R.D. Wingfield - Frost at Christmas

He showed it to Frost.

"I used to have hair like that, son-it drove the girls mad." He read the inscription on the back. "Balder now-me and him both. Who's Rose-his wife?"

"I haven't come to that yet, sir." Digging deeper, Clive unearthed another photograph, the original of the one they had seen earlier on the front page of the Denton Echo. A full description was on the back. "Timothy Fawcus, aged 38, height 5' 11", weight 12 stone 4 lbs., sallow complexion, receding hairline, dark hair, thin features. Appendix scar. Tattoo on right wrist, 'Rose' in a red heart."

Frost pursed his lips. "The ubiquitous Rose. I hope she doesn't turn out to be a bloody sledge, or something, like in that Orson Welles film."

"Citizen Kane, sir-the sledge was called Rosebud."

The inspector chucked his expense claim over for Clive to check the totals. "That description might have been all right at the time, but when your suspect has been rotting in the ground for more than thirty years it doesn't do much, for your tattoos and receding hairline. Still, we'll get it over to Forensic, and they can see if it fits."

"What about checking on the broken arm, sir? And there's the dental chart, of course. If we had that we could compare it with the skull's teeth."

"You're blinding me with science, son. But that'll be your job for tomorrow. Try and trace Fawcus's doctor and dentist. Now what have you found?"

It was a photograph of a young, wide-eyed girl with a Judy Garland hairstyle-Rose Fawcus, the missing man's wife. Her address was shown as No. 172 Longley Road, Denton.

"She won't be there any more," said Frost. "It's being pulled down for the new public library."

The next photograph was of a bright-eyed lad in his teens. The label on the back said "Rupert Garwood. Junior Clerk, Bennington's Bank". The hospital doctor's report was attached. The skull had been fractured but would mend. Garwood was now back as Assistant Manager, Frost remembered. They'd see him first thing in the morning.

And then he realized they were messing about with this ancient, long-forgotten case which had nothing to do with Tracey Uphill, missing since Sunday. He looked through the window. Outside a muffled figure was walking across the car park, treading gingerly and leaving no footprints. The snow was polished glass, frozen solid. Frost shivered. Continue the search the next morning and if they didn't find the stiff, frozen body then, perhaps they'd find it the following day.

He'd had enough. On with the scarf and overcoat. "Pack it in, son-we're going home."

Clive needed no second bidding. He slammed the file shut and rammed it in a drawer, then cannoned into Frost who had stopped dead.

"Good Lord, son. I've just realized. No wonder we've been so lucky. Do you know what today is? It's my birthday."

And it was… at least up to midnight it was. And no one to remember, no one to send him a card.

"Many happy returns," said Clive, hoping this didn't mean they couldn't go home.

But Frost was already off on his record-breaking trot along the echoing corridor, pausing to poke his head round the door of Control. "If Detective Sergeant Hanlon radios in for me, bung out a call on my personal radio. I'm off home."

In the lobby, Henderson was taking details from a man whose car had been stolen. He gave them a cheerful wave.

Outside the night was bitter with air so cold it scoured the lungs. Frost took the driving seat, spun the car into a U-turn, and crawled over gleaming ice to the main road.

"Just a short detour, then I'll drop you off, son." dive's heart missed a couple of beats. He knew the inspector's short detours. But they didn't go far. Down some sideroads leading out of the High Street into a darkened turning without street lights, where Frost halted in front of a black row of blind-windowed terraced houses.

"Longley Road," he announced.

This was where Fawcus had lived back in 1951. Clive looked hard at the houses and realized they were derelict, windows covered with sheets of corrugated iron, heavy planks nailed over doors bearing cryptic messages-Gas Off, Water Off, Electricity Off.

Frost walked up the crumbling steps of No. 172 and peeped through the letterbox into pitch blackness smelling of damp plaster and sodden mattresses.

"No one at home, son. Still, we've got a key." And he produced from his pocket the keyring found in the earth beneath the skeleton. He poked a key in the lock. A click and the lock mechanism turned, but the door, gripped by six-inch nails, held firm. Frost put the key back in the pocket.

"So it fits, sir," said Clive, trying to sound impressed.

The inspector grinned. He was pleased with himself. "Looks like it, doesn't it, son? So this is where our skeleton lived back in 1951." He looked into the barrenness of the street. "And now he's dead, and the whole bloody street's dead and whoever shot his brains out and chopped off his arm is probably dead." He shrugged and descended the steps. "There used to be a little newspaper shop on that corner where I bought my comics when I was a kid. Now I'm a bloody comic myself."

He dropped Barnard at his digs a little after 2:15 p.m. "You can have a lie-in tomorrow, son. I won't be round for you until eight o'clock."

Clive staggered to the door, his sleep-weary brain calculating he would be getting less than five and a half hours sleep, if he was lucky. Actually he was going to be very lucky and would get far less sleep than basic mathematics suggested. Frost noticed the bedroom curtains twitch as the car door slammed and caught a brief glimpse of auburn hair and naked flesh.

He sighed. There'd be no one waiting for him when he got back. His house would be as cold and dead as Longley Road. Gas Off, Electricity Off, Naked Women Off. He remembered he was expecting to hear from Detective Sergeant Hanlon about the bank decoy job, and radioed Control who hadn't any news. The lights went on in Barnard's window. Feeling like a Peeping Tom, Frost saw two shadows merge, then the light went out. That decided him. It is my birthday, he told himself, slamming the car into gear and roaring eastward toward Bath Road, which the Council had newly garnished with salt. He pressed his foot down and the car leaped forward and telegraph poles swished past, his speedometer needle flickering near its limit. That's right, kill yourself on your bloody birthday!

He nearly missed the turn-off. Down the bumpy lane with the car bucking and rearing as it found all the ruts and potholes. Half way down he stopped and switched off the engine. The house was a black lump where the lane turned, but in spite of the late hour a hopeful light gleamed in a downstairs room.

A moment of indecision, then he was out of the car, head down into the stinging wind, floundering ankle deep in snow. The front gate etched a curved groove when he pushed it and deep footsteps followed him up the path. He jabbed the doorbell. A pause. A woman's voice called, "Who is it?"

"Jack Frost"

"Good God!" Bolts were drawn and the door opened. She was wearing a dressing gown, the glass in her hand half full. "What the hell do you want?"

"Just popped round to say hello," said Frost.

"What? At 2:30 in the morning? Well, you've said it. Now you can pop off home again."

"Oh!" said Frost, crestfallen.

"All right, come in. Quick, before I freeze to death."

He stepped into a hothouse. The front door slammed on the snow, on Tracey, Mullett, the skeleton, and the entire outside world.

She led him through to the lounge, dimly lit and thickly carpeted, a hi-fi unit in the corner oozing syrupy late-night music. A soft, chocolate brown studio couch absorbed the heat of a gas fire.

"Well, now you're here you might as well take off your coat."

He shrugged off his coat, stuck his scarf in the pocket, and went to the little cloakroom just off the hall. When he returned she was sitting on the studio couch, her head on one side, watching him. "I've poured you a drink." He flopped down beside her and took the well-filled glass from the sidetable.