The discovery of the cause of the shrinking turns Scott Carey’s unexplained physical change into a specific, if extraordinarily unlikely, chain of exposure and biological effects. Laboratory analysis finds a new toxin in his system; questions about his past bring back a boat-spray incident; and the investigators conclude that radiation had transformed insecticide into a poison that steadily undermined his body’s capacity to maintain growth. Identifying the cause explains the process, but does not itself provide a cure.

The Investigation

The discovery emerges from a sustained medical search rather than a single obvious sign. Paper chromatography separates elements in Scott Carey’s body as they travel across paper, with each element staining a different area according to its specific gravity. The analysis reveals a new element in his system, identified as a new toxin. That finding changes the investigation’s direction: the problem is no longer only how to counteract the growth extract, but what substance is opposing it and where that substance came from.

The questions put to Scott Carey move from possibilities that can be ruled out toward an exposure he has not yet recalled. He is asked whether he encountered germ spray, including bacterial warfare, and then whether he was accidentally sprayed with a large amount of insecticide. At first, he has no clear memory to offer; the possibility produces only diffuse apprehension. The account thus presents recognition as delayed: the relevant experience is part of his past, but it does not initially appear in his mind as an explanation for his present condition.

Recalled Exposures

The first memory concerns Los Angeles, on a Saturday afternoon in July. Scott Carey had left home to go to a store and was walking through a tree-lined alley between rows of houses when a city truck turned in to spray the trees. The mist reached him, and he shouted at the driver. This incident gives the investigators a plausible exposure to insecticide, but they tell him it cannot, by itself, account for the shrinking. It is only the beginning of the explanation, not its solution.

As questioning continues, Scott Carey recalls a separate afternoon aboard a boat. Spray had washed over him there as well. This memory supplies the missing element: the boat spray had been impregnated with radiation. The two episodes therefore do not have interchangeable significance. The Los Angeles encounter establishes an earlier contact with ordinary insecticide, while the later boat incident brings the investigation to the exposure capable of explaining why the substance acted so abnormally. The cause becomes legible only when Scott Carey’s recollections are set beside the laboratory finding.

The Cause and Its Mechanism

The investigators identify the poison as insect spray hideously altered by radiation. The account stresses the exceptional conjunction required: a particular amount of insecticide and a particular amount of radiation had to reach Scott Carey’s system in a particular sequence and at a particular time. It is described as a one-in-a-million chance. The radiation dissipated quickly and became unnoticeable; the poison remained. That contrast helps explain why the cause was difficult to recognize: the exposure’s most unusual component left no continuing visible presence, while its effects persisted in the body.

The toxin did not destroy the pituitary gland. Instead, it progressively impaired the gland’s ability to maintain growth. The distinction matters to the explanation: the gland remains, but the process it regulates is steadily compromised. The poison also forces Scott Carey’s system to convert nitrogen into excess waste, and it affects creatinine, phosphorus, and calcium, leaving them to be discharged rather than retained in their normal role in the body.

The account connects those changes to the physical shrinking through the bones. As the poison decalcifies them, they become soft and pliant, able to shrink little by little. Meanwhile, administered hormone extract cannot reverse the process: the poison provokes antihormone action in direct opposition to the treatment. The shrinking is therefore not described as a sudden transformation or an isolated failure of one remedy. It is a continuing process driven by several connected effects, while the body’s attempted hormonal support is actively countered.

Consequences of the Discovery

Finding the toxin closes the search for what caused Scott Carey’s condition, but it leaves the practical question of treatment open. The investigators conclude that a toxin can be fought only with an antitoxin, and they send him home while they search for one that might save him. The discovery is consequently both an answer and a deferral: it gives the shrinking a causal account, but no immediate means of stopping it.

The wait for an antitoxin becomes a new interval of uncertainty. Scott Carey rents a post-office box so he can receive two or three deliveries a day instead of one, and makes repeated trips there for news. The routine gives the medical search a daily measure: although the cause has been identified, the possibility of treatment remains dependent on a remedy not yet found. In that sense, the explanation does not end the crisis. It clarifies what has happened to his body while leaving its future unresolved.