to creak no matter how carefully he placed his feet. At the top his torch picked out a small landing and two doors side by side. He clicked off the torch and slowly turned the handle of the nearest door.
Pitch black and a feeling of cold and damp. A hollow plop. Water slowly dripping from a tap. And a smell of sweat. Of fear. His thumb was on the button of the torch when he caught the metallic glint of a knife just as something hit him, sending his head smashing against the wall.
The torch dropped from his grasp as arms locked round him and dragged him down to the ground. Someone was on top of him, punching. There was hardly any room to move. His arm was trapped between his body and the wall, but he strained and wriggled frantically until he managed to free it. He reached up. Cloth. Flesh. Then a clawing hand clutched his face. He grabbed it, trying to tear it away while his other hand scrabbled in the blackness over cold, wet lino. Where was the damned torch?
He started to yell ‘Gilmore!’ when a fist crashed down on his face. He jerked up a knee, blindly. A scream of pain as his assailant fell back. His groping hand touched something metallic. The torch. Thankfully he grabbed it and swung it upwards like a club. A sharp crack and a groan as his attacker collapsed on top of him. Frost pushed and wriggled and managed to get on top.
‘Thudding footsteps up the stairs. ‘Are you all right, Inspector?’
‘No, I am bloody not!’ panted Frost. ‘I’m fighting for my bleeding life in here.’
Gilmore pushed in and fumbled for the light switch. They were in a small white-tiled bathroom. Frost, astride the intruder, was wedged between the wall and the bath. His tongue took a trip round his mouth, prodding at teeth, tasting salt.
He stood up to get a better look at the unconscious man on the floor. His attacker was around twenty, fresh complexion, his hair black and cut short, dressed in grey slacks, a grey polo-neck sweater and a windcheater. Gilmore searched his pockets. No wallet, no identification. No sign of a weapon but over the sweater a heavy silver crucifix on a chain glinted like the blade of a knife.
The man on the floor groaned and stirred slightly.
‘Hadn’t we better get him to a doctor?’ asked Gilmore.
Frost shook his head. ‘He’s only stunned.’ Then he remembered the old lady who should have heard all the noise and be screaming blue murder. ‘Let’s find the old girl.’
She was in the bedroom. In the bed, eyes staring upwards, mouth wide open and dribbling red. The bedclothes had been dragged back, exposing a nightdress drenched in blood from the multiple stab wounds in her stomach. On the pillow, by her head, was a browning smear where her killer had wiped the blade clean before leaving.
While the little house swarmed with more people than it had held in its lifetime, Frost and Gilmore closeted themselves in the bathroom with their prisoner, now securely handcuffed. He lay still, apparently unconscious. A dig from Frost’s foot resulted only in a slight moan. On the bath rack was an enormous sponge which Frost held under the cold tap until it was sodden and dripping, then he held it high over the man’s face and squeezed.
The head jerked, and twisted, the eyes fluttered, then opened wide. He blinked and tried to focus on the piece of white plastic bearing a coloured photograph.
‘Police,’ announced Frost.
A sigh of relief as the man struggled up to a sitting position. ‘In the bedroom – she’s dead . . .’ He winced and tried to touch his head and then saw the handcuffs. ‘What’s this? What’s going on?’
‘Suppose you tell us,’ snapped Frost. ‘What’s your name?’
‘Purley. Frederick Purley.’
‘Address?’
‘The Rectory, All Saints Church.’
‘Are you trying to be funny?’ snarled Gilmore.
Purley raised his dripping face to the sergeant. ‘I’m the curate at All Saints Church. Please remove these handcuffs.’ He tried to rise to his feet, but Gilmore pushed him down.
‘Since when do curates break into people’s houses in the middle of the night?’ asked Frost.
‘I only wanted to see if Mrs Winters was all right. I never dreamed . . .’ His head drooped.
‘Why did you think she wasn’t all right?’ asked Frost, dropping his cigarette end into the toilet pan and flushing it away.
‘I’d been sitting with one of my parishioners – an old man, terminally ill