wait for it — a dollop of brown sauce.’
The plump blonde WPC pulled a face. ‘I had that for dinner yesterday.’
‘If you get raped and strangled, we’ll know there’s a connection.’ He studied the report again. ‘Paula must have had another meal. She’d never have eaten all that for breakfast.’
‘She was a growing girl,’ suggested Burton. ‘You’d be surprised what kids eat these days.’
‘She died within half an hour of eating,’ Frost reminded him. ‘The meal wasn’t fully digested. I saw it. I can show it to you if you don’t believe me.’ At Burton’s shuddering refusal, he continued. ‘If she had eaten it at home, she would have to be dead by half-past seven.’
‘We’ve got a witness who saw her at 8.15,’ said Burton.
‘Either the witness is lying, or mistaken, or Paula had another meal. A hot, cooked meal.’ He opened up the package. ‘I hope this isn’t the bloody stomach contents.’ They backed away as he plunged his hand inside but it was a polythene bag he pulled out. Inside were the shoes found on the body. He gave them to the blonde WPC and asked her to send them to Forensic. And that reminded him. ‘Bloody hell — I forgot to ask Forensic to send Drysdale the knife from last night’s stabbing.’
‘Already done,’ said Gilmore. What an inefficient lout the man was.
Frost nodded his thanks. Naked, but wearing shoes. Ate a hot meal. You couldn’t force a kid to eat. She must have gone willingly with her killer and that tended to rule the bald plumber out. But Mullett said they shouldn’t spend time on this case. Leave it for whizz-kid Allen. Sod Mullett. He’d do things his way. ‘Come on, the pair of you,’ he told Gilmore and Burton. ‘Let’s drive over the route she took for her paper round.’
There were a number of strange cars in the car park. Of course. Mullett’s press conference must be in full swing. Mullett would be telling them all about the suspected rape and he hadn’t broken the news to Paula’s parents yet. ‘We’ll call on them first,’ he said. ‘Let’s get it bloody over.’
Burton waited in the car and watched Gilmore and the inspector make the short dash through the rain to the Bartletts’ house. The girl’s father, who answered their knock, was stooped and grey-faced and seemed to have aged some ten years since the previous night. He showed them into the living-room where his wife sat staring into empty space. She forced a ghost-smile of greeting. Frost stood uneasily by the door, not knowing how to begin.
‘Would you like a cup of tea?’ Mr Bartlett asked them.
‘We’d love one,’ Frost replied, hoping the mother would leave the room to make it. He wanted her out of the way while he broke the news of the sexual assault to her husband. But she sat, staring, unseeing, and didn’t move.
Her husband touched her shoulder. ‘Tea for you, love?’ She shook her head.
Frost left Gilmore to keep the woman silent company and followed the man into the kitchen. Bartlett filled an electric kettle from the tap. ‘She’s been like this ever since we heard.’
‘There’s something I must tell you,’ said Frost. He steeled himself to deliver the blow. The father steeled himself to receive it. ‘Your daughter was sexually assaulted before she died.’
The hand holding the kettle shook violently, splashing water all over the tiled floor. Gently, Frost took it from him and guided him towards a chair. Sobs, racked the father’s body.
His face sharing the man’s pain, Frost could only watch and wonder what the hell to say next. The sobbing brought Mrs Bartlett into the kitchen. She cradled her husband’s head in her arms and held him tight. ‘What is it, love?’ But head bowed, tears streaming, he couldn’t answer. She looked enquiringly at Frost who had to force the words out again.
‘I had to tell him that… that Paula was raped.’
Husband and wife clung together, clutching each other like young lovers, saying nothing, their closeness consoling each other. Ignored by them both, Frost fidgeted and wished he was miles away. ‘If it’s any consolation,’ he told them, ‘your daughter was a virgin.’ Why the bloody hell did he say that? What possible consolation could it be that your daughter was a virgin before some bastard raped and choked the life out of her? He became aware that the father, his tears now of anger, was shouting at him.
‘Of course she was a virgin. She was only fifteen. A kid. She’d had no bloody life…’ And then he was sobbing again.
Hastily, Frost excused himself ‘I’ll be in the other room.’ In the living-room Gilmore, uncomfortable in a too- low chair, raised an eyebrow in query. ‘I sodded it up,’ Frost told him. ‘It’s the wailing bleeding wall out there.’ He flopped into a chair. No sign of an ashtray, but he had to have a smoke. He lit one up, offering the pack to Gilmore who declined.
Barely two puffs later the woman was back, her eyes red. She seemed surprised that they were still there. He pinched out the cigarette and stood up. ‘Two more things, Mrs Bartlett.’ She looked apprehensive. What further horrors could he inflict? ‘It’s just that we’re repeating the video made when Paula first went missing. It’ll be shown on the television news tonight.’
She nodded, relieved that it was nothing worse.
‘And — just for the record. Can you tell me what Paula ate on that last morning?’
‘Cornflakes and toast.’
‘You’re sure? She wouldn’t have cooked herself anything?’
‘Oh no. I was down here with her… cornflakes and toast. That’s all she ever had for breakfast.’ As they moved to the front door, she clutched the inspector’s arm. ‘When can we put her to rest?’
At first he didn’t understand what she meant, then realized she was asking about the funeral. ‘Not for a while, love,’ he said.
‘I’d like to see her,’ said Mrs Bartlett, her eyes blinking earnestly behind her glasses.
‘No, love,’ said Frost firmly.
‘Please…’ She gripped so tightly, it hurt.
He gently disentangled her fingers from his sleeve. ‘She wouldn’t want you to see her as she is now, Mrs Bartlett.’
‘I don’t care how she looks. She’s my daughter. She’s my daughter…!’
Her shouts followed them to the car. With the car door closed she stood in the doorway, still shouting, but they could only hear the rain thudding on the car roof. Then her husband appeared and led her back into the house.
‘That wasn’t an unqualified success, was it?’ sighed Frost, sticking the cigarette end back in his mouth. ‘She had cornflakes for breakfast, Burton. What do you deduce from that?’
‘That you were right, sir. She must have had another meal after she was abducted,’ replied the detective constable.
‘Precisely.’ He scratched the match down the car window. ‘You’re a fifteen-year-old virgin, Burton. You’ve been abducted and taken somewhere. Would you have an appetite for chicken pie, peas and chips?’
‘It depends how long I’d been without food. She might have been held for hours without having anything to eat.’
Frost thought this over and nodded. ‘Cooked food, so it’s got to be indoors. And if he’s keeping the girl hidden there for any length of time, he’s got to be alone in the house. Lastly, to get her from his car to the house, he must be pretty certain he won’t be seen. Which means the house has got to be remote.’ He blew the end of his cigarette and watched it glow. ‘The schoolmaster who usually gave her a lift. Is his house remote?’
Burton nodded. ‘It’s all on its own — miles from anywhere.’
‘Then we’ve got the bastard.’
What are you suggesting?’ asked Gilmore who was feeling left out of the discussion. This was typical Frost, plucking a suspect from thin air, then forcing the facts to fit.
‘I’m suggesting that bloody schoolmaster met her in his car and took her back to his house.’
‘The schoolmaster was at his wife’s funeral that day,’ Burton reminded him.
‘This was around eight in the morning. The funeral wouldn’t have been until ten at the earliest.’
‘But he didn’t have to go in the car and fetch her,’ said Burton. ‘She was due to call at his house with the paper anyway.’
‘He was impatient,’ said Frost, stubbornly. ‘Burning for a bit of the other and couldn’t wait.’
‘So impatient,’ scoffed Gilmore, ‘that he gives her chicken pie, peas and chips at eight o’clock in the morning before he has it away with her and then trots off to his wife’s funeral.’
