Closing Our Eyes to Find the Truth
| Author | David M. Paciocco |
| Pages | 193-217 |
CHAPTER
o
Closing
Our
Eyes
to
Find
the
Truth
his hat off his
head
and
wiped
the
sweat away
from
his
brow
with
his
shirt. Cupping
his
hand over
his
eyes,
he
looked
up to
see how
high
the
spring
sun was
standing
in the
eastern
Australian sky.
"Lots
of day
left,"
he
thought.
He let the
spade
fall,
deciding
he
needed
a
break.
Then
he
thrust
his
hand into
the
side pocket
of his
dusty coveralls
to
grab
one of the
smokes
he had
rolled earlier that day.
As he
squatted
down
to
shield
his
match
from
the
stiff
October
breeze
that
blew
in
from
the
seaside,
his eye
caught something
in the
trench.
It
looked like cloth.
He
reached over
and
tugged
at it
with
his
thick
fingers.
It
gave
a
bit,
then
ripped.
A
nest
of
small bones, barely
hanging
together
in the
unmistak-
able
shape
of a
tiny human hand,
fell
out.
"My
Christ," Philmon gasped, spitting
out the
skinny cigarette that
had
been
hanging
from
his
mouth.
He
scrambled
to his
feet
and
backed
off
for a
minute,
his
heart pounding. Then, tentatively,
his
curiosity over-
whelming
him,
he
grabbed
a
nearby broom
and
swept
away
the
dirt
to
free
the
body
from
its
unnatural grave. Within minutes,
he had
unearthed
two
bodies
that
had
been
lying
beside each other
in the
garden
of the
tiny
house
he and his
family
had
been living
in for the
last
two
months.
By
the
time
the
police
had
completed
the job of
digging
up the
rest
of
the
yard
on
Burren-street
in
lylacdonaldtown,
New
South
Wales,
Philmon
wanted
to
walk
away
from
the
accursed place.
The
bodies
of
five
more
infants
had
been
found
buried about
the
yard.
He and his
family
had
been
living
in the
midst
of a
bloody
graveyard.
Although
it was not
uncommon
in
1892
for
newborns
to die of
nat-
ural
causes,
from
scarlet
fever
or
other infectious diseases,
seven
infants
found
buried
in
unmarked
graves
in the
same
backyard
made
the
prospect
G
eorge Philmon had almost finished the drainage ditch. He pulled
194
PROVING GUILT
AND
MAINTAINING INNOCENCE
that
they
had all
died
from
natural causes
defy
common sense.
As
hard
as
it was to
fathom,
it was
obvious
that
someone
had
been killing babies.
The
next
day
Constable Joyce,
who had
come
up from
Sydney
to
investigate, found
his way to the
home
of
John
and
Sara
Makin.
He
wanted
to
speak
to
them
because, prior
to
George Philmon,
they
had
been ten-
ants
of the
Burren-street
property where
the
babies
had
been discovered.
By
now
word
had
spread
of the
macabre discovery,
and the
Makins
had
been holding
their
breath, hoping
that
no one
would approach
them
about
it.
Constable Joyce could
see the
fear
in
their
faces
from
the
time
they opened
the
door
and saw him
standing
there
in his
stiff
navy
tunic.
After
introducing
himself,
and
without
telling
them
why he was
there,
he
said:
"Are
you
people
in the
habit
of
taking
in
children
to
nurse?" Sara
looked
at
John
for a
minute. John forced
a
smile
and
responded:
"No,
we
only
took
one
child
in
Burren-street.
My
wife
was
receiving
10
shillings
a
week
to
nurse
it. We had to
wait
for
three
weeks while
the
parents came
and
took
it
away.
They said they were going
to
Melbourne."
"What were
the
parents named?"
"Don't
recall.
I
think
the
woman's
name
was
Wilson.Yeah,
I
think
it
was
Wilson."
"You
sure
that's
the
only
time
you
took
in a
child
to
nurse?"
"Sure.
We
have children enough
of our
own."
Constable Joyce thanked them
and
walked
away,
knowing
who his
suspects were.
On 28
October, less than
two
weeks later, John
and
Sara
found
themselves called
as
witnesses
at an
inquest
that
was
being held
in aid of
the
investigation. Constable Joyce nodded
to
them
as
they walked into
the
town hall,
but he
never smiled.
His
look sent
a
chill down Sara's back.
"John. They know
something.
I
know
they
do,"
she
whispered
fran-
tically.
"They know something."
She sat for a
moment trying
to
calm her-
self,
and
then
it
dawned
on her — a
thought
that
destroyed
any
hope
she
had
of
regaining
her
composure. What
if the
police
had
been
to the
George-street property where they
had
lived before moving
to
Burren-
street.
"John,"
she
pleaded, looking
to him for
reassurance. "You
don't
think they've been
to
George-street,
do
you?"
"Might
be
that
they
have,
Sara.J
guess
time
will tell."
But
Sara
could
not
wait
for
time
to
tell. When
the
proceedings
adjourned
for the
day,
she set out for a
long walk
in the
fresh
spring
air to
see
what
had
been happening
at
George-street.
She
stood peering over
the
fence
of her
former residence, craning
her
neck
to see if she
could
see
into
the
back property.
A
young woman came
to the
door, with
a
child
on
her hip and a
suspicious look
on her
face.
To continue reading
Request your trial