Hard Frost (22 page)

The Manor House was an imposing edifice, solidly Victorian, forests of chimney pots, standing in extensive grounds and enclosed by a high stone wall thickly coated with ivy. The black, cast-iron gates were firmly closed and a video security camera scrutinized them closely as Burton announced who they were into a microphone. Their credentials established, the gates swung back, closing again immediately they were inside. They coasted up to the main entrance behind a gleaming, pearl grey Rolls-Royce. Frost checked its tax disc and seemed disappointed to find it was current. Up stone steps to the front door where a female secretary hovered and led them directly to Cordwell's study, a large, high-ceilinged room with tall french windows opening out on to a billiard table lawn, a rose garden, and a large fish pool with a weathered stone fountain in the shape of a boy with a dolphin.

   Cordwell, a thickset, coarse-featured man in his early fifties, was at an antique mahogany desk, its green leather top scarred with cigarette burns. As they entered he was bawling down a white and gold phone and didn't give them a second glance. "If he's not measuring up, then chuck him out - you can find a reason. I'm not carrying bloody passengers." He banged the phone down, grabbed an enormous cigar from a silver box and lit up with a lighter fashioned from a genuine flintlock pistol, then flapped a hand for Frost and Mullett to sit. Cordwell had started business selling broken biscuits from a barrow in street markets and, by cheating, scheming and doing down his associates, had worked his way up to owning one of the largest cut-price grocery chains in Britain. A grunt and a snap of his fingers signalled the hovering secretary to place a folder in front of him. He slid it across to the two policemen. "The letter."

   Frost opened the folder. The envelope had been slit open and the letter was fastened to it with a paper clip.

   "We asked you not to open it," he said.

   Cordwell gave him a sweet smile. "Nobody tells me what to do."

   While Frost read the letter, Cordwell was back on the phone tearing some other poor devil off a strip. "Cancel the bloody order!" he barked. "I don't care if they have got a binding agreement - there's bound to be a bloody loophole somewhere, so cancel it." As he slammed the phone down he shouted across to his secretary. "What's that prat's name?" She told him. He scribbled the name on his pad. "Next lot of redundancies, he's got pole position."

   Frost shut his ears to this as he and Mullett skimmed through the letter. Similar to the others, it read:

   Dear Sir Richard Cordwell:

   I have the boy Bobby Kirby. The police will confirm this is genuine. For his safe return I require from your company the sum of £250,000 in used notes . . . no marked money or the boy dies. Be near the public telephone kiosks in the shopping mall outside your Denton store at 8 o'clock tonight with the money and I will phone you with instructions for the handover Just you - no police - I'll be checking to make sure. If you do not comply, the boy will die. The press have been informed and the public will know the consequences.

   "We'll keep this," said Frost, closing the folder and daring Cordwell to refuse, but this was agreed to with a wave of the hand.

   "Is it genuine?"

   "We believe so," said Mullett.

   "
Believe
so? I'm not sodding about with it if it's a try-on."

   "It's genuine," said Frost. "He sent us a tape of the boy."

   Cordwell flicked a long cylinder of ash from his cigar on to the carpet. "And you reckon he'll carry out his threat to kill him?"

   "Yes," said Frost.

   Cordwell beamed. "Good. You got a photograph of the kid?" Frost slid one across the desk. Cordwell studied it through a fog of cigar smoke and nodded his approval. "Nice-looking kid - I was afraid he'd be an ugly little bastard with a squint and bad teeth." He flipped the switch on his intercom. "Roberts - come in!"

   A tap on the door and Roberts entered. A lean, mean-looking man in a sharp silver-grey suit. Cordwell showed him the photograph. "The kidnapped kid," he grunted.

   Roberts looked at it and nodded. "Nice-looking kid . . . and a good photograph. Should come up well in half-tone . . . I think we should go ahead."

   "So do I," said Cordwell. "This is what I want you to do." He barked his orders. "Check with the parents and see if there are any more photographs - the kid as a baby would be nice. Then a press release for tomorrow to all the London dailies - Supermarket Chief To The Rescue, you know the sort of thing. And get me some television interviews - me and the boy." He dismissed Roberts then turned back to Frost. "If you give a press conference you can quote me as saying that to save the boy I'm giving the police my unstinted, wholehearted co-operation."

   "You're too good for this world," said Frost. "Can you get the money together in time?"

   "No problem."

   "How soon can you get it over to us?"

   Cordwell frowned. "Why should I let you have it?"

   "We've got to mark the notes and record as many of the numbers as we can. We also need to put a small radio transmitter inside the case."

   "No!" Mullett winced as Cordwell's fist thumped down on his desk top making the silver cigar case rattle. "The object of the exercise is to save the kid, so no tricks, no marked notes and no transmitters." He reached over and clicked on the intercom again. "Roberts! You can add this to the press release. 'The police wanted the notes to be marked, but supermarket chief, Sir Richard Cord well, said no. Even though the ransom money is being paid by Sir Richard, his first and only consideration is for the safe return of the boy.' " He clicked Roberts off in mid-acknowledgement.

   "Now, listen to me - "began Frost.

   "No!" snapped Cordwell. "You listen to me. I'm not doing this for the love of humanity. This bastard has grabbed a kid and is on my back for the money. He thinks he's blackmailing me, but he's not - I'm doing this of my own volition, because it suits me to do so."

   "Hardly," smirked Mullett. "What would the public say if you refused?"

   "Sod the public. They wouldn't desert Savalot. Knock tuppence off a tin of baked beans and they'd be fighting to come in whether the kid's dead or not. I don't usually give in to blackmail, but I can get some publicity out of this. For a lousy two hundred and fifty thousand quid I can get a million quid's worth of publicity and that's the sort of bargain I like. So you either do it my way, or I'm out!"

   "All right," said Frost reluctantly. "We do it your way."

   "No police involvement in any shape or form until the kid is safely returned?"

   "No police involvement," agreed Frost.

   "Do I have your word?"

   "You have my word."

   Cordwell jabbed a stubby finger at Frost. "Cross me and I'll crucify you - do you read me, buster?"

   Frost put on his hurt look. "I've given you my word," he said.

   They were curtly dismissed and ushered out to the car by the secretary. As Frost settled himself down in the seat, Mullett turned to him angrily. "You had no business giving him your word, Frost."

   "Don't worry, super," said Frost, "I have no intention of keeping it."

   Mullett's eyebrows soared. "What?"

   Frost gave the same sort of sweet smile that Cordwell had given him. "No-one tells me what to do," he said. As the black gates closed behind them, he dug down in his pocket and produced three cigars. He stuck one in his mouth and offered the others to Mullett and Burton.

   Mullett hesitated, but they were excellent cigars, probably costing something like £9 each. He accepted a light from Frost and inhaled with deep satisfaction. Soon the interior of the Ford was hazy blue and redolent with the rich Havana aroma. He thought wryly of the smell in his own car from that wretched woman last night. He took another drag and beamed with a glow of well-being. There was something about a good cigar . . . Maybe it wasn't Frost's fault. Perhaps, at times, he was too hard on the man. He took the cigar from his mouth and contemplated the glowing end. "An excellent smoke, Frost. Where did you get them?"

   "I pinched them from Cordwell's box when he wasn't looking," said Frost.

Chapter 9

When Frost got back to his office he nearly tripped over the fur coats the insurance assessor had dropped on the floor. Mullett was right, the office did stink. He opened the window a fraction to let in some fresh air, while he made a few phone calls. Liz was still attending the postmortems where, no doubt, Drysdale was being his usual thorough self with all three tiny bodies. Bill Wells confirmed there was still no sign of the missing mother. Frost drummed the desk in thought - had he called off the dragging of the canal too soon?

   The jewellery was still on his desk. He'd have to get Margie Stanfield down for a formal identification of her property and the sooner she took back her skunk-smelling furs, the better. Margie! She must be Stanfield's second wife. He seemed to remember an entirely different woman when he was at the house all those years ago for the arson case.

   He stared at the jewellery. Damn. This phoney abduction case was irritating him. He wanted to get it out of the way, but he couldn't wait for Liz to come back from her autopsy treat so he collared Burton from the incident room.

   "Where are we going?" asked the DC, sliding behind the steering wheel.

   "Bennington's Bank," Frost told him. "I want to take a look at their security video for when Stanfield was drawing out all that cash." The car slowed at traffic lights. "How are you getting on with Sergeant Liz?"

   "She tore me off a strip today," said Burton, moving forward as the lights changed. "I put the wrong date down on a report." He grinned. "I think I'm starting to fancy her."

   "She wouldn't be a bad looker if she tarted herself up," mused Frost. "Reminds me of those old Hollywood films where the heroine is a schoolmistress with no make-up, thick glasses, her hair in a bun and a flat chest. When she has her first kiss from the hero, she takes off her glasses, lets her hair down and her tits swell up to twice their previous size." He started unbuckling his seat belt as the bank loomed into view. "The same thing could happen to our Liz."

   Burton grinned again as he turned the car into the "Staff Only' car-park behind the bank. "I wouldn't mind being the bloke who makes it happen."

The bank manager brought in the videotape and fed it into the player for them. "I'm rather busy, so I'll leave you to it, inspector."

   "Yes, you go and foreclose on some poor sod," answered Frost. "We'll manage." He pressed the play button.

   On the monitor a black and white picture of the customer area of the bank. It was a minute to opening time so no customers. A running clock superimposed on the corner of the picture showed the seconds zipping on to 9.30 a.m. A cashier walked across the customer area, checked the time with the wall clock, then opened the doors. He was shoved to one side as an impatient Stanfield, barging his way through other customers, managed to reach the cashier's window before anyone else. He was carrying a large briefcase.

   It was a wide angle shot taken from behind the counters. Other customers went to different cashiers, but the two detectives kept their eyes on Stanfield who pushed across a withdrawal slip, drumming his fingers impatiently on the counter as the cashier read it through. He snapped some angry remark and then moved to the end of the counter. The cashier came out and led Stanfield to the assistant manager's office and out of camera range. "He's waiting in there while they're getting the money out of the vaults," explained Frost.

   More people came into the bank. Queues shuffled forward, cashing cheques or paying in money.

   "What are we looking for?" asked Burton.

   "I haven't the faintest bloody idea," admitted Frost.

   Ten more minutes of watching people come and go and Frost's attention was starting to wander. He began to read a confidential letter on the manager's desk. "There he is!" said Burton. He was all attention again.

   Stanfield moved back into the picture. The briefcase bulged and seemed heavier. He snarled at someone who dared to get in his path as he barged his way through the crowded customer area. The doors closed behind him and he was gone.

   Frost let the tape run for a couple of minutes, then fished out his cigarette packet. "There's something there, son, something screaming at me . . . but I don't know what it is." He wound the tape back to the start and played it through again, only half watching as he dribbled smoke from his nose. Suddenly, he stiffened. "Yes I do!" His finger jabbed the freeze frame button making the picture quiver and stop. "In the corner, there - at the automatic cash machine." The frozen picture was quite blurred and Burton couldn't make out who Frost meant. Then he saw a figure right in the corner of the screen drawing money from the service till. The person's back was to the camera. They could just make out light-coloured trousers and a dark duffel coat with the hood up.

   "So?" asked Burton.

   Frost pressed the play button again. The figure, not much more than an out-of-focus blur, seemed to be getting money from the machine, then a swirl of customers hid him from view. Frost forwarded the tape. The superimposed clock had moved on another six or seven minutes. The crowd suddenly thinned. "Look!" said Frost. "The bastard is still there . . . What's he doing now?"

   The figure had now moved away from the service till and was by the automatic deposit machine where he seemed to be finding difficulty in filling in one of the bank's forms, screwing up the current effort and starting on a new one. He was still there as Stanfield emerged from the assistant manager's office carrying the briefcase. Stanfield left. The man screwed his form up, tossed it in a bin and sauntered out of the bank.

   "He followed Stanfield in," said Frost. "He was here all the time Stanfield was in the bank. When Stanfield left, so did he." He zipped back the tape, replaying some of it, freeze-framing from time to time.