Looking for Peyton Place

by Barbara Delinsky

  “So now you’ve come back to town to get revenge. Sorry, sweetheart, but there’s nothing to avenge.”

  “Then you have nothing to worry about, do you?” I said offhandedly, and that did make him nervous. Everything about him seemed suddenly tighter.

  Warily, he asked, “Are you here to write?”

  I glanced at The Apothecary just as Lisa and Timmy emerged. “Well, writing is what I do.”

  “How much do you make per book?”

  “East of Lonely has just gone back to press again. I think the in-print total is approaching two million.”

  “How much do you make?”

  I was amused. “I’m sorry. I don’t discuss money.”

  “I could find out.”

  “I don’t think so. Meades control Middle River, but they don’t control New York—or Washington, for that matter.” I smiled. “You don’t scare me, Aidan.” I turned the smile on my niece and nephew. “Get what you needed?”

  By way of an answer, Lisa held up the prescription bag. “Hi, Mr. Meade,” she said with a deference that was echoed by her brother as they cinched themselves into the single seat belt again.

  Politely, I said to Aidan, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to ask you to move your vehicle.”

  He probably would have argued—Meades prided themselves on getting the last word—had one of his children not yelled, “Dad-dy, I need to go potty bad!”

  With a grunt of displeasure, he gave my BMW a pat, and walked off.

  I watched in my rearview mirror as he climbed into the big black SUV, slammed the door, and drove away. There was no pounding heart now. I might have prayed that my confrontation with Aidan would have taken place at a later time, but Someone upstairs had known better. It wasn’t that my prayer hadn’t been answered, simply that I had prayed for the wrong thing. I should have prayed to get it over and done. Now that it was, I was composed and content.

  I couldn’t have asked for a more satisfying meeting.

  Back at the house, while Timmy washed my car with a ten-year-old’s love and Lisa the almost-woman made chili from a mix, I logged onto the Web for a refresher on mercury poisoning.

  There were two kinds—acute and chronic.

  Acute mercury poisoning results from intense exposure over a short period of time, most notably either from eating the stuff or inhaling undiluted vapors. Symptoms start with a cough or tightness in the chest, and progress to breathing and stomach troubles. Fatalities occur in cases where pneumonia develops. In cases where mercury is actually swallowed, there can be intense nausea, vomiting, and diarrhea, not to mention permanent kidney damage.

  I didn’t see my mother or sister falling into this category. Chronic mercury poisoning, though, was less easily dismissed. It consists of repeated low-level exposure to contaminated materials, and since the symptoms are slow to appear, exposure can occur much earlier. Moreover, the symptoms of chronic mercury poisoning vary widely from victim to victim. One might suffer bleeding gums, another numbness in the hands and feet. Others suffer slurred speech and difficulty walking, or mood changes that include irritability, apathy, and hypersensitivity. In the later stages of chronic mercury poisoning, the central nervous system can be affected, as can kidney and liver functions. Birth defects are a serious risk, hence the warning that pregnant women not eat those kinds of fish that retain higher concentrations of the metal. The relationship between mercury poisoning and autism in young children is a whole other story.

  I pulled up more sites in search of other symptoms. By the time I was done, I had found descriptions of all of the ones I had seen in my mother and was starting to see in my sister—the fine tremor of the hand, the trouble with balance, the memory loss and frequent inability to hold a train of thought for long.

  Unfortunately, these malfunctions could also be attributed to Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s, or to any number of other conditions. Worse, identifying chronic mercury poisoning with certainty is next to impossible. Acute mercury poisoning can be proven, since blood tests done within several days of exposure to high doses of mercury show elevated levels of the metal. After those few days, though, it moves into the nervous system and no longer shows up in the blood, at which point a blood test is useless. Urine tests are even worse; since mercury doesn’t ever leave the body through urine, it never shows up in a test.

  The bottom line? Chronic mercury poisoning can never be diagnosed for sure.

  On the other hand, if it could be shown that a person with specific symptoms has been exposed to mercury, a circumstantial case can be made. This was where Northwood Mill came in. Yes, I was biased. I was looking to pin this on the mill. But what else could be responsible? If people in Middle River were getting sick in the numbers I thought they were, the source of mercury had to be big. The mill was big.

  “What are you doing, Auntie Anne?” Lisa asked.

  “Oh, some research,” I said, knowing she would assume the research was for a book. Highlighting the latest batch of information, I copied it into a folder with the rest. “It’s kind of a fishing expedition at this point.” I clicked the folder shut and turned away from the laptop. “That chili smells really good, sweetie. Did your mom teach you how to make it?”

  “Nope. My dad. He’s the cook. Mom only gets home in time to eat.” Her eyes flew to the door and widened in excitement. “Here she is now. She left work early to see you.” She ran to the door and opened the screen. “Hi, Mom. Come on in here. I’m making dinner for Aunt Phoebe and Auntie Anne.”

  Sabina came through the door looking tired and tense. “You are the best girl in the world,” she said and kissed her daughter on the forehead. “Want to help Timmy finish the car, so I can have a minute alone with Auntie Anne?”

  “I have to stir the chili first,” the girl said and returned to the stove. With deliberate motions—carefully taught, I decided—she put on a mitt, lifted the lid of the big pot, stirred the chili in a way that avoided splatter, then returned the lid to the pot, removed the mitt, and smiled at us.

  “Well done,” I said, smiling back.

  Looking proud, she went outside.

  The screen door had barely slapped shut when Sabina slipped into the chair kitty-corner to mine at the table and said, simmering, “I just got a call from Aidan Meade. He wants to know why you’re here. What did you say to him?”

  “Nothing,” I replied. I was annoyed by her annoyance. “He didn’t ask why I was here.” At least, not in as many words. “Why’s he asking you?”

  “Because you must have said something that set him off. I asked if you were writing a book, and you said you weren’t. He thinks you are. He thinks you’re still fixated on doing what Grace did.”

  “This has nothing to do with Grace.”

  “With you it always has to do with Grace. She had a grudge against small towns. So do you.”

  “She didn’t have a grudge against small towns. She just never fit in.”

  “She hated them. Look at Peyton Place.”

  “She painted a realistic picture. There’s as much to love about that town as there is to hate.”

  “See? You defend her.”

  “I understand her. I know what it’s like not to fit in. I have good reason to hold a grudge against Middle River. But why would I want to write a book about it? I have ideas aplenty for future books that have nothing to do with this town. Aidan Meade must have one guilty conscience if all he can think is that I’m writing a book about him.”

  “Or about us. Why else would you be here?”

  “This is my home.”

  “Correction,” Sabina said. “Your home is in Washington. This is where you grew up, but you left. You rejected us.”

  “Correction,” I shot back, “you rejected me. Middle River made my life so miserable that I had to leave. And I’m not moving back here. Trust me on that. I like my life. But my roots are here. I feel a need to connect.”

  “Why? Mom’s gone.”

  “But you’re here. Phoebe’s h
ere. You’re the closest blood relatives I have.” There it was, TRUTH #3: My need for family, bubbling to the surface before I could hold it down—and believe me, I would have liked to. Sharing emotions wasn’t something we usually did. Tipping my hand to Sabina made me vulnerable.

  But the words seemed to quiet her. She drew in a tired breath and sat back in the chair. “Then try to see it from my point of view, Annie. I’m in a difficult position. He’s my employer.”

  Sabina was Northwood Mill’s main computer person, very much the jack-of-all-trades where information technology was concerned. When a computer malfunctioned, she was there. When an employee needed instruction, she was there. She was there when computers were added to the network, there when the system had to be wiped clean of viruses and worms, and she had a major say when it was time to upgrade. The last, of course, meant that she had to train every last employee when upgrades were made.

  Being only functionally computer-literate myself—i.e., I could do what I needed to do, namely e-mail, write, and search, but little else—I had the utmost respect for her. I had a feeling she worked longer hours than any of the Meades.

  “They need you more than you need them,” I said on that hunch.

  “Not true,” Sabina argued. “They pay me well, and the benefits are twice what I’d get elsewhere. We have two kids to take care of. But you wouldn’t know about that.”

  No. I wouldn’t. Steering clear of that discussion, I said, “Sabina? Do you know anything about mercury poisoning?”

  “Should I?”

  “The symptoms Mom had are very similar.”

  “Mom had Parkinson’s.” She scowled. “Why can’t you accept what she had? Are you so afraid you’ll get it too?”

  “It’s not that. It’s just that these symptoms bother me. Same with Phoebe’s symptoms. And from what I’ve read in the Middle River Times, it seems like lots of people are suffering from one or another of the same symptoms.”

  “Are they?” she asked doubtfully.

  “If what I’ve read is correct. You know the column—”

  “I do, but the ailments go across the board. Face it, Annie. Middle River is getting older. Older people have more ailments.”

  “More frequent miscarriages in twenty-somethings? More autism in children?”

  “What’s your point?” my sister asked blandly.

  “The mill. Do you think it could be a polluter?”

  “No.”

  “Have you ever heard the word mercury spoken there?”

  “No.”

  “Are you aware that mercury is a political hot button?”

  “No. Where are you heading with this?”

  I backed off. “I don’t know. I’m just wondering about these things.”

  Sabina rose, tired and sad now. “I know you, Annie. Wondering leads to no good. Please. I’m begging you. Please, don’t do anything to make life difficult for us here. My husband works for the mill. I work for the mill. This is our livelihood, our future, our children’s future. We can’t afford to have you meddling.”

  I wasn’t meddling. All I was doing, I decided, going online again that evening after Phoebe went upstairs, was learning more about a problem that maybe, just maybe, was causing harm.

  Basically, there are two sources of mercury emissions—natural and man-made. Natural mercury emissions come from volcanic eruptions, the eroding of soil and rocks, and oceanic vapors. These have been around forever, and can’t be contained.

  Man-made sources of mercury pollution are another story. There are two major villains on this end. The first are trash incinerators that dispose of mercury-laden goods such as thermometers, fluorescent lightbulbs, and dental fillings. The second are oil- and coal-powered plants. These plants are the nation’s single largest mercury polluter; once emitted, their toxins remain in the air for centuries. Moreover, once airborne mercury drifts to earth and mixes with bacteria in the soil, it becomes methyl-mercury, and methyl-mercury is extraordinarily toxic. It is also bioaccumulative, meaning that it grows more potent as it climbs the food chain. Mercury in a minnow isn’t as bad as it is in trout, which isn’t as bad as it is in swordfish or tuna, which are larger. Man, being at the top of the food chain, suffers the harshest effects.

  Although some airborne mercury comes from industrial plants in the Midwest, nearly 50 percent is generated in New England. New Hampshire has yet to prohibit mercury pollution and, hence, is one of the worst offenders.

  That was something. But I was still in need of a crucial piece of information. I had to dig for it; clearly the industry didn’t want the past rearing its ugly head. Beneath layers of links, though, I finally found what I sought: paper mills were indeed known mercury pollutants.

  If Northwood Mill released mercury, its most probable victim of contamination was the river. My mother’s shop was on the river, not far downstream of the mill. She had spent much of her working life there. Now my sister was taking over. And all those other people worked in all those other shops on the shores of the Middle River. And all those customers sat for hours on those back decks drinking in sunshine and potentially harmful vapors. And all those people on the other side fished for dinner and ate what they caught.

  The possibilities were endless.

  I didn’t know whether to be excited or horrified. In need of grounding, not to mention direction, I turned off my laptop and phoned Greg. I half expected that he would be out somewhere celebrating his last night in Washington, but my luck held. He was home.

  “Hey,” I said with a relieved smile.

  “Hey, yourself,” he said back and answered my e-mail query. “All packed, thanks.”

  “Then why aren’t you partying?”

  “I am.”

  Ah. He wasn’t alone. “Oh dear. Can we talk another time?”

  But he was easygoing as ever. “We’re waiting for take-out delivery, so this is a great time. What’s up?”

  It was all the encouragement I needed. “I might be onto something here,” I said eagerly. “My mother’s symptoms are identical to those of chronic mercury poisoning.”

  “Mercury? Huh. Any idea how she might have been exposed?”

  “Our paper mill.”

  “Does it produce mercury waste?”

  “Not now. But it did. Paper mills are known polluters. Their waste goes right into the river. My mom worked along the river for years. Now my sister’s been there awhile, and she isn’t well.”

  “Same symptoms?”

  “Some. And she has a cold. One of the effects of chronic mercury poisoning is a weakened immune system. Lots of colds, the flu, pneumonia.”

  “I’m not sure you can get mercury poisoning just from working alongside a river. I think there has to be direct contact, like something eaten or touched.”

  “That’s possible,” I conceded. “But refresh my memory. What’s the latest on mercury regulations?”

  Greg didn’t hesitate; recapping the news in layman’s terms was his forte. “Everyone is in agreement that emissions need to be reduced. The disagreement comes in how much and when. The Clean Air Act suggested guidelines and deadlines, but the EPA has scaled back the guidelines and extended the deadlines.”

  “Under pressure from lobbyists?”

  “You bet. And then there’s the credit-trading business. All plants pollute. How much they’re allowed to pollute is spelled out in pollution credits. A plant that cleans itself up so that it doesn’t have to use its credits can sell them to a plant that doesn’t want to clean up. The clean plant makes money to compensate for getting clean, and the dirty plant pays to stay dirty. Opponents say this will create hot spots where the pollution is worse than ever. Do we want to live in one of those spots?”

  “No. But my mother and sister—much of Middle River—may be doing just that.”

  “Direct contact, Annie. Keep that in mind. Besides, I wouldn’t accuse anyone until you know more. The issue is disposal. If it followed the rules, your mill may be on the up-and-up.”


  “How would I find out?”

  “Ask.”

  “I can’t ask at the mill. They’d go berserk.”

  “Then call the state environmental agency.”

  “Like they’d know if the mill has broken rules? Wouldn’t Northwood cover it up?”

  “They’d try. If they were caught, they’d pay a fine and cover that up. But it’d still be in the state records.”

  It was a good thought, precisely why I had called Greg. His suggestions were always intelligent, purposeful, and diplomatic. Prone to impulsiveness, I’d had, especially, to learn the last.

  State environmental agency, I wrote down, then said, “I’m going to go back through the archives of the local paper to find out who is sick and with what. The health column is thorough.”

  “It would be better to talk with local doctors.”

  “But then the cat would be out of the bag.”

  “Would that be so bad?”

  “Yes. The Meades own the mill, and they’re evil. If they get wind of the fact that I’m looking into this, they’ll take it out on my sisters. I did talk with my mother’s doctor. He heads the clinic. He put the bug in my ear about mercury, but he’s in a precarious position. The mill controls much of the town, including the clinic.” I paused. “When you talk Middle River, you talk the mill. It always comes down to that.”

  “And you’d love to get back at the Meades,” Greg said.

  “Mom had something. Phoebe may, too.”

  “And you’d love to get back at the Meades,” he repeated.

  I was silent. He knew me too well. “You bet I would,” I finally admitted.

  “Thinking of doing the Grace thing?”

  “Definitely not. Grace wrote a book. I’m not doing that.”

  “Even if you find a connection? Even if you follow this all the way and manage to bring about change?”

  “If things change, there’s no need for a book.”

  “What if you find a cover-up? It would make a terrific story.”