The Hands of Mr Ottermole

Originally Aired: December 2, 1948

Suspense #317, "The Hands of Mr Ottermole,"

In the fog-shrouded streets of London's Casper Street district, a mysterious strangler stalks victims with terrifying efficiency, killing without motive or mercy. A veteran police sergeant with fifteen years on the force recounts the chilling crimes to a persistent newspaper man who has been lurking in the district's shadows, perhaps too interested in the murders for his own good. As bodies accumulate—including the tragic deaths of Mr. Wybrow and his wife, killed just steps from safety in their own home—the sergeant finds himself haunted by questions with no answers. Who is this killer whose strong, white hands reach out of the darkness? What force drives him to strike in this impoverished neighborhood where there's nothing to steal but lives?

The investigation intensifies as the sergeant walks his beat, always arriving moments too late, while the strangler seems to move like a phantom through the foggy streets. With suspicion falling on anyone who walks these lanes at night—including the newspaper man himself—the hunt for the murderer becomes increasingly desperate in this atmospheric tale of urban terror.