A Killing Frost Part 12

Fielding paced up and down the holding cell. 'I want bail,' he told Frost. 'I'm self-employed. If I don't work the family get no money. I can't let my customers down. I need bail.'

'The magistrate might grant you bail, but I doubt it,' Frost told him. 'You rarely get bail in a murder case, even one as old as this.'

'I never killed her,' insisted Fielding.

'I'm not the jury, son, just your bog-standard "don't believe a word the b.a.s.t.a.r.d is saying" common or garden cop. Anyway, like I told you, this isn't my case. Detective Chief Inspector Skinner should be here shortly. You can tell him you didn't do it. He's a miserable sod and could do with a good laugh.'

As he was closing the cell door, he thought of the man's wife and kids. 'Get a solicitor, son. He might w.a.n.gle bail for you.'

Fielding, who had slumped down on the bunk bed, looked up, his face a picture of despair. 'I can't afford a solicitor.'

'If you ask for one, we'll get you one free,' Frost told him. 'We've got a whole list of dead-beat lawyers who don't mind losing a hopeless case just to gain experience.' Fielding's abject expression almost made him feel pity for the man. ' joking, son. They're all quite good. Just ask for one.'

He was mounting the stairs to the canteen when Wells came running after him.

'Jack!'

'Unless it's a multiple murder or some big-busted tart streaking, it can wait. I'm having my dinner,' said Frost.

'More important than both of them, Jack. Beazley's phoned about eight times. He's doing his nut.'

Frost stopped in his tracks. 's.h.i.+t!' He had forgotten all about Beazley. With a wistful glance at the canteen door, Frost turned and descended the stairs. 'Let's go and break the good news that I let his blackmailer get away with a thousand quid.'

Beazley leant back in his chair and stared at Frost, wide eyed, mouth gaping in disbelief. 'Am I hearing you right or do I need to get my bleeding ears syringed? You let the b.a.s.t.a.r.d get away with a thousand quid of my money? A thousand b.l.o.o.d.y quid? You don't do a flaming thing right. That Fortress cheque you asked for - it would have taken four days to clear so I had to transfer the money electronically. You never told me that, did you?"

'I'm sorry Mr Beazley.'

'No, I'm the one who's flaming sorry for listening to you in the first place. You were supposed to be watching the cashpoints. Where the h.e.l.l were you?'

'As I explained, Mr Beazley - ' began Frost.

Beazley cut him short. 'I don't want your b.l.o.o.d.y explanations. That's not going to get my flaming money back, is it?'

'As I explained,' repeated Frost patiently, 'the man whose card had been stolen had a spare card which he hadn't told us about. When we got the message that the card was being used, we naturally went after him.'

'He was probably a b.l.o.o.d.y decoy,' said Beazley, 'and you fell for it.'

'No, Mr Beazley. It was just our rotten luck this stupid sod presented his card a few minutes before the blackmailer.'

'Talking of stupid sods, what are you going to do about it?'

Before Frost could answer, there was a timid tap at the door.

Beazley scowled and grunted, 'Yes?'

A grey-haired lady wearing steel-rimmed gla.s.ses and carrying a shorthand notebook came in. Beazley completely ignored her. 'So what are you going to do about it?' he repeated.

'We're resuming the stake-out tomorrow night. We'll get him this time.'

'Tomorrow night? What about tonight? Are you just going to let him help himself to more of my money?'

'He's already collected today's five hundred pounds so he's got to wait until tomorrow.' Beazley glared at Frost and tugged his lower lip. 'No. I'm pulling out. I've no faith in you. Get the rest of my money back.' Then he realised the woman was standing there. 'What the h.e.l.l do you want?'

'You asked me to come in for dictation at twelve, Mr Beazley.'

'How can I give you dictation when I've got the bleeding plod here, you stupid cow? p.i.s.s off!'

As she left and Beazley turned his attention back to the DI, Frost's mobile rang.

'You asked me to ring you, Guv,' whispered Morgan.

'b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l!' Frost exclaimed loudly for Beazley's benefit. 'I'm on my way.' He clicked off. 'Sorry, Mr Beazley, we'll have to talk about this later. We've got a paedophile on the loose.'

'If you're after him, it's his lucky day. He's as safe as b.l.o.o.d.y houses,' sniffed Beazley. 'And I want my money back.'

But Frost had gone.

In the outer office, the grey-haired lady was hammering away at a keyboard. She paused and smiled up at Frost as he was pa.s.sing through. The door to Beazley's office crashed open and Beazley jabbed a finger at the woman. 'You, f.a.n.n.y. In here. I want you.' He glared at Frost. 'And stop wasting my staff's time. She's here to work, not to listen to your rubbish.' The door slammed.

'I keep getting the urge to smash your boss in the kisser,' Frost told the woman.

She gathered up her shorthand notebook and smiled sweetly. 'In the kisser, Inspector? What's wrong with in the goolies?'

He clattered down the stairs to the car park. His stomach was rumbling. A foot-down drive back to the station and up to the canteen for dinner.

He was opening the car door when his mobile rang again. It was Taffy Morgan. 'It's all right, Taff,' he said. 'It worked. I'm on my way back to the station.'

'No, it's something else, Guv,' said Taffy, sounding serious. 'The embankment next to the railway tunnel just before Denton station. A bloke's just phoned in. He reckons he's found a body.'

Chapter 6.

The man who had found the body - sharp-nosed, in his late fifties and wearing a scruffy railway-company jacket and cap - was waiting for them at the side of the road on the bridge crossing the railway line. He flagged them down. 'Are you the police? I'm Fred Daniels. It's down there.' He pointed over the side of the bridge, down to the overgrown railway embankment that hugged the railway line. He was excited, anxious to make the most of his moment of fame. 'As soon as I opened my eyes this morning, I knew something awful was going to happen, I just knew.'

I don't want your bleeding life story, thought Frost, shutting his ears and staring down at the track. He shuddered. He was sharply reminded of an earlier occasion when he'd clambered down this very embankment to view a woman's decapitated body, and the farce of having to call the police surgeon in to certify death. They never found the head. It must have been pulverised by the engine. He couldn't remember any otherdetails - one of so many cases - but the picture of that mangled, headless body was embedded in his brain.

'You all right, Guv?' Taffy Morgan was looking at him anxiously.

'Yes.' Frost turned to Daniels. 'So where is the body?'

'I'll show you.' The man scrabbled over the bridge wall and dropped down to the embankment on the other side. 'Follow me.'

Frost left Morgan to wait for the rest of the team and heaved himself over the wall.

'This way,' urged the man eagerly. 'And be careful. It's very steep. You could slide down to the railway line if you don't watch it.' He slithered down the incline, stopping at a clump of bushes and pointing. 'Behind there.'

Frost didn't need any further guidance. His nostrils twitched and he felt the first stirring of a protesting stomach. A too familiar smell: the rancid, cloying, decaying reek of death. Gingerly he made his way round the bushes. The smell hit him hard, making him gasp. He lit up a cigarette, but the smoke tasted of decomposed flesh. He tore the cigarette from his mouth and hurled it down on to the railway line.

The body was almost hidden by the overgrown vegetation. The smell was unbearable. Frost held his breath and parted the gra.s.s to look down on rotting slime that once was flesh. Human, but too decomposed to immediately ascertain the s.e.x. It had been there some time so, thank G.o.d, it wasn't Debbie Clark or Jan O'Brien. It wasn't easy to make out if the body had both feet, but it looked too decayed for the bits they had been finding to have come from it.

Stepping back, he yelled up to DC Morgan, who was in animated conversation with a young woman who seemed anxious to know what was going on. 'I don't want any b.l.o.o.d.y sightseers, Taffy. Get rid of her and come on down here.' He switched on his mobile and called the station. 'Seren-bleeding-dipity' he told Sergeant Wells. 'When you look for one body, you find a different one. It's neither of our missing girls. Get the duty doc and the full murder team down here - and tell them an empty stomach is advisable.'

He turned his attention to the railway worker. 'It's well hidden. How come you spotted it?'

'I'm working on the line down there. I wanted a slash so I nipped up here to do it behind the bushes and that's when I found it. Flaming heck. It was the last thing I expected.' His nose quivered and he screwed his face up in disgust. 'When the wind changes, you can't half smell it, can you?'

'Smell what - your pee?'

'No - the body.'

'Right. Thank you, Mr Daniels,' said Frost, anxious to get rid of him. 'When you get a chance, would you call in at Denton police station and give us a written statement - just for the record.'

'My pleasure,' said Daniels enthusiastically. 'I'll do it now. If they think I'm coming into workafter this, they're flaming well mistaken. Shaken me up rotten, this has. Like the time I tripped over a flaming body at the side of the line. Three trains had gone over it and the drivers hadn't noticed . . . How could they bleeding miss it?' He glanced at the bushes. 'At least this one is in one piece and not all mashed up in bits.'

'Yes, there's always a bright side,' agreed Frost.

A blue plastic marquee - erected with some difficulty because of the sharp slope of the embankment - had been set up over the body. Frost stuck his head inside and withdrew it quickly. The rotting-flesh smell was now concentrated inside the enclosed s.p.a.ce. He turned his attention to the team from Forensic, backs bent, white-overalled, painstakingly doing a fingertip search of the surrounding area and coming up with ma.s.ses of junk . . . spent matches, sc.r.a.ps of paper, rusty tin cans, plastic. carrier bags. All absolutely useless, but all would have to be logged and grid-referenced. All a complete waste of bleeding time.

'Jack!' Dr Mackenzie, the duty police surgeon, was making his way down the slope with much difficulty. Frost steadied him as he slid to a halt outside the marquee. 'What have you got for me?'

'I've got a body with no nose,' said Frost.

Mackenzie had heard this chestnut many times before, but he went along with it. 'No nose? How does it smell?'

'b.l.o.o.d.y horrible,' said Frost, cackling at the ancient joke.

'You'll have to get yourself some new material,' said the doctor, as Frost stood to one side to let him enter the tent first.

'This job's full of laughs,' said Frost, filling his lungs with fresh air before following Mackenzie in. 'I don't need new material.' He nodded at the body. 'It's not in tip-top condition, so I want to know if it's male or female, age, cause of death, and how long, to the nearest minute, it has been dead.'

Mackenzie, his handkerchief clapped over his mouth, took a quick look at the body. 'If you think I'm going to touch that for the sort of money the police pay me, Jack, you've got another thing coming. It's dead . . .' He bent and peered at it. 'I think it's female, probably young, but I'm not prodding about to find the cause of death. Let Drysdale enjoy himself doing that.' Drysdale was the Home Office pathologist, very much disliked by Mackenzie.

'Has she got two feet, Doc?' asked Frost.

Mackenzie blinked in astonishment. 'Eh?'

'We've been finding bits of a chopped-off foot. I want to know if it came from her.'

Mackenzie parted the overgrown gra.s.s and peered down. 'She's been chewed about by more animals than you can shake a stick at, but both feet seem to be there.'

'How long has she been dead?' asked Frost.

Mackenzie shrugged and spread his hands. 'Weeks, months - you tell me.' He looked downagain. 'There's no clothing on the body. It could have been torn off by animals or stripped before being dumped, but I'd guess he or she was stripped before being dumped here. Drysdale will tell you.'

He stepped out of the marquee and took a deep breath. 'G.o.d! Doesn't fresh air taste good? I'll send in my bill, and make certain they pay it promptly this time. They made me wait weeks for the last cheque.' He clambered up the embankment to his car.

Harding from Forensic, who was in charge of the fingertip search, approached Frost. 'We've thoroughly searched the area up to the bridge, Inspector. We've found plenty of junk, but not a sc.r.a.p of clothing. Do you want us to widen the search area?'

Frost tugged at his lower lip, then shook his head. 'No. It's my gut feeling she - if it is a she, Mackenzie wouldn't say for sure - was stripped naked before she was dumped here. My other gut feeling is that the clothes we found in the lake belong to this poor cow.' He shook a cigarette from the packet and lit up. 'Drysdale should be able to give us some idea as to how big she was and we can see if the clothing would fit.'

'I think Drysdale's retired or cutting down his hours,' Harding told him.

Frost brightened up. 'Ah well, not all bad news then.' He would have to let Dr Mackenzie know. He beckoned Morgan down.

The detective constable slithered down the embankment. 'Do you want me to get you some thing to eat, Guv?'

Frost nodded at the open flap of the tent. 'Stick your nose in there, Taff, and tell me if you feel like eating.' He looked up. A plumpish woman in her early forties, wearing slacks and a thick windcheater, had clambered over the bridge wall and was cautiously making her way down. 'Who the bleeding h.e.l.l is that, Taffy? You're supposed to be up there, stopping any fat tart who feels like it from coming down for a sniff.'

'You told me to come down here,' protested Morgan.

'I don't care what I said - get rid of her.'

Morgan clawed his way up to head her off, but to Frost's annoyance soon made his way down again with the woman in tow.

'I thought I told you to get rid of her,' hissed Frost.

'You don't know who she is, Guv. She's the new Home Office pathologist.'

Frost gaped. 'Flaming heck, Taff. There is a G.o.d after all!' He introduced himself to the woman. 'Detective Inspector Frost.'

She flashed a smile, showing perfect teeth. 'Dr Ridley. What have you got for me, Inspector?'

'We'd better look at the body first,' said Frost with a giggle. He hesitated at the flap. 'It's a bit whiffy in there.'

She opened her bag and took out a gauze mask that covered her mouth and nose, then stepped inside, her forehead wrinkling in distaste as shesaw the body. At first she seemed as reluctant as Mackenzie to actually touch it. 'Not much I can tell you until I get her on the autopsy table.'

'She?' queried Frost. 'Definitely female?'