Frost at Christmas (36 page)

   At the vicarage, the Reverend James Bell and his wife avoided each other. Whatever love was once there when he and his girl bride had smiled happily into the wedding photographer's lens had now shriveled and died. As soon as Christmas was over, she would leave him.

   The car taking Martha Wendle to the Magistrate's Court skirted the woods. She pressed her face to the window, but the cottage wasn't visible from the road.

   Clive was with Detective Inspector Allen. They had scooped up the papers from Frost's desk, which now looked obscenely bare, and were working through them in Allen's office. From time to time Allen would "tut-tut" at work left undone. Clive couldn't keep his mind on the job. Every time the phone rang he would rush to answer it, hoping for news from the hospital. Frost was hanging on to life by a thread and they were operating that morning to remove the bullet.

   Powell had been arrested and was waiting for Allen' to question him. He had overlooked the significance of the Luger pistol. When the bullet was dug out of Frost's skull, that too would be sent to Forensic for comparison with the bullet in Garwood . . . the bullet in the skeleton.

   Mullett was with the Chief Constable and was very happy. The commandership of the new, enlarged Denton Division was definitely to be his, and a replacement for Frost would arrive that morning from County H.Q. Shame about Frost, of course, but things couldn't have worked out better.

   Frost was having a nightmare - a nightmare he had had many times before. He was in hospital being wheeled to the operating theater where a gowned and masked figure was waiting. There were instruments - knives, saws - sharp, terrible, and shiny, laid out on a green cloth. At this point he usually woke up, trembling and wet with sweat, but this time the nightmare was going on. They rated his chances at less than fifty-fifty and expected him to die.

   But Frost was never any good at figures and never did what was expected of him.

   Six days to Christmas. Outside it started to snow again.

THE END