?’

  ‘Could be, we’ve not had a visit for a while – a good ten years.’

  ‘Even if she is, we’ve got nothing to hide, and we’re all on the same side, right?’

  ‘Don’t kid yourself, sweetheart, they’re after results like the rest of us.’

  Clarke pushed her plate away. Frost repeated his question about whether Hayward had been asking about him.

  ‘Not really, not directly. But I’ll be honest, we have spoken about you.’
>
  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘How handsome and clever you are.’

  ‘Funny.’

  ‘I don’t know, Jack … nothing bad. All good. If she is PSD she’s very clever and good at what she does. Because she’ll talk around a subject, get you to open up about things. I’ve told her everything about the George Price case. She seemed interested, especially in the horse-racing angle. And what with Michael Price working in the video shop, she was looking for a connection there with pirated videos.’

  ‘Oh yes, she’s looking for connections everywhere, and she might well be right,’ said Frost as he soaked up the rust-coloured pool of grease on his plate with the crust of his sandwich and snaffled it down. ‘OK. Well, no one’s done anything wrong or got anything to hide. So, we don’t have anything to worry about.’

  ‘Who else knows?’

  ‘No one. Because it’s not a rock-solid fact yet, just a hunch, a gut feeling. Talking about gut feelings’ – Frost aimed a nicotine-stained forefinger at Clarke’s barely dented bacon sarnie – ‘you finished with that?’

  She made a face like the stained forefinger was enough to put her off food for life. ‘Be my guest,’ she said, over her mug of tea. ‘Oh, Frank Trafford, you read his statement?’

  ‘I had a quick peruse. Says at the time of the shooting he was walking home from Radleigh races. Which would have taken him in the opposite direction from the shooting, through the woods and over the hills, leaving him up shit creek without an alibi or witnesses to his whereabouts. Right?’

  ‘That’s about it. You still want me to set up an ID parade with him?’

  ‘If we can get enough blokes with dodgy ’taches to join him.’

  ‘Tell you what, though, since his wife left him, he’s really gone downhill, I reckon. Arthur said the house was a real mess, beer bottles all over the place, chicken shit all over the carpet, and what with her being a cleaner—’

  ‘Chicken shit?’

  ‘Yeah, he keeps chickens in his back garden. He must have left the back door open. Place stank, Arthur said, it was all over the carpet, the sofa …’