After a lunch break, they take Percy back to Warneet to re-enact his movements from the time he abducted Yvonne. The cars pull up at the deserted beach and begrudgingly, poker-faced, he answers their questions as police cameraman Ewan Cunningham films his movements. 'Show us what you did here,' they ask Percy. 'What did you do then?' 'The girl was only wearing socks; where did you put her shoes?' They want to know why he was sitting so high in the seat when he had passed the Payden family and he tells them in his blank, nondescript way, that he was sitting on the girl. To hide her. He volunteers nothing further, answering what he is asked, and only what he is asked.
Constable Paul Jones knows the Tuohy family from Warneet. He identifies Yvonne's body at the coroner's court on 21 July, nodding quietly when the sheet is pulled back to reveal her face. 'Yes, that's Yvonne. Yvonne Tuohy.' He has known her for two years, he says. The haunted expression on her face will stay with him all his days. He knows she died in pure agony.
The murder of a young girl, however newsworthy, would never take centre stage against the historic drama of the moon landing. While the story, 'So Now It's Goodbye, Moon!' made the front page of Melbourne's Sun newspaper on 22 July, Yvonne's murder is relegated to page 21 with the headline 'Man Seizes Girl With Knife At Throat'. The next day, Percy's arrest appears on page 15: 'Killing's Girl. Man Charged'.
The detectives examine the handwritten notes confiscated from Percy's naval locker. Sickened by the contents, they read in silence, not seeking retreat in the gallows humour so often employed by police officers to disguise shock and abhorrence. Squirming in their seats, they pass the notes quietly between each other, reading the obscene ramblings of a depraved paedophile. 'Get two boys, (6-10) and two girls (6-14) or boy, (6) or three girls (6-14) and take them out to place. When I get there, blindfold them and strip them and have a good look and feel. Tie them to trees and ropes coming from behind under armpits, around behind neck and under other arm, and around tree. Nail a stick to the tree and tape their heads to it. Put a pair of plastics on each and tie string around legs so they won't leak . . .' A page of fantasies in his small, tight handwriting about babies and faeces, imprisonment and torture, mutilation and cannibalism, so utterly foul that the detectives need to take breaks from reading them every few minutes. Percy reveals perfectly laid out depraved plans, starting with abduction and building to a crescendo, ending when he is sated with his own filth, when the children cannibalise each other, 'til only bones left.
The notes, secreted in his locker, detail abduction, torture, murder, mutilation. 'If it is a boy (under 3) the penis is cut off.' His fetishes for urine and faeces and for cross-dressing; of the cunning way he will entice his prey with promises and threats. Percy, the ineffectual loner who has no presence in real life, who never stands out in a crowd, fantasising about his power; about abducting his quarry from a crowded area. 'Go into town and find girl (6-10) walking around with mother. Hold them up quietly and take them out of crowd. Keep gun pointed at kid and give mother a list. Two pairs of pantihose, (to fit you), four pairs plastics, four pairs thick undies (to fit kid.) Tell her got five minutes to get. Tell her no one will get hurt if she co-operates.' Children fighting to the death and blocking the cargotid [sic] artery or windpipe. Writing about people he knows – 'Two girls at Barnsley' – and what he will do to them. 'Entice them into car. Take them to secluded place, strip them and tie their hands behind their back. Inspect them thoroughly. Make them sit on me and piss and shit.' The food supplies he will need – one large can of beer; two packets of chips; two large chocolates – and miscellaneous needs: one washer, one small towel, one piss blanket.
The writings are so degenerate that no one who reads them will ever forget their contents. And something else is dawning on police, as well. This bloke is so bent that God only knows what else he has done. God only knows.
Armed with Percy's writings, at 8.30 p.m. Monday, Knight and Delaney resume their interview of Percy. They want to know about his highly sexualised writings. 'The one found in the ash tray of your car is headed "Two Girls at Barnsley",' they ask him. 'When did you write that?'
'Around about March this year when I was home on leave in Sydney.'
'Why did you write that?'
'I got the feeling, I got the urge. Thoughts came into my mind.'
'What sort of thoughts?'
'The thoughts came into my mind to try and do these things one day.'
'How long have you been writing articles like this?'
'About four years.'
Knight has him now, playing it by the book and quietly hammering him about details of his sordid writings. Finally Percy admits the terrible truth about what he forced Yvonne to do, how he degraded her as she sat whimpering with fear, insisting she defecate and urinate, telling her he would hurt her if she did not comply, playing out his fantasies on this terrified victim and smearing her body with both their faeces.
'Do you agree that your writings also show a list of articles to take with you when you pick up girls and boys, and that list includes a washer and a small towel?' Knight asks.
'I didn't actually have a small towel, sir, I had a big one which I carry around when I am sailing. It's normally in the car all the time.' Percy corrects Knight, politely. Subordinate, controlled. He wanted to take the boy, too, he admits, and followed him for about forty yards along the beach after he ran off.
'Why was that?'
'I wanted to take him with me and when he ran off I wanted to stop him from getting away and telling someone.'
He's not sure, Percy continues, but after he killed Yvonne he thinks he could have cleaned the knife on her tracksuit. Knight wants to know how often he thinks about the things he describes in his writings. 'It varies,' Percy admits, sullenly. 'It could be a couple of weeks; it could be a couple of months. Depending on other things I am doing.'
'How long do you think about them when they occur?'
'It could be a couple of days; it could be shorter or longer. Sometimes when I'm on leave with nothing to do it could be longer.'
'After you saw the children did you want to do to them some of the things you describe in your writings?'
'Yes.' Driving back from Cowes, he stopped and put on the pants, he admits. He defecated and got an erection. 'I was, most likely, off my head when I saw the kids.'
Is there anything else he would like to tell them about this matter? He shakes his head. No, he says, eventually. He can't think of anything.