Frost 5 - Winter Frost

by R D Wingfield

  She raised her eyes to the ceiling. 'More bleeding questions!'

  'Yes, more bleeding questions,' snapped Frost. 'You told me Jenny was wearing a greeny-blue dress when she went to school yesterday. The school tell us she was wearing a red woollen dress.'

  She tugged the cigarette from her mouth so she could cough better. 'A red dress?' she spluttered. 'The silly sods don't know what they're talking about. she hasn't got a red dress.'

  'The poor little mite has only got one dress,' put in the Nan. 'When did you last buy her anything new?'

  'She don't go without, and if she had a red dress I'd be the first to know.'

  'Was she wearing the blue dress when she came home for her lunch yesterday?' asked Frost.

  'I suppose so.'

  Frost stared up at her. 'What do you mean, you suppose so?'

  'I wasn't here when she came in for lunch. I was at Bingo.'

  'You told me the last time you saw her was yesterday lunchtime.'

  'I didn't actually see-her. I left her money for chips. When I came back the money was gone, so I knew she'd been home.'

  'But you are sure she was wearing the blue dress when she went off to school yesterday morning?'

  'She must have done, it's the only dress she's got. I've been trying to save up for something new, but money's tight.'

  'Not tight when it comes to bloody Bingo,' said the Nan.

  Frost knuckled the weariness from his eyes. 'Must have done?' he echoed. 'You saw what she was wearing, surely?'

  'I didn't actually see her. I was still in bed. She gets her own breakfast.'

  Frost stared in disbelief. 'She gets her own breakfast? A seven-year-old kid gets her own breakfast while her mother pigs it in bed?'

  She folded her arms defiantly. 'You're here to find my kid, not give me a moral bleeding lecture.'

  'Just for the record,' said Frost, 'when did you last see your daughter?'

  'Night before last. She watched telly, then went up to bed.'

  'As recently as that?' shrilled the Nan in mock disbelief. 'It's a wonder you'd still recognize her. Why did you pack her off to my place yesterday? I suppose that lousy boyfriend was coming round again.' She turned to Frost. 'That bastard was always hitting that kid - the times she's come round to me, crying her eyes out.'

  Frost turned to the mother. 'His name and address?'

  'No,' she shrieked. 'He doesn't want to get involved.'

  'Well, he bloody well is involved,' yelled Frost back. 'Name and address, please.'

  'Dennis Hadleigh, Flat 2, Peabody Estate.'

  'And what does he do, apart from hitting seven-year-old kids?'

  'He's a lorry driver.'

  Frost scribbled the details down on the back of his cigarette packet and stood up. 'I want to search the house.'

  'Search the house?' Her voice went up an octave. 'Do you think I've done her in?'

  'She could have got herself locked in a cupboard, or something,' explained Frost. 'It has happened.'

  'Don't you think I'd know if she was in the house?'

  'You don't know where she is half the time,' sniffed the Nan. 'You and that bastard could be having it away while Jenny was dying in the loft.'

  Hands on hips, the woman glared down at her mother. 'I've just about had enough of your innuendoes, mother,' she snarled. 'Either you keep your mouth shut or you get out of my house.'

  Shutting his ears to the in-fighting, Frost went to the front door and called in the rest of the team who were waiting in cars outside and got them to search the house and the small back garden. Jerking his head for Morgan to follow, he returned to the two women. 'Which is Jenny's room?'

  It was at the top of the stairs. They squeezed past Jordan who was heaving Simms up through a trap door into the loft. A small room, still decorated with Little Bo-Peep nursery paper. There was a single bed, neatly made with folded pyjamas on the pillow, a pink-painted chest of drawers on which stood a twelve-inch black and white television set and, on the other side of the bed, a white Melamine wardrobe.

  Frost lit up a cigarette and parted the curtains to the sash window to look down on the small back yard where a uniformed officer, his torch cutting through the darkness, was prodding amongst the long, uncut grass. He shuddered at the feeling he had had so many times before. A cold, empty room. The room of a child who was not coming back.

  Morgan pulled out the bed to make certain there was nothing underneath, then opened up the wardrobe where a few items of child's clothing swung from hangers. On the floor of the wardrobe were some down-at-heel shoes and a pile of well-read children's books.

  Frost went through the chest of drawers. More clothes, all neatly folded, balled pairs of socks, handkerchiefs, knickers, everything he would expect to find. A nagging buzzing at the back of his brain was telling him he was missing something, but he couldn't think what it was.

  Morgan had dragged the wardrobe away from the wall. 'Guv, look at this.' Hidden behind the wardrobe were some expensive children's annuals. They looked brand new. 'Get Fanny up here,' he told Morgan.

  The woman came up and leant, arms folded, against the door frame. 'Found her in the wardrobe, have you?'

  Touching them only by the edges, Frost held up the books. 'Did you buy her these?'

  She fanned away cigarette smoke and squinted at them. 'No, I didn't. Where did they come from?'

  'Stuck behind the wardrobe.'

  'The little moo - she must have nicked them.'

  'Perhaps,' said Frost, laying the books carefully on the bed. He snapped his fingers, suddenly realizing what it was that had been worrying him. He flung open the wardrobe door and waved a hand at the hangers. 'You said she usually wore this greeny-blue dress . . . Is it any of these?'

  She stared at the row of coats and cardigans and sniffed disdainfully. 'Do they look like flaming blue dresses?'

  'When she came back from school the day before yesterday, was she wearing the blue dress then?'

  'Of course she was.'

  'You actually saw her with it on?'

  'Yes. Why are you asking?'

  'Because it's not here,' said Frost, 'that's why.' She didn't understand what the hell he was talking about, but sod her. 'Where would she have put it if it wanted washing?'

  'In the linen basket next to the washing machine.'

  'Go with her and see if it's there,' Frost told Morgan. He sat on the bed and waited, but he guessed what the answer would be. He looked round the room, bed made, pyjamas folded . . . The poor kid must have done all that herself, certainly not that slut of a mother. A thudding up the stairs as Morgan returned.

  'Not there, guv.'

  Frost yelled out to his team. 'Look out for a kiddy's blue dress . . . If you find any items of kid's clothing, I want to see them.'

  He sat on the bed in the cold, scarf tight round his neck, and smoked some more, getting up to flick the ash out of the window, not wanting to mess up the kid's neat and tidy little room.

  At last, dirty and dishevelled, the team filed in. 'The kid's not here, and no sign of any clothes," announced Jordan.

  Frost nodded. He expected nothing else. 'Someone's got her, and I've a nasty feeling in my water it's the same bastard who got Vicky.' He jerked a thumb at the books on the bed. 'Put them in an evidence bag. I want them checked for prints. She might have nicked them, but on the other hand some nice kind dirty bastard of a man might have given them to her as a little present . . . "and don't tell your mum, love . . ." If she left for school wearing a blue dress and turned up in a red one, she must have stopped off on the way to change clothes, perhaps at the house of the nice kind man who gave her the books.' He felt himself go cold as he said it. 'My gut feeling is she's dead, but let's hope my track record holds and I'm wrong. Let's get a search going. It's freezing out there, so the sooner we start, the better.'

  He clicked on his mobile phone and called the station. 'I want every available man in on this search, Bill - off-duty men as well.'

  'Have you cl
eared it with Mullett?' asked Wells.

  'I'll clear it with him,' said Frost. 'And get the underwater team to stand by. We'll start dragging the canal tomorrow.'

  The search was already under way as he drove back to the station. He could see the beams of torches cutting through the dark of Denton Woods. 'Shouldn't we start dragging the canal tonight?' Morgan asked.

  'If she's in the canal, she's dead,' said Frost bluntly. I'm never in a hurry to find a kid's dead body.' He turned the heater up. It was cold in the car, but a damn sight colder out in the open. If the kid was out there . . . in the dark . . .

  As they drove past King Street he noticed there were very few toms out. Not the cold that was keeping them in. They had heard about the body found the previous night. Too many bloody cases, too few men and too little time.

  'Guv . . .' Morgan was dragging him from his reverie. 'Radio, guv.'

  It was Bill Wells. 'Jack . . . Just had a phone call. A man reckons his eleven-year-old son has gone missing. The kid goes to the same school as the two missing girls!'

  Shit, thought Frost. It never rains but it bleeding buckets down. He took the address. 'We're on our way . . .'

  Chapter 8

  The door was opened by WPG June Purdy, a bouncy little brunette in her mid-twenties. Frost was glad Morgan wasn't with him. The DC would have been panting all over her like a dog on heat. He wouldn't mind doing a bit of panting himself, but this wasn't the time. 'Fill me in, love,' he asked.

  'Eleven-year-old Tony Scotney. Went to school today as usual, never came home for his tea, and they haven't seen him since.' She was not one to waste words.

  Frost rammed a cigarette in his mouth. 'Why didn't they report it earlier?'

  'They suspected he'd sneaked off to the cinema straight from school . . . he's done it before, apparently.'

  She led Frost into the living-room where the father, dark-haired, early forties, a permanent frown creasing his forehead, was pacing up and down. The mother, a few years younger, sat huddled up in an armchair, biting her lip to stop the tears and drumming her fingers incessantly.

  'For God's sake, stop that,' snapped her husband. He looked up anxiously as Frost came in. 'Any news?'

  'We're still looking,' said Frost. He hadn't organized a separate search, but the teams searching for the girl had been alerted. 'We need a photograph.'

  Silently, the mother handed over a photograph taken at the school around the same time as that of the missing Jenny Brewer. A boy, dark-haired like his father with a hint of devilment in his eyes. He stuffed it in his pocket. No-one was inviting him to sit, so he plonked himself down in a chair near the fire and loosened his scarf. 'I understand Tony's done this son of thing before?'

  'He's never stayed out this late,' said the woman.

  'The little sod,' shouted his father. I'll wring his bloody neck.' He stopped as worry overcame anger, then took his wife's hand and patted it gently.

  'When did you last see Tony?' asked Frost.

  The mother answered him. 'Lunchtime. He wanted to see the new Walt Disney at the Regal, but he was rude to me, so I said no. He started shouting at me and stamped off.'

  'You've checked with his friends?'

  'The first thing I did,' said the father. 'He left them after school and told them he was going to see the film.'

  'Would he have had the money to go?'

  The mother shook her head. 'I wouldn't give it to him. In the past he would have taken it from my purse when I wasn't looking, but now I don't give him the chance . . . I always keep it with me.'

  'You're sure there was nothing missing from your purse today?'

  'Positive. There were only notes in it and they're still all there.'

  'You checked with the cinema?'

  'Of course I did,' snapped the father. 'Went with the manager and we looked everywhere . . . he wasn't there.' He stared at the floor and shook his head. 'The little sod. If he's doing this just to teach us a lesson, I'll . . ." He left the sentence hanging and sprang to his feet, glaring at Frost. 'Questions, questions, questions. You won't find him with bloody questions. I'm going out to look for him.' He barged out and they heard the front door slam.

  'I'm sorry he's so rude,' said his wife. 'He's worried sick.'

  Frost nodded sympathetically. He was bloody worried too. Two kids missing the same day. A paedophile gang operating in Denton? God, he hoped not. He shuddered at the thought, but kept his voice casual, trying to think of words to reassure her. 'We deal with missing children all the time, Mrs Scotney. The parents worry themselves sick, then nine times out of ten the kid comes swaggering back, as bold as brass.'

  'But why would he stay out so late?'

  'Perhaps he's afraid of what his father might do to him?' suggested Frost.

  She shook her head and sniffed back her tears. 'His father's all talk . . . he threatens, but doesn't do anything. I sometimes think it would be better if - ' The phone cut her short. With a gasp of hope, she snatched it up. 'Yes . . . ?' Her face fell. 'No, mother, still no news . . . Please stay off the line.' She hung up. Her shoulders shook. She was crying.

  Frost squeezed her shoulder. 'Don't worry, love. Tony's going to be all right, just you wait and see.' Empty words. How the hell did he know? But she knuckled away her tears and smiled bravely as if she believed him

  He pulled the WPG to one side and lowered his voice. 'Stay with her, and while you're here, give the place a thorough going-over. The little sod could well be hiding somewhere just to pay them back.'

  He let himself out. A heavy clammy mist was forming. Just the thing for a night bloody search. As he climbed in the car and turned up the heat, his radio buzzed. Bill Wells from the station. 'Didn't want to call you while you were in the house, Jack, in case the parents overheard. We think we've found the boy.'

  Frost's stomach tightened into a hard knot. The sergeant's tone made it clear this was bad news. 'You think we've found him?'

  'Kid answering his description taken to Denton Hospital. Victim of a hit and run . . .'

  'Shit! Where did it happen?'

  'The slip road running along Denton Woods.'

  'Denton Woods? What the hell was he doing there?'

  'No idea. We had a call from a motorist, wouldn't give his name. He told us where to find him. Said the kid ran straight out in front of his car, didn't give him a chance.'

  'And how is the boy?'

  'He's in intensive care, Jack. They don't expect him to pull through.' Wells paused. 'Someone's got to break the news to the parents.'

  Frost looked back at the house. He didn't want to go back in there with this sort of news. 'A road accident? Traffic should do it.'

  'With the search for the girl, we're thin on the ground, Jack - and you are on the spot.'

  'Yes. Always in the right place at the wrong bleeding time.'

  'Then you'll do it?'

  'Yes, anything for a laugh.'

  He took one last drag on his cigarette, pitched it out into the darkness, then went back to the house and jammed his thumb in the doorbell.

  PC Jordan bumped the area car along the pot-holed short cut which would take them out of the woods and back on to the main road. He and Simms should have had their meal break half an hour ago but this hit and run accident had held them up. The mist was thickening and visibility shrinking fast. Simms had his head stuck out of the side window to ensure they didn't end up in the ditch running alongside the lane. Suddenly he pulled in his head. 'Stop the car!'

  Jordan braked. 'What is it?'

  'A car, no lights, parked among the bushes.'

  Jordan groaned. 'Top bleeding marks for observation.' His stomach was rumbling, begging for food. 'All right, but let's make it quick. I'm starving.'

  They climbed out and walked back to a dark grey BMW, not more than a year old. The doors were locked and no sign of the driver. Simms felt the bonnet. 'It's not been here long.'

  'Joy-rider?' suggested Jordan.

  'Joy-riders don't lock the bleeding
thing up when they leave it. Better check it out.' While Jordan radioed Control Simms shone his torch inside. A mobile phone on the passenger seat next to a briefcase, nothing else.

  'Not reported stolen,' said Jordan, giving the tires a perfunctory kick. 'Can we go and get something to eat now?'

  'The owner probably doesn't know it's missing yet,' said Simms. 'You don't abandon an expensive motor like this in the middle of the woods.'

  'Perhaps it broke down?'

  'He's got a mobile phone. He'd phone for assistance and wait in the warm.' He lifted his hand for silence. 'Did you hear that?'

  From behind some bushes, a groan then the sound of someone being violently sick.

  'Just what I wanted to give me an appetite for my supper,' moaned Jordan.

  They waited by the BMW until a short, pasty-faced man in his early thirties, wearing a sheepskin-lined leather jacket, staggered from the bushes, wiping his mouth with a handkerchief and dabbing sweat from his forehead. He started when he saw the two policemen, but managed to force a weak grin. 'I've been sick,' he explained.

  'So we heard,' said Simms, holding out a hand. 'Driving licence, please, sir.'

  The licence confirmed that the man was Patrick Thomas Morris, the registered owner of the car. Hoping that was the end of it, Jordan edged back to the area car, but Simms hadn't finished. His nose twitched. 'Have you been drinking, sir?'

  The man looked even more unhappy. 'Drinking? No - a beer . . . just one beer . . .'

  'I'm sure you're right, sir,' said Simms, 'but I'm sure you want us to check.' He fetched a breathalyser. Jordan watched anxiously while Morris blew into the mouthpiece. Let it be negative, he pleaded silently. I want my flaming supper. He suppressed a groan as the crystals changed colour.

  Simms showed it to the man. 'More than one beer, sir - you must have miscounted. I'm afraid you will have to accompany us back to the station.'

  'No - please.' The man was clasping his hands together beseechingly. 'I only had one beer while I was driving, I swear. But I then felt sick, so I stopped and took a sip of brandy to settle my stomach.' He pulled a flask from his hip pocket to show them. 'I wasn't going to drive any more. I was going to sleep it off in the car, I swear.'