Frost's mind whirled. Jayne? Who the hell was Jayne? Then it clicked. She was the redhead. Clever, bloody clever. The man deserved an Oscar. 'Not your receptionist sir, a prostitute… Sarah Hicks, fur coat and bobble hat.'
Ashby's eyes narrowed as if he was trying to remember. 'You mean that old granny? She offered me her services and I told her to leave me alone. I then went into my receptionist's flat for a quick chat.'
'What time did you leave there, sir?'
'Round about half-past one.'
Frost nodded. That agreed with the time the receptionist had told him. 'And what time did you return to your house?'
A vague shrug. 'Around a quarter to two, I suppose.'
'That's the time I would have expected you to arrive if you had driven straight there, but in actual fact it was gone 3.30, not too long after we found the body.'
Frowning, the solicitor looked up from his notes. 'Who says my client didn't arrive home until nearly 3.30?'
'One of my officers, sir. Your client has been under surveillance all evening.'
'If he was under surveillance, you will know where he was during that time.'
Frost tried not to look uncomfortable. 'Unfortunately, sir, the officer concerned was called away to another incident for a while.' A tap at the door and Bill Wells came in. 'Not now,' hissed Frost.
Wells pushed a piece of paper towards the inspector and left hurriedly. Frost glanced at it. A note from Mullett, heavily underlined in red. 'Must speak to you urgently.' Damn. Was the sod still here? He crumpled the note and resumed his questioning. 'So what were you doing in that missing hour and a half, Mr Ashby?'
'Just driving around… I still wasn't tired.'
'And where did you drive?'
'Round the woods, along the trunk road. I don't blow for sure. You may not be willing to believe this, 'inspector, but I was still very upset about Helen. It's bad enough when a stranger is murdered, but when it's someone you work with, you see every day…' He blew his nose loudly.
Hearts and bleeding flowers time, thought Frost. But he was worried. He wasn't really getting anywhere. He kept hoping Forensic would come galloping to the rescue at the last minute with solid evidence to nail the bastard. He pulled out the list of dates for the earlier prostitute killings and read them to Ashby asking where he was on those nights., To each date the reply was: 'I'm sorry. I don't remember.'
'An alibi we could check would be very helpful,' Frost told him.
'Had I known I'd need one I'd have made damn sure I got one. Prostitute killings! What else will you try to accuse me of — the Great Train Robbery?'
'Two people you were in contact with are now dead, sir. One of them was a prostitute. Our serial killer picks up prostitutes, and you have received two cautions for kerb-crawling, looking for prostitutes at night.'
The solicitor glared at his client. 'Kerb-crawling? You never told me about that.'
'I didn't think it was important.'
'Important? Of course it's important.'
'If I could continue,' said Frost, sounding almost apologetic for interrupting. 'One other question. Tell me about your phone calls to the Samaritans, Mr Ashby.'
Ashby stared incredulously. 'The Samaritans? Why on earth should I phone them?'
'Telling them about things you had done, and finding you were talking to your old receptionist and fearing she had recognized your voice.'
Ashby gave a scoffing laugh. 'This is really scraping the bottom of the barrel, Inspector. You're floundering. You haven't a clue and you're trying to come up with a suspect, any damn suspect. You tried to pin the murder of those kids on that poor man who hanged himself. Well, you're not going to pin this on me.'
Frost winced inwardly but tried not to show it. Every tin-pot crook would be chucking that in his face from now on.
The solicitor cleared his throat. 'My client has denied your accusations which you clearly have no evidence to support. I demand that he be released from custody.'
I'm sorry,' replied Frost. 'Our investigations are continuing and there will be further matters I wish to put before your client.'
The solicitor pursed his lips angrily and zipped up his briefcase with a flourish. 'Very well, Inspector. But if you hold him one second longer than the law allows without specifically charging, you will be in serious trouble.'
Tm rarely out of it,' said Frost.
Harding from Forensic was waiting for him in the murder incident room. He wasn't smiling. 'You're just pretending it's bad news, aren't you?' said Frost. 'You've nailed him, haven't you?' He swilled down the dregs of cold tea on the desk, then spat it out hurriedly. He had forgotten he had dunked a cigarette end in it.
'Nothing on his clothes. Fibres from her fur coat adhering to the driver's window of the Honda, but nothing else.'
'She would have leant on the car to stick her titties through the window,' said Frost. 'You sure you found nothing inside — a 60B bra or a pair of open crotch knickers?'
Harding gave a tired grin. I wouldn't have kept it from you if we had, Inspector. I like to be frank and open.'
I'd prefer you to be lying and bleeding devious,' said Frost. 'If she got inside that car there should be bits of fur all over the seat.' He had a sudden thought. 'He's got a place where he usually takes them. Perhaps he's got a car vacuum cleaner. Could he have cleaned it out before he drove back home?'
Harding shook his head. 'It would have to be a super vacuum cleaner to remove every trace, Inspector.'
'You're bleeding useless,' said Frost.
'We can't find what isn't there,' protested Harding, 'and you can take it from me, there was nothing.'
'Perhaps he's got a second car hidden away somewhere,' Burton suggested. 'Changes cars when he picks up toms, then changes back to the Honda when he drives home.'
'And changes his flaming suit as well?' said Frost, shaking his head. 'It's too complicated. Either we've got the wrong man, or we're missing something. In any case, it's too bloody late and I'm too tired to think.' He buttoned up his mac. 'First thing in the morning we contact all the toms who work in that area and find out if any of them saw Sarah going off with anyone.' He stretched his arms and yawned. I'm for bed before any more bodies turn up.'
He got as far as the corridor.
'Frost!'
He winced. Bloody Mullett. Half-past four in the morning and there was Hornrim Harry, uniform razor-creased, face all shining and squeaky clean, making Frost feel dirtier and more dishevelled than ever.
'Super?'
'My office… now!'
Frost followed him to the old log cabin and flopped wearily into the visitor's chair. Mullett marched to his desk and sat ramrod straight behind it, treating the inspector to a long, disapproving glare. What the hell have I done now, thought Frost, digging in his pocket for a cigarette and finding the note Bill Wells had given him in-the interview room. Mullett demanding to see him urgently. Knickers! He'd forgotten all about it.
'I was just about to phone you when you called out,' lied Frost, thinking Sod it, a couple of minutes earlier and I'd have made it to the car-park and been off home. He put on his tired, overworked copper face. 'This won't take long will it, Super? It's been one hell of a night.'
'Not only for you. Frost. I too have had one hell of a night. Woken up in the small hours by the press demanding my comments on the latest killing and asking if it was true that we had arrested a man in connection with the serial killings. And I didn't know a damn thing about it.'
Frost frowned. 'I didn't know the press had got the story. They didn't phone the station.'
Mullett picked up his paper knife and beat a gentle tattoo on his desk top. 'Er… no… I had arranged that all press calls were to be diverted to me. I wanted to spare you the burden of having to deal with them.' He wouldn't look Frost in the eye as he said this. His concern was firstly that he didn't trust Frost to deal with the media, dreading seeing some of the man's more outrageous comments spread across the front pages of every London daily, but more important, it didn't do his own career any harm to have his name featured as spokesman in such an
