Dead Creek (13 page)

Erin leaned back against the kitchen sink and crossed her arms. She looked hard at her father. “You know Jeannie Phelan is running for county clerk, right? And I’m her campaign manager. So we got all these flyers printed up last Wednesday, and I got everyone to take some and start dropping them off in mailboxes.

“I took a bunch myself, and I decided I’d go out toward Crandon a ways and then north to Pine Lake. I had about three hours to kill, so I put Cody in the van and I just started to drive down the different roads, dropping off flyers at every house. Some houses have mailboxes by the road, and some have them right on the door or the porch. If they were on the door, I’d get out of the van and go shove one in the box or wherever.

“So I’m heading toward Pine Lake, and I’m driving past the sign for Marjorie’s Bed and Breakfast when I see this road I’ve never been on before. Looks like new houses going in or something because it’s getting traveled. I go up about a mile, and I see this old building with a truck in front of it. I was turning around when I noticed the road swung back behind the building. So I keep going, I go over a hill, and on the other side there’s a brand-new house—a big, fancy, log house. I pull in the drive, get out of the van, and walk up to the house. It has a porch that runs around it on both sides.

“So, Dad, I’m standing at the front door and I’m looking for a mailbox. I can’t find one. Then I sort of peer into this front window by the door because I’m intrigued by this incredible house when all of a sudden—I heard him before I saw him—I heard someone pounding across the porch. Then this guy comes around the corner of the house right at me like he’s going to hit me or something.”

“Are you serious?” Osborne was stunned.

“I can’t even remember exactly what he looked like except he was big, he was wearing these huge black boots, and he had this intense look of hate or fury or something in his eyes. I mean—he came at me! I screamed and ran,” said Erin. “It makes me shake to talk about it.”

She was right; Osborne could see her arms trembling even through her heavy sweater.

“Did he follow you to the van?”

“No, thank God. He never left the porch. He never said anything, either. I don’t even know where he came from. He just loomed up with these eyes and this hate, and I thought I was going to die. Taught me a lesson. You won’t catch me back in
those
woods again. I swung that van in a circle and beat it out of there, but I looked back in my rearview mirror, and I could see him waving his arms at me. It was so freaky, Dad. Don’t go near that place, whatever you do.”

“But you don’t remember what he looked like?”

“Just … like big and bearded, these sharp, blazing eyes, and those boots. A real big guy.” Erin paused and thought hard. “He was in farmer overalls and a dirty old sweatshirt, but I don’t remember too much more than that. He had this look in his eyes, Dad. Like he hated me and
like he’d been waiting for me.”

Erin had begun to tremble again. Osborne reached to pull her close and put his arms around her. This was strange, thought Osborne. He couldn’t help but wonder if Ray had run into the same situation.

“Well,” he stroked Erin’s hair, “take it easy. You’re fine, and that’s what counts. I’ll tell Lew and Ray. We’re going out that way to retrace what happened to Ray yesterday, and I’m going to check out this house you’ve mentioned. You know, I don’t recall anyone building back in there. You know me, I’m pretty tuned in around here.”

“It’s a prefab, Dad,” said Erin. “We know the manufacturer, and you can put those up in less than a month if you get your foundation poured. The other weird thing is the little lake it’s on. It looks man-made.”

“A man-made lake in this part of the country?” Osborne shook his head. “We’ve already got three hundred and twenty lakes in a ten-mile radius of Loon Lake. Why would anyone want to make another one?”

Leaving
Mike in Erin’s backyard, Osborne hurried across the street and over the sun-dappled courthouse lawn. Lew’s office in the new wing attached to the jail was just a block and a half away. A brisk east wind gave the air a cold edge, even though the sun was still high. Osborne broke into a jog. He did not want to be late for the conference call with Rick Shanley.

The door to Lew’s office stood open. Lew sat at her desk, rocking back in her chair as she chatted with Ray, sprawled in one of two leather-seated wooden armchairs pulled up in front of the big old oak desk. The room was airy and light-filled, thanks to three wide, tall windows whose sills spilled over with green plants. The southern exposure agreed with them. To Osborne’s right as he entered was a small table, which held a coffeepot, its red light glowing. As he stopped to fill a mug, Lew straightened up in her chair, pushed a multibuttoned telephone console toward the center of her desk, and waved at him.

“Close that door behind you, will you, Doc?” she said. “I’ve got the speakerphone all set up. Are we ready?” Osborne nodded as he sat down, steaming mug in hand, and crossed his legs.

“Okay, Lucy.” Lew leaned toward the console. “You can put us through.” A brief pause, a distant ring, and Dr. Richard Shanley identified himself.

“Hey, Rick.” Ray clasped his hands as he leaned forward, elbows on the arms of his chair. “Ray Pradt here. I’ve got Police Chief Lewellyn Ferris with me and Dr. Paul Osborne. You and Doc Osborne met at my place, remember?”

“Sure do, how are you, Dr. Osborne? Caught any trophy muskies lately?” Shanley’s voice boomed into the room, causing Lew to turn the volume down a notch. Osborne got the impression she didn’t want Shanley’s remarks heard outside the room.

“Season’s just opening, Rick,” said Osborne. “I like to fish shallow water right after the ice leaves the lake. That’s why I was scouting upstream when I found the bodies you’ve been looking at. Now, I don’t know if you know or not, but muskies are very territorial, always feeding in the same spots if the temperature is right. There is a heck of a trophy muskie I’ve been stalking for years now. So when I get a spring sun and a west wind, I know right where to go. Otherwise, Rick, I would never have been up that creek, and no one else fishes that spot. Chances are real good no one would have come across those fellas ever.”

“He’s right,” said Lew. “We’re lucky Doc Osborne found them when he did—before the water warmed up. I want to thank you, by the way, for changing your schedule to run your tests. I know Wausau appreciates it, too.”

“You have no idea how much I appreciate it,” said Shanley.

He sounded downright buoyant, quite different from the tight-lipped academic Osborne been introduced to one October afternoon seven months earlier. Ray had swung into his drive that day with Shanley in tow, right after the two men had agreed on Ray’s participation in Shanley’s research. At that time, the environmental expert, identified only as “a new client,” was obviously anxious to keep a low profile, was probably running late for another appointment, and had been rather curt to Ray, cutting him off just as he had launched into a discussion of Shanley’s search for chemical pollutants affecting wildlife in the region. No such abruptness was apparent in the voice coming through the speakerphone today. Expansive was more like it.

“I have to thank you for this, Ray. A bonanza. I’ve spent all morning here in the lab, and I will probably be here … well, I’m planning to stay overnight. I apologize if I sound gleeful over someone’s bad fortune, but I’ve been on the lookout for something like this for a good, oh, three, four years.”

Ray’s eyes sparkled at Shanley’s response.

Lew caught his expression and shook her head. She leaned off to the side of the phone to whisper to Osborne, “Can you imagine two guys so thrilled with a corpse? Only a grave digger …” She rolled her eyes.

“Rick, Chief Ferris needs to hear from you directly on some of the background behind your research,” said Ray.

“Of course,” Shanley responded swiftly. “And I’ll be brief, Chief, because I have a paper I just published that I’m sending up by messenger Monday morning. It will fill in a lot of details. As Ray may have told you, I head up a team working for FIEH, the Ford Institute of Environmental Health.

“We are a privately funded national consortium of chemists, zoologists, and endocrinologists. My team has been looking for evidence of alkyl phenols, a family of chemicals that can best be described as superestrogens, which are very powerful synthetic hormones affecting many life forms, both plant and animal. We have found traces of the alkyl phenols in lower life forms in your area. But before I detail what I found this morning, let me say that three of your victims do not fit the pathology I am researching.”

Shanley paused for several beats, and Osborne could hear papers shuffling, “The fourth body is remarkable. Absolutely remarkable. As Ray would say, ‘This is one trophy specimen.’

“But before I get into this, Chief Ferris, I must be perfectly clear: I do not have all the answers. No one has the answers. The research on
naturally occurring
hormones, such as estrogen and testosterone, is so new that every answer generates ten new questions. My research is on how
synthetic
hormones affect our natural hormones—raising even more questions. By that I mean that everything I’m about to tell you is open to interpretation. I may have a Ph.D. in my field, but there are scientists who disagree vehemently with my findings. On the other hand, while I cannot prove my case definitively, they cannot disprove it, either.

“Chief, it’s critical that you know this because the results of my tests and what will stand up in a court of law are two entirely different matters.”

“Does anything you found concern the cause of death?” asked Lew.

“Oh no, no, no. But if you are looking to assign blame for the source of pollution …”

“Not an issue for me,” said Lew. “I am interested only in how these people died, why and, frankly, at this point, we are still trying to figure out who’s who.”

“Good,” said Shanley. “Then what I have to say may help you do that. Let me back up for a moment to explain why. Almost everyone is familiar with the DES scare in the late seventies. DES—diethylstilbestrol—is an estrogen-like drug that was administered to pregnant women for over twenty years. While the intent was to prevent spontaneous abortions, the result was a disturbance of the balance of hormones in the womb, which caused genital defects in the children. Among those defects were undescended testes, which is what we have with the victim in question.

“However, since DES was banned, it has been documented that at least forty-five
other
synthetic chemicals, particularly industrial chemicals in common use, have been found to affect the endocrine systems of various animal populations, including humans. That is, they disturb the delicate balance of naturally occurring hormones and have a profound effect on health. These chemicals happen to be chemicals used in paper and pulp production, including food wrappings—chemicals that have been released into the water around Loon Lake.

“We call them endocrine disruptors because that is, essentially, what they do. Once ingested by an animal or a human, they elbow their way into the cells of the reproductive tracts in fetuses, where they attach themselves to molecular receptors, which are like docking sites—for lack of a better description—cells that are normally reserved for natural estrogen. But these endocrine disruptors make themselves at home and proceed to become more and more active than normal estrogens, hence we call them superestrogens.

“And what these superestrogens do is biochemically feminize the embryo so that females end up with overdeveloped reproductive systems and males the opposite. Where females may experience an early, precocious puberty, males are feminized. Their puberty is delayed, almost canceled. In both sexes, the developmental growth that is supposed to happen during early adolescence is disrupted—but how severely depends on the level of exposure and over what period of time. And it gets more complicated.

“For example,” Shanley’s voice rose with excitement, “research done by another group, not mine, has shown that some of these superestrogens are capable of mutating into testosterone, the male hormone responsible for masculine development, wholly on their own. This changes the picture significantly. It explains why some of the feminized life forms have displayed unexpected male characteristics.

“But let me simplify what we know to date. We know the majority of the changes caused by a mother’s exposure to any of the superestrogens during her pregnancy won’t show up in a female child until the child is supposed to enter puberty. If she gives birth to a boy, then an early clue is undescended testes. In fact, the testes may never descend and the intra-abdominal tissue may degenerate over time, which is what I found in this victim.

“But back to puberty, when the most serious symptoms occur. Because the superestrogen blocks a natural release of testosterone, a boy will not experience a normal growth spurt, leaving him not only small in stature but with a feminized skeletal framework as well. He may experience little or no axillary hair growth, whether pubic, facial, or other body hair. In fact, your report from the pathologist here in Wausau will show that in addition to wearing a hairpiece, the victim had traces of adhesive on the lower jaw and above the upper lip, indicating the victim tried to disguise the lack of a beard. The superestrogens will also promote the development of a high level of body fat rather than muscle mass.
Again, I found evidence of each of these characteristics in the victim.

“Other signs, which I cannot document, are a delay in the deepening of the voice, and the emotions may be affected, causing him to experience severe depression and anxiety.

“So, short of the emotional markers, which, of course, I cannot judge, it is remarkable how many signs of endocrine disruption I found in the victim. But not textbook. My guess is he had testosterone administered medically in his late teens, which accounts for his medium height. Otherwise, the hormone count is off the charts for female levels and, as I said, I found no evidence of testicular tissue in the abdomen, which confirms a severe hormonal imbalance during fetal development that restricted reproductive development.

“Not only is the skeleton feminized, but the victim also has a feminized corpus callosum, the bridge joining the two halves of the brain, which is always larger in females. I mentioned the marked lack of body hair, and I found some swelling of breast tissue, but that appears to have been arrested, probably with testosterone injections. And, finally, this body has the cleanest arteries I have ever seen in a male this age—the one good thing excess estrogen can do for you.”

“Rick, what are the signs of endocrine disruption in a female child?” asked Osborne, getting up to refill his coffee mug.

“Female development is affected in several different ways. Not only do some of the girls experience puberty much too soon as a result of excess estrogen, but if some of these estrogens mutate into testosterone, thereby boosting testosterone levels at the same time, an imbalance between the two can have a disproportionate effect on the growth of the spine. In addition to height, in some girls you will see the shoulders broaden, muscle mass develop, the voice may deepen and, often, the girl is hirsute.”

“Hirsute?” asked Ray. “What does that mean?”

“Hirsute means hairy, Ray. Affected females will have the misfortune of developing excess body hair. They may show evidence of pubic hair much earlier than expected in a young girl and, generally, a pattern of coarse hair growth down the midline of the abdomen and across the medial surface of the thighs. Some will have excess facial hair—they’ll need to shave.”

“Baldness?” asked Lew.

“I don’t know. That could be a secondary defect, but genetics play a role, too. Please remember what I said when I started: Our research raises ten questions for every answer. May I add one more factor to all this?”

“Go right ahead, Doctor.”

“This discussion is so focused on the physical defects caused by the superestrogens, I don’t want you to miss the psychological impact. The emotional and psychological damage can be devastating. Puberty may be a time to grow and develop physically, but it is also a time when you are learning what is good and evil in the world.

“Take a child whose puberty is totally askew and you throw in an entire new set of problems: sexually precocious children are at risk for sexual abuse, kids whose physical development is delayed may not be able to participate in sports. Teenagers seek the company of kids like themselves. These kids get left out.

“Left out and singled out because they look different. Normal in every other way—bright, enthusiastic, full of imagination. Think about it—at a time of life when peer pressure is all-powerful, they can easily become targets, objects of ridicule.

“This is what drives my reseach, people. The need to save children from disaster.”

Lew’s office was silent. Osborne sat perfectly still. Lew and Ray both shifted in their chairs. Lew cleared her throat.

“Rick, do we know exactly when and how the mother is exposed to these industrial chemicals during the pregnancy?” she asked.

“Yes and no. Our studies have found that plants affected by the industrial chemicals that produce endocrine disruptors make compounds called phytoestrogens, which are passed along to plant-eaters. We are finding phytoestrogens in the plant life in a number of lakes, rivers, and streams around Loon Lake. Minuscule amounts so far.”

“Plant-eaters like fish? I didn’t think fish ate plants,” said Osborne, uncrossing his legs to sit forward in his chair.

“Not fish, but frogs, salamanders, otters, mink, eagles—you name it,” said Shanley. “So far we have only seen it in nonhuman life forms in your immediate area. The contaminants enter the food chain in organisms lower than fish but are transmitted up through a food chain that includes fish. This is the first human male exhibiting so many female characteristics that I’ve ever seen—and, I want to emphasize, my observations are quite theroretical.