In The Shadow Of Mengele by Angharad Copyright © 2010 Angharad All Rights Reserved.

Raoul is a boy who came to Britain from Brazil in 1984.

The first thing everyone noticed about Raoul was how delicate he was as a boy, with very fine features verging on pretty. He’d come to live with his aunt after his mother had died from some horrible disease.

His aunt Rita had lived over here for many years having married and then divorced a London taxi driver. She was a beautiful woman and the resemblance to her nephew was striking.

How do I feature in this tale? I’m her GP and of course accepted her nephew on to my list when he came to live with her. Other than a cursory exam when he was registered there wasn’t a lot to be said about the boy other than his prettiness and I hoped he wouldn’t get into too many fights over it.

His previous medical history, which was somewhat fragmentary was he had an old post operative scar on his abdomen which was supposedly an emergency operation to remove a ruptured spleen. If that was the case it was done by a blind surgeon, because it ran all the way to his groin from his belly button and is nowhere near the spleen, which is under the ribs on the left side.

The boy seemed to have no ill effects so we never did anything about investigating it. The aunt suggested peritonitis, but this was again unlikely and incisions for gangrenous appendix aren’t long running scars but short horizontal ones. He had no problems with bladder or anything so, with the NHS motto of, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it, we left well alone.

Raoul seemed to settle in with his aunt and I didn’t see him again for another year, when he seemed to be disturbed by strange dreams. His English was very good for a ten year old and he was still stunningly beautiful–looks which were wasted on a boy.

On talking to his aunt, she explained that Raoul had been one of twins, obviously heterozygous, because the other had been a sister. She’d been killed in the same accident which had caused his operation to be done. They were about seven at the time.

The dreams were related to the crash and the loss of his sister and possibly the death of his mother. I referred them to the paediatric psychotherapist who apparently cleared things up.

When Raoul was coming up eleven he was brought to see me again. This time it was more confusing. He was growing breasts. Lots of boys have gynaecomastia, where they have one or both their breasts start to grow like girls do, and may even start to lactate, it usually sorts itself out and in any case nothing is done for several months other than reassurance.

His looks and shape were still more girl than boy and I began to look a bit harder. He had a penis, a very small one, his scrotum was tiny and I could feel no sign of testes and it wasn’t just breasts, this boy had a girl’s hips.

I did some bloods, and the results were a little worrying, he had the hormonal profile of a premenstrual female. I did a chromosome test, he was definitely XY. I sent him off to the local paediatrician.

The resulting phone call I had back was interesting to say the least.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Anne, it’s Peter Swain.”

“Hello, Pete, how are you?”

“Well, and yourself?”

“Yeah, now the divorce is over–pity we had to sell the house, but I’ve got a nice cottage now down by the river–you must come and see it, bring Mollie of course.”

“She’s off on one of her save the world trips, can’t remember where now–somewhere in bloody Africa, I expect, be back in three months. You know what she’s like.”

“I do indeed, Pete, look come for dinner one evening say Saturday or Sunday?”

“Sunday would be good, I’m on call Saturday.”

“Good, see you then.”

“Um–Anne?”

“Yes?”

“About this young Brazilian lad you sent me?”

“Oh Raoul Da Silver, what about him?”

“Somebody did something very clever and equally nasty to him.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know he’s turning into a female?”

“I know he’s very feminine, but he’s definitely XY.”

“Did you find any testes?”

“No, you know that, I put that in the referral.”

“I suspect he had some.”

“Had some, what are you saying?”

“Somebody took them.”

“Eh?” this was getting more and more bizarre.

“Yes, someone removed them.”

“When?” Then I remembered the scar down his belly.

“That’s not all.”

“What else did they take?”

“It isn’t what they took, it’s what they left behind–we did an ultrasound and then I managed to grab a free space with the MRI.”

“C’mon, Pete, cut the crap, tell me what you found?”

“He’s got a perfectly functioning pair of ovaries and womb.”

“What he’s intersexed–but he can’t be, his chromosomes are male.”

“These bits have been implanted, but they’re part of him.”

“So what are you saying, some person or persons unknown implanted girl’s bits in him after removing his male bits?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

“But I have no record of immune-suppressants being prescribed, which would surely be necessary?”

“You’d have thought so.”

“Hang on, he had a twin sister who died.”

“When?”

“I don’t have exact dates–you don’t think–oh my God.”

“What they took bits from the sister and popped them into–a bit death camp stuff isn’t it?”

“Yeah, but he’s from Brazil didn’t some of the Nazis end up there?”

“Yeah, didn’t Mengele or whatever his name was, end up there or in Paraguay.”

“Anne, the boy or should that be girl now?, mentioned something about a doctor, let me see my notes.” I waited while Peter flicked through sheets of paper. “Ah here we are, Dr Mengally, I thought he said–oh shit–what do we do now?”

“What indeed?” I said and felt a cold shiver run down my spine.

“Dr Weisenthal, are you busy?” called my receptionist through the door.