And a timber hauler might well need a gun to deal with snakes. George Bakewell, the owner of the house, made no comment.
FRANK WILKINSON'S ALVIS CAR
Moxley attempted to conduct himself in a normal manner. He said his hand injury kept him away from his work as a wood cutter and hauler, had a haircut and shave, and left a pair of shoes to be mended. He ate several meals at the Belmore house. But he knew he was on borrowed time. He knew that the earth covering the bodies was a mere 3 inches thick and that the area where they were buried, though concealed, was not remote and was subject to traffic on foot and by horse and motor. On reading the Daily Telegraph report on the search for Dorothy and Frank, Moxley remarked to Bakewell, âPeople never know what can happen when they get off the main road.â
Under increasing pressure from the newspapers, the police mounted an intense search for traces of the missing couple. Pieces of physical evidence began to be found: the covering of a car's internal light wrapped in a woman's beret, a garden spade in the middle of Milperra Road. Reasoning that the Alvis was a distinctive car - likely to be seen and difficult to conceal - the police published a detailed description of it, including its number plates. The strategy paid off as sightings began to filter in, from those who had seen it at Strath-field and Moorebank, and from the garage attendant who had sold Moxley the petrol in the early hours after the murder. Within a couple of days two of the people Moxley had approached to sell spare parts came forward, as did the man who rented him the garage. Their physical descriptions matched. Moxley was well known to the police as a habitual criminal and his wounding in 1930 was fresh in some memories. His photograph appeared in the press.
WILLIAM MOXLEY, 1925 PHOTOGRAPH RELEASED TO NEWSPAPERS
Police found the hessian mask in the garage along with the torn and bloodstained rug. A sharp-eyed detective expressed the opinion that dirt on and in the car resembled that in the vicinity of the Holsworthy Army Reserve. The police search concentrated on that area and on 11 April a party of police from Liverpool searched the scrubland in the vicinity of Illawarra Road and its adjacent tracks. A constable reported that they saw car tracks and followed them:
I then saw stains under a tree which resembled blood stains. I then saw bushes piled up 5 or 6 feet from the treeâ¦I pushed these bushes aside and with a stick I was carrying I dug a hole about 2 inches into the ground. I saw three human fingers.
The constable alerted a detective and a guard was placed at the site. Later that day Frank Wilkinson's body was uncovered. It was lying face down. Hardened police were shocked at the injuries.
THE BODY OF FRANK WILKINSON IN GRAVE
The discovery of the body had a dramatic effect on people and places of business in the Moorebank area. Several shops and factories closed out of fear that a killer was on the loose, but some members of the public took it upon themselves to search for Dorothy Denzel's body. One such person was Philip Albert Hanley, a railway ganger from Liverpool, who rode his horse to the area where Wilkinson's body was found and searched the scrub. (Why the police did not conduct an extensive search themselves is not clear; probably they were working on the assumption that Dorothy Denzel had been abducted and taken elsewhere.)
THE BODY OF DOROTHY DENZEL IN GRAVE
Hanley, on horseback, could see over the scrub and he noticed a mound of piled-up dead and dry branches covering a place where the earth had been disturbed. âI took it,â he testified, âthat that was where the girl would be.â Hanley flagged down a motorist and instructed him to contact the police. He added one detail to his otherwise matter-of-fact account: âThe horse shied a little and sniffed when I brought it up to the mound.â
Frank Wilkinson's body was found on 11 April and news of