R. Wingfield - Hard Frost

"The bad news is that Inspector Allen has been seconded to Greenford as acting chief inspector and I'm in charge of this missing boy enquiry. You are looking for Bobby Kirby, aged seven. You all have a photograph and a description. His parents have split up and he lives with his mother and her boyfriend. Last night the mother and the boyfriend nipped out to the pub for a quick one, leaving the kid alone in the house. When they returned just after ten, the kid wasn't there. Apparently he sneaked out with his guy to collect money. About eleven o'clock last night we found the guy behind a pile or rubbish bags stacked in a shop doorway in Patriot Street. Next to the guy was a boy's body in a rubbish sack. The boy, aged around seven or eight, had been chloroformed and gagged with plastic masking tape and had choked on his own vomit. He was naked, but there was no sign of sexual assault. The boy was not Bobby Kirby and up to now he has not been reported as missing so we don't know who he is. We'll be checking with schools as soon as they open. So our task is twofold. To find Bobby and to find out all we can about the dead boy."

He deliberately didn't say anything about the severed finger. There'd be floods of hoax calls and fake confessions and he wanted there to be something that only the real murderer would know.

"About half an hour before he died, the boy ate a hamburger. It's going to be a bloody waste of time, but we've got to check all the fast food joints in Denton and ask if they remember serving something as unusual as a hamburger to the boy in the photograph around, say, four to five o'clock. I'm sure this will give us about three hundred useless leads, but it's got to be done. Any questions?"

A duffle-coated PC from Lexton Division put up his hand. "You think there's a connection between the dead boy and Bobby?"

"The dead kid was found next to Bobby's guy. That's the only connection we've got at the moment. It could be a coincidence, but it's good enough for me. I say there's a connection." He looked around. No-one else had any questions. "Right. You've been allocated your search areas, so the very best of luck."

He watched them file out clutching the copies of the photographs. He was hoping for the best, but he had a nasty feeling at the pit of his stomach that they were not going to find anything.

Phones in the incident room were ringing non-stop. The TV appeal for Bobby's return made by his distraught parents, the tear-stained mother with her husband's arm firmly around her, Terry Green and the Chinese nurse tactfully absent, had provoked a terrific response from people convinced they had seen Bobby. None of the leads seemed very hopeful, but all would have to be followed up.

In the same TV bulletin, a photograph of the dead boy was shown with a statement that the police were anxious to identify him. No mention was made of the fact that he was dead, nor that there might be a connection with Bobby.

DC Burton, his ear sore from being constantly pressed against the phone, scribbled some details and thanked the caller. He tossed the form into the main collection basket.

"Any news from Forensic?" asked Frost, dropping in the chair next to him.

"Nothing worth having. The masking tape on the boy's face is run of the mill stuff and there were no prints on it. The cotton wool is a standard type. The plastic bag round his hand came from Bi-Wize supermarket and there were no prints on the rubbish sack the body was in."

"If we didn't have a Forensic Department," said Frost, 'how would we know we had sod all to go on? What about the prints on the other rubbish sacks?"

"The only prints found so far came from the shop staff."

"This bloke is too bloody clever to leave prints," said Frost gloomily. He glanced up at the clock. Nine twenty-five. The kid had been dead for some sixteen hours and no-one had yet reported him missing. "Who's in charge of checking the schools?"

"Wonder Woman. She's in Mr. Allen's office."

"Right, son." Frost pushed himself up from the chair. "Let's go and see what she's got if you'll pardon the expression,"

Bill Wells was distributing the internal mail. From force of habit he knocked on the door of Inspector Allen's office and a red light signalling "Wait' flashed. Dutifully, he waited. Then a green light bade him "Enter'. He went in and stared goggle-eyed. Sitting at Inspector Allen's desk as if she owned the bloody place was Liz bloody Maud. The cow! Flicking the switch to make him wait. Who the hell did she think she was?

She didn't look up, just waggled her finger at the in-tray. "In there, please." Fuming, Wells flung the mail in. As he reached the door, she called him. "Sergeant!"

He turned. She was holding up a red folder and beckoning for him to come over. "Do you mind taking this to MrMullett?"

"Yes, I bloody well do mind," he snapped, and his slamming of the door echoed around the building.

Liz shrugged. She knew Wells resented her. Well, he would just have to learn to start taking orders from a woman, because her immediate aim was to be made up to acting detective inspector during Allen's absence. She had seen Superintendent Mullett and explained why she was the most suitable person for the temporary promotion. He had nodded vigorously and agreed wholeheartedly with everything she had said. "The decision is not up to me," he had told her, 'but it will receive my strongest personal recommendation." As she didn't yet know Mullett very well, she believed him.

Spluttering with indignation, Wells buttonholed Frost as he came out of the murder incident room and poured out his moans about Liz Maud. "In Allen's office and with the red light on."

"Perhaps she's turning it into a knocking shop," suggested Frost.

But Wells was too angry for jokes. "Who the hell does she think she is? She's only a flaming sergeant and she's acting like a…" He stopped open-mouthed as the almost unthinkable thought struck him. "Flaming hell, Jack. You don't think she's going to be made up to acting DIdo you?"

"Could be," said Frost. "I saw her coming out of Mullett's office with her knickers in her hand."

"I wonder she wears any," snarled Wells, stamping off. "I bet that's how she was made up to sergeant."

Frost went into Allen's office without knocking although the red light was on. "What news from the schools?" he asked.

"Five boys in the right age group didn't attend for lessons today," she told him. "Three they know about — one to the dentist, one in hospital and one the mother phoned through this morning to say he had a cold…"

"Check that one," said Frost. "The mother could be lying. What about the other two?"

"I've sent Collier round to the houses. I'll let you know as soon as he reports in."

Ten o'clock. A lull in the incident room. The phones had stopped ringing and Frost was sitting on the corner of a desk, watching Liz who was stretching across to stick coloured pins into the wall maps, to mark the progress of the various search parties, and was showing lots of leg into the bargain. "I wouldn't mind sticking something in her," he murmured to Burton.

Progress was slow. Everything up to now was negative. The five boys who were away from school had all been accounted for. The fingerprints on the rubbish bags all came from the shop staff, except for two which were too blurred to provide any positive identification but like the others probably came from a shop assistant. The little Chinese nurse was reported to be very fond of Bobby and wouldn't lift a finger to harm him. A missing boy and a dead boy and no leads to follow on either.

The phone rang. He looked up hopefully, but it was Mullett asking for a progress report.

"Tell him it consists of two words," grunted Frost, 'and the second is "all"!"

"Still following up leads, sir," translated Liz. "We'll let you know as soon as we have something positive." She went back to her wall map.