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Beazley doesn’t like people smoking in here.’
       ‘It does less harm than eating the food,’ said Frost, making no attempt to put the cigarette out. ‘So what’s the news?’
       ‘We’ve been over the shelves thoroughly three times. No sign of the missing jar. We’ve been through the till receipts - it hasn’t been checked out. I don’t know what we can do. We can’t open the store until we find it. I dread to think what Mr Beazley will say.’
       ‘If no one’s bought it and it’s not still in the store, then it’s gone out without being paid for. So either a member of your staff has helped him self or . . .’ His eyes widened and the hand holding his cigarette paused in mid air. A light dawned and he grinned. ‘. . . or it could have been nicked by a shoplifter.’
       ‘Speculation,’ moaned Martin. ‘We could never prove it.’
       ‘This might be your lucky day said Frost. He pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and dialled a number. ‘Jordan? Inspector Frost here. That milk powder you picked up from Sadie’s house - did it have a blue cross on the bottom?
       Well check it out now.’ He drummed his fingers on the table as he waited. ‘Yes . . . What? Brilliant. No, don’t send it to Forensic yet. Hang on to it until I get there.’ He dropped the phone back in his pocket. ‘We’ve traced it,’ he told Martin. ‘You can open up again. But let me know the minute you get another letter demanding money - and make certain as few people as possible smear their fingerprints on it.’

    ‘I can go, can I?’ shrilled Sadie. ‘Oh, bleeding nice! Locked up, falsely imprisoned, insulted and then kicked out. What about compensation?’
       ‘Your compensation is that we’re not nicking you for shoplifting,’ said Frost. ‘Now push off before I change my mind.’
       ‘What about my kiddy?’
       ‘Sort that out with Social Services, Sadie, and next time you nick something, make sure it isn’t contaminated.’
       ‘You wouldn’t treat me like this if I was an asylum-seeker.’
       ‘Then go and seek bleeding asylum and come back and see, but for now, push off.’ He held the door wide open for her to leave. ‘Another dissatisfied customer,’ he told Bill Wells and mooched back to his office.

    Frost looked up from the crime-statistics report where a column of figures was dancing before his eyes. A tap at the office door heralded the arrival of Simms and Jordan.
       ‘Whatever it is, the answer’s no,’ he told them. ‘I’ve got my sums to do.’
       Jordan grinned. ‘We’ve just been out on a call, Inspector. Teenage girl missing from home.’
       ‘She’s not here,’ said Frost, ‘and I wouldn’t tell you if she was.’ He put his pen down and sighed. ‘All right. Tell me about it.’
       ‘She’s Debbie Clark. Told her parents she was going -to a sleepover with her schoolfriend Audrey Glisson - she’s done this many times before. Went off on her bike about half seven yesterday evening. When she didn’t come home this morning, the parents phoned Audrey’s house. Debbie hadn’t been there and hadn’t arranged to go there.’
       ‘So she’s been missing overnight? Probably having a sleepover under her boyfriend. I bet she’s now at his place having a fag,’ said Frost dismissively, picking up his pen again. ‘Fill in a missing-persons report.’
       ‘The parents claim she isn’t that sort of a girl,’ said Jordan.
       Frost snorted. ‘As I’ve told you a million times, lads, every time a teenage girl goes missing from home, the parents swear blind she’s a pure, sweet, home-loving girl training to be a nun, and nine times out of ten they turn out to be little scrubbers, on the game, pumping them selves full of coke, who’ve run away for the umpteenth time.’
       ‘She’s only just thirteen, Inspector. Today is her birthday . . . they were throwing her a party tonight.’ 
       ‘If I had the choice