“I’ll see what I can do to speed it up a little by having it hand delivered,” Christine said.
“Before I let you go,” Jack said. “I’d like to ask what you might suggest I read to bolster my prion knowledge, which is pretty meager.”
“Wikipedia has a pretty good review article that’s kept up-to-date,” Christine said. “As far as the latest info is concerned, you could read a bit about these new ideas of treating prion disease using CRISPR to knock out the human prion gene. Weirdly enough, doing so doesn’t seem to hurt nerve cells’ function, which begs the question of why has the prion gene been selected for over the eons. No one seems to know, meaning there’s a lot left for science to discover when it comes to prions.”
“I just remembered something else I wanted to ask you,” Jack said. “From the mad cow episode in Great Britain, we know that infected beef can transmit prion disease to humans. What other animal sources are known? What about chicken, for instance?”
“Chickens have not yet been implicated,” Christine said. “But that’s not to say it won’t happen in the future. The only other food is pork and some ungulates like deer. Why, no one knows. It is especially strange that lamb has never been implicated even though scrapie, a disease of sheep, was the first known prion disease.”
“Seems that there is a lot for science to learn about prions,” Jack said.
“Truer words have never been spoken,” Christine responded.
After appropriate goodbyes, Jack terminated the call, and then sat there on the couch thinking about prions. The whole issue of a protein being infectious and causing a progressively debilitating disease leading to death was beyond scary. It was terrifying. He knew that proteins were the basic building blocks of life, so how could they possibly function as the source of death rather than life. It seemed too much like a terrifying science fiction plot.
With a heavy sigh, Jack opened his laptop and brought up the Wikipedia article titled “Prion” and began reading, but he didn’t get far. The crunching sound of car tires on gravel caught his attention, and the moment he looked up he saw Warren’s boatlike 1959, bright red, Cadillac Coupe Deville come around the final bend in the driveway and pull up alongside the similar colored but not so colorful Cherokee.
In response, Jack flipped his laptop closed, leaped up, and dashed out of the house. His timing was just about perfect as he came up on the driver’s side of the fastidiously restored Cadillac just as Warren was alighting from the car. After a quick embrace, Warren introduced Jada Thomas, who’d climbed out and walked around to the driver’s side to meet Jack.
As Jack shook Jada’s hand while welcoming her, he looked into her bottomless and expressive eyes set in a sculpted face that reminded him of a famous ancient Egyptian bust. She had a slim, athletic body and a unique hairstyle he was later to learn was called box braids. His immediate impression was that she was a perfect match for Warren and vice versa.
In Jack’s estimation Warren was one of the more impressive andpersonally generous persons he’d had the pleasure of knowing, and he also possessed an innate humanity and intelligence. Although he had never had the benefit of a formal higher education after high school, he’d been a voracious closet-reader from a tender age who remembered everything. He was also such a pleasure to watch on the basketball court that Jack frequently found himself envious of Warren’s inborn athleticism.
“I can’t wait for you guys to see this place,” Jack said with unbridled enthusiasm after the introductions, gesturing back toward the house and the lake. “It’s off the charts.”
“It is unique looking,” Warren agreed, gazing up at the house.
“It looks to me like a movie set for a horror movie,” Jada said.
“Interesting you say that,” Jack commented. “My wife, Laurie, said the same thing. Come on, let me show you the inside.”
“First, let us grab our stuff,” Warren said as he turned and headed to the rear of the car where he popped the trunk. Jada followed, and they both pulled out their backpacks, which they slung over their respective shoulders. Jada then picked up several large, white shopping bags with the nameDeLuca’s Meats, Madison Avenue, emblazoned on them. At the same time Warren lifted a case of Bud Light, which he balanced on a knee while retrieving a smaller brown bag. He then closed the trunk. “I didn’t want to run dry, isolated out here in Sherwood Forest,” he explained. “Plus, I brought some New York bagels.”
“It’s not that isolated,” Jack said with a laugh. He took the bagels from Warren and then relieved Jada of the shopping bags she was holding. “Whoa,” he added. “These are heavier than I expected. How many steaks are in here?”
“Jada generously bought enough for an army,” Warren said as everyone started out for the house’s rear entrance.
“Warren had said you were visiting some old friends, so I got extra,” Jada explained.
“That’s true,” Jack said. “Thank you. That’s very kind of you. With your okay, we’ll have a cookout tonight, and I’ll be pleased to invite over my old medical schoolmate and his wife.”
“You certainly have my okay,” Jada said with a smile.
“Where’s Laurie?” Warren questioned.
“She’s out at the pool,” Jack explained.
While he put the bag of New York steaks into the kitchen refrigerator and Warren went to put his beer into the even larger cooler in the butler’s pantry, Jack said, “As you’ll both see, this house is truly remarkable and in extraordinarily good condition, probably due to its isolation but also to its recent, tasteful renovation. It was built more than a hundred and fifty years ago by the founder of the shoe company that was responsible for the growth of the town itself, which is equally as impressive, as you’ll see. He built the house for his firstborn son. There’s another house of the same architectural style but even larger on this same lake, which the founder built for himself. I’ll point it out when we go outside. It’s visible across the lake. Originally Laurie and I were supposed to stay there, but it turned out that it is curiously enough being occupied by a group of militiamen from Holland.”
“What the hell are militiamen from Holland doing out here in the middle of nowhere?” Warren questioned as he rejoined the others.
“That’s another rather long story,” Jack said. “The town looks peaceful, but it has some definite social problems stemming from the shoe factory going bust about fifteen years ago. As a consequence, it’s got its own, homegrown right-wing militia called the Diehard Patriots. On top of that, it seems to have what might be adeveloping medical mystery of a dozen or so people exhibiting rapidly progressive Alzheimer’s-like symptoms.”
“Uh-oh,” Warren voiced. “That sounds like an irresistible clarion call for the Jack Stapleton I know. If there’s trouble to be had, he can find it. I’m glad I came.”
Jack laughed at Warren’s suggestion. “You’re giving me too much credit for finding trouble.”
“As I said on the phone, trouble seems to be your middle name,” Warren said facetiously.
