Stranglehold Read Online Free PDF

level with you, and hope you’ll do the same with me in doo course.’ Whether in response to Lambert’s pained expression or because he found the imitation too tiresome to sustain, he dropped back to his normal voice. ‘From the manner of the killing, I would be surprised if these two young women did not die by the same hand, John.’
    Lambert nodded glumly. That was his own view: he had hoped to hear it refuted. He said, ‘And since I’ve managed to lure you at last into the realms of speculation, have you any other thoughts that might help us in the investigation?’
    Burgess looked across at the shape beneath the sheet which he had worked on so carefully for two hours. He preferred the dead to the living, since with corpses he could carry his research to whatever lengths was necessary, a process not possible where life had to be preserved: that appealed to the scientist which was the strongest factor in his persona. Sometimes he spoke flippantly, as though his material was no more than dead meat. But he remained aware always that life had been abruptly and unlawfully terminated, that his work in this laboratory was ultimately concerned with justice and order.
    Burgess said soberly, ‘I’m not a psychologist, John. But the manner of these killings – swift and apparently motiveless – is too similar for my liking. I think you should expect your man to kill again.’

CHAPTER 4
    Sergeant Bert Hook was supposed to be good with disturbed girls. It was one of those repetitive station jokes which CID sections love to perpetuate.
    He did not feel himself very effective with Debbie Cook, and the WDC he took with him was too young to be of much assistance to him. Miss Cook was too tearful to be coherent, and though he knew she needed physical comfort, Hook was too old a hand to put the fatherly arm he knew she wanted around her narrow shoulders.
    â€˜She looked so – peaceful!’ she sobbed, for the third time. ‘I couldn’t believe at first that she was dead.’
    Hook could imagine the words being used for weeks to come, when she had ceased to weep and become a temporary celebrity through her association with the dead girl. He said, ‘You’re upset, love, of course. But we’re going to need your help if we’re to catch the man who did it.’
    She nodded, wiping a tear from her nose with her index finger. She looked very young and forlorn, like a child who sees the end of the world in a broken doll. ‘What happens next? What about the funeral?’
    â€˜Well, first of all, Harriet will have to be identified formally by her next of kin, even though because of you we know for certain now that it’s her.’ She looked up at him gratefully at his acknowledgement of her help, and he knew suddenly that it was a long time since anyone had been kind to her. Except perhaps the dead Harriet.
    As if she read that thought, the girl said, ‘It sounds funny, “Harriet”. She never called herself anything but Hetty.’ She stared down at her sodden handkerchief, turning it over in her hands as if she could not understand how it had become so wet.
    Hook, recognizing the effects of her ordeal upon the girl, took the cardigan he saw on the back of a chair and draped it round the slim shoulders as they gave a sudden shudder.
    It was warm enough outside, but this small bedroom was on the second floor of the house, facing north, and the girl was in shock. He had a moment of sudden fear that the woollen might belong to the dead girl and not this one, but then she pulled it about her like a small blanket, without putting her arms through the sleeves.
    â€˜My mother used to do that when I was little,’ she said. There was surprise in her voice, as though the memory had come to her from a long way away and surprised her.
    Feeling rather more like a social worker than a detective-sergeant, Hook said rather desperately,