DI Jack Frost 02 - A Touch of Frost

went down this road, turned into the woods, then took this path.” The pointer scraped the map as it traced her route.
    “She left the main path here and cut down this little side route, which should have brought her back to the main road. But she never made it.”
    From the back of the room the rasp of a match being struck. Allen froze. Without turning around, he said, “I hope no-one intends smoking during my briefing.” The sound of a match hastily blown out. He relaxed and continued. “She had reached this point here, where the path curves, and that was where the bastard was waiting for her. Exactly the same tactics as he employed with all the rest. The cloth chucked over her head, the hands around her throat to semi-strangle her into unconsciousness. Her attacker then dragged her from the path, behind some bushes, about here" - the pointer jabbed the map - "where he stripped her down to her stockings. But at this point, to everyone’s surprise, including his victim’s, he deviated from his usual pattern. He didn’t rape her. Instead, he viciously kicked and punched her, breaking her nose, her jaw, and some ribs."
    “At five minutes to one this morning, Sergeant Wells received a telephone message from an anonymous male caller reporting the body of a girl in the woods. We don’t know who this man was, but we want to trace him. This call was followed up by Constables Simms and Jordan in Charlie Alpha. They were later joined by Mr. Frost and Inspector . . . I do beg his pardon . . . Constable Webster, our refugee from Braybridge District.” He smirked as Webster smouldered, and waited for the laughter to subside so he could continue.
    As he turned back to the map he heard the door to the briefing room open and close. Obviously Frost trying to sneak in unseen. “So kind of you to grace us with your presence,” he began sarcastically, but he was horrified to hear the scraping of chairs as everyone rose and sprang to attention. “So sorry, Superintendent,” he said hastily. “I thought it was Mr. Frost.”
    Mullett, in a mint-condition uniform straight from the tailor’s, graciously nodded his acceptance of the apology, then smiled and waved a hand for everyone to sit. He then sat in one of the chairs in the back row, folded his arms, and assumed an expression of intense concentration. “Please carry on, Inspector.”
    “I spoke to the victim in the hospital,” Allen wen't on. “As in the case of all the previous victims, she could tell me absolutely nothing about her attacker. I’m hoping to question her further today when the surgeons have patched her up, but the current position is that six women have been attacked and we do not have even the vaguest description of the rapist. All we know from semen samples is that his blood group is type O, a group shared by more than forty-four percent of the male population.”
    The briefing room door was flung back on its hinges and a late comer lurched in, managing to kick over an empty lager tin which rolled down the aisle and bounced up on to the dais, only halting when it touched Allen’s shoe. Delicately, the inspector pushed it to one side with his toe. He didn’t look up. He didn’t have to. There was no doubt this time who the newcomer was. “Good morning, Mr. Frost. I’m afraid we had to start without you.”
    “That’s all right,” said Frost grandly. “I completely forgot about this bloody meeting. It won’t take long, will it? I’ve got a post-mortem at ten.” He shivered. “It’s a bit nippy in here.” He slammed shut the open window, flopped into a chair in the back row, and lit up a cigarette.
    Allen’s eyes glinted. A chance to cut Frost down to size in front of the Superintendent. “I don’t like people smoking during my briefing sessions, Mr. Frost.”
    “That’s all right,” beamed Frost, the cigarette waggling in his mouth. “I don’t like people jabbering away while I’m smoking, but I put up with it.” The burst of laughter that followed was withered to silence by the ice of Allen’s expression. Grinning broadly, Frost puffed away at his cigarette, making as much smoke as possible. He turned to share the joke with the person sitting next to him, and to his horror it was Mullett, all immaculate uniform, gleaming buttons, and wintry disapproval. “A word with you afterward, Inspector,” he hissed.
    “Yes, Super, of course,” muttered Frost, wriggling uneasily in his chair and wishing he’d chosen somewhere