After almost 114 years, the mystery of the death of Hazel Drew, the 20-year-old girl whose case inspired the story of Laura Palmer, played by actress Sherilyn Fenn, at the center of the cult masterpiece "Twin Peaks", may finally have found a solution. by David Lynch and Mark Frost.

The mystery of Hazel Drew dates back to July 7, 1908, when a group of boys who were camping in Teal's Pond, a small town on the shores of Sand Lake, in New York State, saw the body of a young woman emerge from the waters of the lake. lass. Hazel Drew, in fact.

A death that shook the quiet local community and that was quickly filed as a suicide, despite the many obscure points left by the investigation conducted by the investigators of the time, from which came out, just like in Twin Peaks, not a few, disturbing details about the quiet provincial life which was not peaceful at all.

A new book by two authors and fans of the Lynch series, David Bushman and Mark Givens, just released in the US under the title "Murder at Teal's Pond", is dedicated to the story of Hazel Drew.

By analyzing documents and newspaper articles of the time, Bushman and Givens managed to reconstruct not only Hazel Drew's "secret" life, but also to formulate a precise hypothesis about her end: it was undoubtedly a murder.

The two authors found how the young woman, who had worked since the age of 14 as a waitress and housekeeper, had forged ties with the families of the most influential notables of the small community of Teal's Pond, a stronghold of the Republican party. And, working in their homes, she would have come into contact with a "cauldron of crime, sex and corruption." In this very reality she might have perhaps felt something that she shouldn't have or have made more intimate bonds than legitimate with some big shot, the which - if known - could have caused scandal.

So someone might have gotten it out of the way. And the authors of the book also mention two specific names: those of the embalmer at the local funeral home, a certain William Cushing, and of a friend of his, a leading figure in the local Republican party, Fred Schatzle.

To frame them, the testimony of a couple - William and Elizabeth Hoffay - who told police investigators investigating Drew's death that they saw, one of the nights preceding the discovery of the body, in the lake area, a suspicious wagon, with on board two men carrying something strange and who, meeting the couple, immediately turned around so as not to be recognized.

The detectives knew that Cushing had borrowed the wagon from Schatzle that night, but they never investigated the clue or bothered to ask the Hoffays to recognize the two suspects, by photo or live.

Just Cushing and Schatzle would be, for the authors of the book, the real killers. And they would act to protect themselves or some Republican party notable from a scandal by getting rid of poor Hazel who knew too much. All this - Bushman and Givens venture - with the protection of the police, who did not want to go through with it.

A disturbing story, full of question marks, set against the backdrop of the quiet and disturbing American province. The same one that, at the end of the Eighties, fascinated David Lynch and his friend and screenwriter Mark Forst, to the point of choosing to adapt it to make it one of the absolute masterpieces of the thriller genre.

(Unioneonline / lf)

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