Fatal Frost Read online

  As he got up to leave he realized what Simms had been referring to in mentioning the cat and the nasty surprise that would have greeted the girl. ‘This place that was done over on Saturday night – any progress?’

  ‘Nothing yet,’ Simms said.

  Frost lit a cigarette, his fifth of the day. ‘Hmm, a burglar with a violent dislike for animals. Perhaps he’s allergic to them, like me.’

  Tuesday (2)

  SIMMS LED THE way to the CID offices.

  Frost had now moved into Bert Williams’s old office, and Simms had reluctantly inherited his shabby chair and rickety desk. Arthur Hanlon’s absence meant that the desk opposite was also free, so Waters had a base for the time being. The office itself was filthy. It wasn’t entirely Frost’s fault – the dust-caked windows and mould on the ceiling could hardly be pinned on him – but he was infamous for being pathologically untidy. The floor was considered an extension of his desk, and scruffy piles of paper spilled across the carpet, dotted with greasy crumbs and cigarette ash. Clearly, taking his detritus with him when he moved had been too much of an effort, so he’d simply left it behind, and for Simms it was a point of principle not to clear up after Frost.

  ‘Sorry about the mess,’ he muttered.

  ‘Don’t worry, I’ve seen worse.’ Waters shrugged.

  Simms went to raise the blinds in order to open the window and let some air in. He’d not been in the office properly since Friday, and the full extent of the musty waste offended even him, although he’d managed to put up with it for a month. Perhaps it was another uncomfortable example of how Waters’ presence threw a less than flattering perspective on things. Despite his placid demeanour, Simms was convinced the taciturn officer was judging him, and he sensed he may not be coming out of it too well.

  ‘I know I’m only a guest here,’ Waters said, ‘an unwelcome one at that, but might I make a suggestion on the burglary case?’

  ‘Fire away,’ said Simms.

  ‘Maybe we should check again the method of the break-in on both of the recent cases. Apart from the dead animals, we may find other similarities.’

  ‘Already on it,’ Simms said, waving the file at the DS. ‘And no problem with making suggestions – we need all the help we can get.’ The path of least resistance – perhaps it was the best way forward. Waters was smart, and Simms could learn a lot from the more experienced man. There seemed little point trying to fight it. Besides, anything he came up with, Simms could take the credit for once the bloke returned to East London. Not that he’d have the man’s company for long, now Frost was in the frame. Simms wasn’t sure how he felt about that – should he feel slighted?

  ‘Maybe Frost has something too. This warm weather we’ve been having causes animals to moult; plays havoc with allergies.’

  ‘Yeah, maybe. Christ knows it’s been hot.’ Simms reached over the desk to whack on the fan, and opened the burglary file.

  ‘What’s Frost like to work with?’ Waters asked, intent on reminding Simms of Frost’s babysitter role, or so it seemed.

  Simms paused to consider a suitable response. ‘Well, some would say he was unorthodox,’ he said, eventually. ‘Unconventional. The super certainly thinks so,’ he added ambiguously, preferring not to indicate whether he agreed with Superintendent Mullett or not.

  Bill Wells watched a very forlorn-looking Clarke leave the building with that Kim Myles from Rimmington Division. Wells didn’t really know Myles, who was a recent recruit to Denton, but already he didn’t like the way she carried on, teasing the young lads in uniform and sashaying around the station in her short skirts. He didn’t think it appropriate, she being a detective and all.

  He watched Myles hold the door for Clarke. She wasn’t limping, she just looked sort of depressed.

  ‘These young women.’ The superintendent had appeared beside him at the front desk, tutting. ‘This would never have happened even five or six years ago.’

  ‘How do you mean, sir?’ Wells asked.

  ‘Equality for women in the police force, especially in CID, has certain ramifications.’ Mullett shook his head wistfully.

  ‘But, sir, it wasn’t a dangerous situation – it was a routine enquiry. No one could have expected—’

  But before he could make his point Mullett turned and cut him off. ‘Don’t get me wrong now, Sergeant. As far as progress and the modernization of the police force goes I’m the biggest supporter there is.’

  ‘Of course, sir. Take DS Waters …’ Bringing a black officer to Denton seemed to Wells’s mind about as ‘modern’ as you could get.

  ‘What do you mean, “take DS Waters”?’ Mullett’s brow furrowed, his beady eyes staring intently at Wells, who wished, not for the first time, that he would remember to think before he spoke. ‘DS Waters is on secondment from the Metropolitan Police as part of a new programme. It’s certainly not my doing, and a pretty ridiculous idea, if you ask me.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Wells said, fiddling with his Biro. He didn’t get the super at all sometimes.

  ‘And talking of progress, I see a skip has appeared outside, but why on earth has it been left in the senior-rank parking bays?’

  ‘A skip?’

  ‘Yes, Wells, you know what a skip is, don’t you? I’ve just seen its arrival from my office window. Why have you allowed it to be left in such a position?’

  ‘PC Pooley is coordinating …’ Wells began sheepishly, aware of how undignified his grassing-up sounded.

  ‘That boy’s hopeless, and anyway, he’s off sick. It was you I saw chatting with the tradesmen yesterday …’

  The phone trilled and Wells grabbed it as quickly as possible, cutting the superintendent off mid-flow. ‘Denton Police. Yes, wait one moment, please. It’s Mrs Mullett, sir.’

  His angry demeanour unchanging, Mullett told Wells to put the call through to Miss Smith, before turning on his heels and marching off down the corridor. Wells cursed his bad luck at being caught in the car park yesterday talking to the builders. A few words exchanged about a fire exit, and suddenly he was responsible for the entire renovation! With any luck, come tomorrow Pooley would be back to take some of the flak.

  He glanced at the lobby clock above the notice board. It was only ten o’clock. Still a long way to go, he thought, grudgingly.

  Tuesday (3)

  ‘TRUANTS AMONG FIFTH years in early May?’ The headmaster looked bemused. ‘You surprise me, Detective.’

  Clarke felt the colour rise in her cheeks. It was a daft idea. Superintendent Mullett had insisted they visit local schools and get a list of truanting kids, since both she and Myles had judged her assaulter to be about sixteen. She only hoped the old fool sitting in front of them didn’t recognize her. It had been a good few years since she’d left Denton Comprehensive, though the head was still wearing the same moth-eaten black gown he’d worn years ago. She remembered him careering around the playground like Batman, terrorizing the first years.

  ‘The older ones will have left already on turning sixteen; they’ve been dribbling out since Easter. Some return for revision classes – the more conscientious, those sitting GCEs.’

  ‘Anyone expelled? Or particularly aggressive?’ Myles asked, making the best of the situation. They’d purposely not told the school the exact reason for the visit – not that Mullett had any concern or fear on Clarke’s behalf – but he didn’t want it getting out that a Denton officer had been stabbed.

  The head shamelessly gave the female officer the once-over with his eyes. ‘Let me have a word with the heads of year, Detective …?’

  ‘Myles.’

  ‘Detective Myles,’ he repeated, a sly grin on his dried purple lips.

  Dirty old toad, Clarke thought.

  Myles pulled out of the school’s staff car park just as the bell went for mid-morning break, and like wasps from a nest that’s been poked with a stick swarms of children flew out of the building’s doors. You couldn’t blame them; it was certainly a lovely day.

  ‘Well, tha
t was a pretty pointless exercise,’ she said, lighting a Silk Cut and winding down the window.

  ‘I agree,’ Clarke said resignedly. ‘This time of year the entire country’s fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds are anywhere but in the classroom. They’re either revising for or sitting CSEs and O levels …’

  ‘Or neither – hanging around street corners, nicking stuff out of Woolies and stabbing policewomen in car parks,’ Myles said.

  Outside the gates were a bunch of lads, ties at half mast, shirts hanging out, laughing and teasing one another as they passed around cigarettes. ‘Look at them, the little sods.’ Myles grimaced. One of them blew her a kiss. ‘Enjoy it now, kiddo – it won’t be so much fun when you’re one of the three million.’

  ‘The super wants leads, but I can’t see how we’ll get anything, short of me hoiking up my skirt in assembly and calling out for someone to come forward.’

  Myles tried to remain positive. ‘We might pick up something, you never know. So, where to next?’

  ‘Mayflower Comp, I guess. Jesus, that place makes this one look like Eton – what a dump. My brother went there.’

  ‘So did I, if you don’t mind!’ said Myles briskly.

  I bet, thought Clarke.

  ‘Right,’ Frost said, starting the car. ‘We’re off to see one Harry Baskin. He owns a seedy nightclub called the Coconut Grove, and is no stranger to visits from the Old Bill. His latest venture was a hostile acquisition of the huge Chinese laundry in the middle of town …’

  ‘Ah, I heard about it yesterday morning,’ Waters chipped in. ‘Closed the laundry down and turned it into a sauna, didn’t he?’

  ‘Correct. Fair enough, really; the place was on the verge of going bust, yet another victim of the bleedin’ recession. When times are tough it’s surprising how quickly people learn how to iron their own shirts. So, Harry offers the laundry proprietor a deal – ship out to smaller premises, a new dry cleaner’s in London Street, with a few select staff, leaving him with a prime spot in town. Not a bad deal for Mr Wang. Trouble was, that leaves half the original staff on the street. Fortunately for them, kind old Uncle Harry offers to take them under his wing.’

  ‘Very generous of him,’ Waters replied knowingly.

  ‘Of course it is. Who are we to suggest he then gets them to skivvy for him around the clock while he pays them bugger all? I reckon that young Chinese lad – you know, one of the ones who got a cab from the station after the last train had arrived – could very well be on his payroll … Harry being Harry, he made sure he got the younger, fitter staff and left the oldsters to run Wang’s new set-up.’ Frost paused for a moment. ‘Harry’s not a bad lad, though. Just overreaches his natural capabilities once in a while, and that’s when we need to slap his wrist. Nothing in the league of the East End villains you must be used to. I bet you couldn’t believe your bad luck, getting sent down here!’

  ‘I didn’t get sent,’ said Waters quietly.

  ‘No?’ said Frost, surprised.

  Waters stretched uncomfortably in the car. ‘I volunteered to come here.’

  ‘Blimey! Nobody’s ever done it that way before. What on earth possessed you?’ Frost looked out on to Market Square, which they were passing, as if to confirm his view.

  ‘Needed to get out of town for a bit – you know, a change is as good as a rest, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Well yeah, but really, Denton? Surely two weeks in Marbella would’ve done the trick …’

  ‘I needed more than a fortnight on the Costa del Sol.’ He sighed. ‘I’m going through a divorce. Bit messy, to be honest.’

  ‘Sorry to hear that, pal.’

  ‘It’s cool. It’s just that until we get the settlement sorted I’m out on my ear. I’d been sleeping on mates’ couches for the last two months. So, when the Chief Constable came to the nick at Bethnal Green looking for possible candidates, my hand shot up; not that I think the “initiative” is a good thing for the black man, hell no, it sucks big time, but I felt I’d put people out enough and it would do me some good to get away from all that crap for a while. Know what I mean?’

  ‘Sure, sure, well, we’d better try and make your stay a pleasant one, eh?’ Frost smiled. ‘And here we are at Harry’s.’

  Frost had returned to the station to collect Waters as promised, in order to appease Mullett. He’d slipped out to see his colleague and friend Arthur Hanlon, though he hadn’t felt obliged to reveal this to anyone at Eagle Lane. The unmarried Hanlon had been close to his mother and her death had devastated him. Frost, having recently lost his own mother, was sympathetic up to a point, but to his mind a hasty return to work was the best medicine for bereavement. True, his own mother’s death had been a relief, coming as it did at the end of a protracted and painful illness. This was not the case for Mrs H, who apart from a brief stint last year in Denton General had seemed in the rudest of health before being struck by a heart attack. He wondered how Hanlon would cope with his grief in the months to come; as for Frost, the ongoing process of dealing with his mother’s estate had caused him more difficulties than the actual event of her death. He did not think himself cold-hearted, but was disappointed to discover that playing his mother’s jazz collection – a fond childhood memory – had proven little more than an irritant to his adult self. He couldn’t concentrate on his reading with the big-band stuff, and the lighter, softer melodies sent him to sleep. In a last-ditch attempt to connect with her memory he was in the process of making up cassettes to play in the car. He didn’t hold out much hope.

  Meanwhile, he’d left Simms with instructions to liaise with British Rail to find out if anything had been left on the train Samantha Ellis might have been on, and also to check out the second cab driver, Charlie Feltham, to try to identify those two drunk girls he’d picked up that Saturday night.

  Now Frost and Waters made their way across the pot-holed forecourt towards the tatty entrance of Coconut Grove.

  Frost had seen and heard little of Harry since last autumn. There’d not been any trouble at the club, and to all intents and purposes Baskin had been keeping his nose clean. Now the sauna had opened it was clear what he’d been up to these past six months.

  The club door was opened by a stern-looking heavy with a crewcut, but upon seeing Frost he simply nodded and stood to one side. This was a well-established ritual.

  ‘Frost! What a nice surprise. What brings you here at this time of day?’ Baskin greeted them from the corridor, seemingly about to enter his office. ‘The club isn’t actually open, but why let that stop you? I’m sure you’re up for a party whatever the time of day.’

  ‘Not me, Harry, you know that.’

  Baskin laughed a deep, gravelly laugh. ‘I would say you’re all the same, but you, Jack, are one of a kind, I’ll grant you that.’

  The two detectives followed Baskin into his den and sat down in a pair of large leather chairs, and Frost began his usual search for a light. Baskin slid a large Ronson lighter across the desk in his direction, eyeing Waters with obvious curiosity.

  ‘So, what’s up? Surely it’s not about my new place in town? A couple of your girls have already been sniffing around. There’s nothing to get worked up about; it ain’t a bloody brothel.’

  Frost exhaled and said nothing, thinking back to the events of last year.

  Baskin misinterpreted his silence as disbelief. ‘Come on – if I was interested in that sort of thing I’d run it from here, wouldn’t I? Not set up in the middle of town next door to bloody Aster’s.’ His eyes were flicking nervously between the two policemen.

  ‘Harry,’ said Frost, reaching across and squeezing Waters’ forearm firmly, ‘I’d like to introduce Detective Sergeant Waters from the Met Vice Squad.’

  ‘Bloody hell, Jack, that’s a bit heavy!’ Baskin exclaimed.

  ‘Nothing for you to worry about, Harry.’ Frost smiled. ‘It’s just a fact-finding mission; you know, information exchange, that sort of thing.’

  Baskin raised his eyebrows and mutt
ered, ‘Fact finding,’ as he weighed up the possible implications. Still looking uneasy, he twisted open a cigar case that resembled a torpedo and silently offered one to Waters.

  ‘Don’t mind if I do. These look like quality.’

  ‘Cuban.’ Baskin nodded, relief washing over his features. Frost knew his reasoning; if the man could appreciate a good cigar, then he couldn’t be all bad.

  ‘Romeo and Juliet, Churchill’s favourite,’ said Frost, stubbing out the Rothmans which appeared like a child’s sweet cigarette in comparison.

  ‘Really?’ said Baskin with genuine interest. ‘Well, I never. Great man. Great man.’

  ‘I wouldn’t get carried away. I imagine that’s all you’ve got in common – though you could probably match his post-war waistline. Listen, I’m not interested in your sauna place, Harry. I’m sure there’s nothing going on there apart from the odd Sunday-school lesson.’

  ‘Knew you’d see it that way, Jack.’

  ‘No, I’m not interested in that,’ Frost said, taking a sip of the single malt Baskin had just poured, ‘though the super has other ideas. You know how it is with him, mixing in powerful circles, playing golf with important people. The manager of the bank next to Aster’s, for example. He doesn’t want anything unsightly within teeing-off distance of Market Square. The super takes these things very personally.’

  ‘Well, you tell him, Jack, I’ve taken that on board and I’ll see him right.’ Baskin paused for second. ‘So, if you’re not here about that, then what are you here about?’

  ‘A Chinese lad got a taxi from the station to Market Square on Saturday night. I’m guessing he works for you.’

  Baskin looked momentarily stumped. ‘What makes you say that?’

  ‘The sauna, it used to be a Chinese laundry. We believe you “inherited” a number of the staff …’

  ‘Maybe.’ Baskin shrugged non-committally. ‘But I don’t have a monopoly on employing Chinamen. There’s that Chinky opposite the Cricketers, for starters.’